Author Archives: Kenan Malik

HOPE AND FEAR IN A WORLD OF UNCERTAINTY

July 16, 2018 by Kenan Malik

This essay, on the meaning of hope, was my Observer column this week. It was published on 15 July 2018 under the headline ‘The Thai cave rescue was born of hope, an instinct that sustains and drives us’. Abandon all hope, ye who enter here.’ So reads the inscription above the entrance to Hell in Dante’s Inferno. There must have been times over the past two weeks when it might have seemed the inscription to the entrance to the Tham Luang […]

Categories: Human, Philosophy & Ethics, Politics • Tags: hope, human nature, seneca, thai cave rescue, tham luang caves, viktor frankl

SHOUTOUT FOR A RETURN TO OZ

July 13, 2018 by Kenan Malik

I am returning to Australia next April to give the keynote address at the Welcoming Cities conference in Brisbane. I’m looking forward greatly to coming back to Oz, and to Brisbane. I am open to speaking in other events and in other places, too. So, this is a shoutout – if you would like me to speak at an event in Australia in March/April 2019 do get in touch and hopefully we can arrange something. . The photo is […]

Categories: Kenan Malik

THE SUPREME COURT AND SOCIAL CHANGE

July 9, 2018 by Kenan Malik

This essay, on the debate about Donald Trump’s judicial pick for the Supreme Court, and what it tells us about the relationship between courts, democracy and social change, was my Observer column this week. (The column included also a short piece on an exhibition in Florence on the Islamic influence on European art.) It was published in the Observer, 8 July 2018, under the headline ‘The law, whether in the US or UK, can’t change society if we resist’. […]

Categories: International, Justice & Liberties, Philosophy & Ethics • Tags: democracy, donald trump, judicial activism, judicial system, justice, law, roe v wade, scotus, supreme court, usa

PLUCKED FROM THE WEB

July 6, 2018 by Kenan Malik

The latest (somewhat random) collection of recent essays and stories from around the web that have caught my eye and are worth plucking out to be re-read. . ‘It’s nothing like a broken leg’: why I’m done with the mental health conversation Hannah Jane Parkinson, Guardian, 30 June 2018 I will admit that I am not well. That writing this, right now, I am not well. This will colour the writing. But it is part of why I want to […]

Categories: Pandaemonium

A CRISIS THAT HAS LITTLE TO DO WITH MIGRATION

July 2, 2018 by Kenan Malik

This essay, on the drivers of the ‘migration crisis’, was my Observer column this week. (The column included also a short piece on tribalism in sport and politics.) It was published in the Observer, 1 July 2018, under the headline ‘Hostility to migrants is not born of rising numbers but a failure of hope’. Another migration crisis, another EU summit, another banal resolution. Last week’s gathering of EU leaders was dominated by the migration issue, and shaped by the different needs […]

Categories: International, Race & Immigration • Tags: bence sagvari, european union, fortress europe, immigration controls, migration, migration crisis, vera messing

A QUIET RAGE AGAINST APARTHEID

June 29, 2018 by Kenan Malik

‘My prime concern was with values – what did we value in South Africa, how did we get to those values and how did we express those values,’ David Goldblatt observed. ‘I was very interested in the events that were taking place in the country as a citizen but, as a photographer, I’m not particularly interested, and I wasn’t then, in photographing the moment that something happens. I’m interested in the conditions that give rise to events.’ David Goldblatt, who died […]

Categories: Justice & Liberties, Photos • Tags: apartheid, david goldblatt, photography, south africa

DEBATING HUMANS AND MACHINES

June 25, 2018 by Kenan Malik

This essay, on what the remarkable achievement of IBM’s ‘Project Debater’ tells us about the differences between humans and machines, was my Observer column this week. (The column included also a short piece on the persecution of the Roma.) It was published in the Observer, 24 June 2018, under the headline ‘Machines may beat us in debate, but will they ever have the human touch?’ So, a machine can now not only demolish you at chess or devastate you […]

Categories: Human, Philosophy & Ethics, Science • Tags: a1, Human, ibm, machine, meaning, project debater, semantic networks, social

PLUCKED FROM THE WEB #41

June 22, 2018 by Kenan Malik

The latest (somewhat random) collection of recent essays and stories from around the web that have caught my eye and are worth plucking out to be re-read. . No, it’s not a gig economy Doug Henwood, Jacobin, 8 June 2018 Despite the voluble testimony of pundits and bar companions, the world of work is not one of Uber drivers and temp workers. In fact, the share of US employment accounted for by contingent and ‘alternative’ arrangements is lower now than […]

Categories: Pandaemonium

WHAT DON’T WE TALK OF IN TALKING OF DIVERSITY?

