Author Archives: Kenan Malik

SUELLA BRAVERMAN AND THE PROBLEMS OF MULTICULTURALISM

October 4, 2023 by Kenan Malik

This essay, on the real problems with multicultuiralism, was my Observer column this week. It was published on 1 October 2023, under the headline “Suella Braverman’s bigoted attack on multiculturalism shouldn’t blind us to its problems”. “Has multiculturalism failed?” It is a debate that raged a decade ago but had seemed to have faded into the political background in recent years. Until, that is, the home secretary, Suella Braverman, attempted to light the fires again, in a speech she gave last week to the […]

Categories: Britain, Multiculturalism, Race & Immigration • Tags: diversity, free speech, identity politics, multiculturalism, racism, suella braverman, white identity

CLASS IDENTITY AND CLASS AWARENESS

September 27, 2023 by Kenan Malik

This essay, on the changing attitudes of the working class, was my Observer column this week. It was published on 24 September 2023, under the headline “Forty years ago, class defined us in Britain. Now it’s we who define our class”. A liberal elite out of touch with the conservative instincts of the British people. A political realignment defined by an electorate more culturally conservative but economically leftwing. A working class hostile to liberal norms, especially on immigration. It is a picture […]

Categories: Britain, Class • Tags: british social attitudes, class boundaries, immigration, inequality, social conservatism, social liberalism, working class

EXPLOITERS DON’T CARE ABOUT RACE OR CULTURE

September 20, 2023 by Kenan Malik

This essay, on what a protest at a Peckham shop tells us about race and class in contemporary Britain, was my Observer column this week. It was published on 17 September 2023, under the headline “What a brawl in a Peckham shop tells us about race and class in Britain today”. A customer demands a refund on goods she bought but no longer wants. The shop owner refuses, offering a credit note instead. The customer grabs other goods, apparently in recompense. The […]

Categories: Britain, Class, Race & Immigration • Tags: blacks and asians, ethnic divisions, peckham, peckham shop protest, race and class

MORALITY AND THE DECLINE OF CHRISTIAN FAITH

September 13, 2023 by Kenan Malik

This essay, on the relationship between Christianity and morality, was my Observer column this week. It was published on 10 September 2023, under the headline “Our retreat from Christianity doesn’t mean we’ve lost our sense of morality“. A shape less recognisable each week,A purpose more obscure. I wonder whoWill be the last, the very last, to seekThis place for what it was… So mused Philip Larkin in his 1954 poem “Church Going”, about a visit to an empty church, to take its […]

Categories: Atheism & Religion, Britain, Philosophy & Ethics • Tags: anglicanism, christianiaty, churches, immigration, linda woodhead, moral decline, philip larkin

TO OPPOSE BIGOTRY, OPPOSE BLASPHEMY LAWS

September 6, 2023 by Kenan Malik

This essay, on the need to oppose blasphemy laws, was my Observer column this week. It was published on 3 September 2023, under the headline “Blasphemy law is no answer to bigotry in the wake of Denmark’s Qur’an burnings“. Should governments ban the “improper treatment of objects of significant religious importance to a religious community”? That is what the Danish government is suggesting in a new law it announced last week that could see offenders imprisoned for two years. The proposed ban comes after […]

Categories: Atheism & Religion, Free Speech, International, Philosophy & Ethics • Tags: anti-muslim hatred, blasphemy, blasphemy laws, bookburning, censorship, denmark, far right, islam, qur'an, qur'an descration

ALL WORKERS SHOULD POSSESS EQUAL EMPLOYMENT RIGHTS

August 30, 2023 by Kenan Malik

This essay, on the need for “single status” for workers, was my Observer column this week. It was published on 27 August 2023, under the headline “Labour’s backtracking on casual workers will weaken the rights of all employees”. If you have a job, are you a worker or an employee? In everyday conversation, it is a distinction without meaning, and the two are usually taken to be synonymous and used interchangeably. In British law, though, workers and employees form discrete categories. Legally, […]

Categories: Britain, Class • Tags: angela rayner, employment rights, gig economy, labour party, minimum wage, single status, workers rights

WORKING CLASS SONG

August 23, 2023 by Kenan Malik

This essay, on Oliver Anthony and the decayed tradition of working class protest song, was my Observer column this week. It was published on 20 August 2023, under the headline “The protest song that’s taken America by storm hits too many false notes”. There is mean things happening in this landOh the rich man boasts and bragsWhile the poor man goes in ragsThere is mean things happening in this land So runs the opening verse of John Handcox’s classic 1930s song “There […]

Categories: Class, Culture & Books • Tags: john handcox, liberal elite, oliver anthony, protest songs, rich men north of richmond, trade unions, working class, working class song

WAITING TO BE ARRESTED AT NIGHT

August 20, 2023 by Kenan Malik

This review of Tahir Hamut Izgil‘s Waiting to be Arrested at Night: A Uyghur Poet’s Memoir of China’s Genocide was published in the Observer on 13 August 2023 A group of Uyghur friends are having a late-night chat. “I wish the Chinese would just conquer the world,” one says suddenly. “Why do you say that?” another asks, surprised. “The world doesn’t care what happens to us,” the first man replies. “Since we can’t have freedom anyway, let the whole world taste subjugation. […]

Categories: Culture & Books, International • Tags: china, tahir hamut izgil, uyghurs

ON BECOMING A WOKE VILLAIN

August 16, 2023 by Kenan Malik

This essay, on how I became the centre of a minor controversy by speaking to civil servants, was my Observer column this week. It was published on 13 August 2023, under the headline “How I became a ‘woke’ villain with treacherous views too heretical for civil servants’ ears”. When I speak to civil servants next month about my book Not So Black and White, it will be, according to former home secretary Priti Patel, “an extraordinary betrayal of the voters who elected us to […]

Categories: Free Speech, Kenan Malik • Tags: censorship, civil service, dan kaszeta, immigration, priti patel, steven edginton

THE WARFARE OF THE CRADLE

August 9, 2023 by Kenan Malik

This essay, on the new conservative natalism, was my Observer column this week. It was published on 6 August 2023, under the headline “Conservative calls for women to have more babies hide pernicious motives”. “I’ve done my bit by having six children, so now you do yours”, Jacob Rees-Mogg demanded of GB News viewers recently. Not so long ago, politicians were panicking about overpopulation. Now many worry that there are – or will be – too few people in the world. “There is […]

Categories: History, Politics, Women • Tags: benefit sanctions, conservatism, falling birthrates, giorgia meloni, identity politics, immigration, miriam cates, muslims, natalism, national conservatives, racial science, racism, theodore roosevelt, two child benefit limit, victor orban, white decline

SEEPING INTO THE MAINSTREAM

August 2, 2023 by Kenan Malik

This essay, on how far-right ideas seep into mainstream even if far-right parties lose in elections, was my Observer column this week. It was published on 30 July 2023, under the headline “The far right don’t need to win elections to spread their malign ideas”. The Spanish elections last week did not unfold as many had predicted. The coalition of the