June 18, 2018 by Kenan Malik

This essay, on the row between Lionel Shriver and Penguin Random House and on what we mean by ‘diversity’, was my Observer column this week. It was published in the Observer, 17 June 2018, under the headline ‘We’re now confusing diversity and equality. Which is our priority?’ What do we mean by diversity? And why is it good – or not? For all the myriad debates about diversity today, such questions are rarely addressed in any depth. The latest hoo-ha […]

Categories: Britain, Culture & Books, Race & Immigration • Tags: adolph reed, conservatism, david lammy, diversity, equality, immigration, inequality, lionel shriver, mslexia, oxford university, penguin random house, racism, sivanandan

THE CHURCHES OF KOSZEG

June 15, 2018 by Kenan Malik

Kőszeg is a small Hungarian town almost on the Austrian border. Its roots lie in the 13th century, and it is suffused with history, and full of architectural gems. Its churches are historically fascinating, being witness to shifting religious alliances and affiliations, and often strikingly beautiful. I did not, unfortunately, have the chance to visit many. The two here are St James’ Church, built at the turn of the 14th and 15th centuries supposedly from the remnants of a demolished […]

Categories: Photos • Tags: churches, hungary, koszeg, photography

LOOKING CLOSER TO HOME

June 11, 2018 by Kenan Malik

This is a transcript of my opening keynote talk at the ‘Dehumanising the Other’ conference at the CEU in Budapest. It was called ‘Looking Closer to Home: How mainstream politics paved the way for the demonization of migrants’. A shorter version of the talk was published as the Sunday essay in the Observer on 10 June 2018. In October 2013, a ship carrying migrants sank off the Italian island of Lampedusa. Some 300 people drowned. It was not the first […]

Categories: International, Politics, Race & Immigration • Tags: africa, britain, emmanuel macron, european union, far right, fortress europe, greece, immigration, italy, lesbos, liberalism, populism, racism, theresa may, victor orban, windrush generation

PLUCKED FROM THE WEB #40

June 8, 2018 by Kenan Malik

The latest (somewhat random) collection of recent essays and stories from around the web that have caught my eye and are worth plucking out to be re-read. . Centrists are the most hostile to democracy, not extremists David Adler, New York Times, 23 May 2018 The warning signs are flashing red: Democracy is under threat. Across Europe and North America, candidates are more authoritarian, party systems are more volatile, and citizens are more hostile to the norms and institutions of […]

Categories: Pandaemonium

THE DYING OF TRADE UNIONS

June 4, 2018 by Kenan Malik

This essay, on the crisis facing trade unions, was the main part of my Observer column this week. (The column included also a short piece on Roseanne and that tweet.) It was published in the Observer, 3 June 2018, under the headline ‘Unions are too vital to democracy to be allowed to gentrify and die’. Two reports last week exposed both the changing character of the labour market and the degree to which the power of the organised working class […]

Categories: Britain, Class • Tags: amazon, labour movment, precariat, strikes, trade unions, ucu, working class

NARCISSISM AND PHILIP ROTH

June 1, 2018 by Kenan Malik

This essay was first published in Göteborgs-Posten, 31 May 2018. ‘The epithet American-Jewish writer has no meaning for me’, Philip Roth once said. ‘If I’m not an American, I’m nothing.’ Since the American novelist’s death last week, there have been many fine eulogies to Roth, and to his place in the modern literary pantheon. Some critics have focused on his themes of Jewishness and sex, and with his obsession with himself. Others have looked upon his work as chronicling the […]

Categories: Culture & Books • Tags: american literature, american pastoral, goodbye columbus, i married a communist, identity politics, literature, misogyny, narcissism, novels, philip roth, portnoy's complaint, the american dream, the human stain, usa

POPULAR ANGER AND THE REPACKAGING OF POWER

May 28, 2018 by Kenan Malik

This essay, on the outcome of the Italian elections and the formation of the new government, was the main part of my Observer column this week. (The column included also a short piece on Chris Froome and the thrill of sport.) It was published in the Observer, 27 May 2018, under the headline ‘With no progressive force to give it shape, Italians’ anger has hit a wall’. ‘A political prime minister of a political government.’ So said Luigi Di Maio, […]

Categories: International, Politics • Tags: five star movement, forza italia, giuseppe conte, italy, left, lega, silvio berlusconi

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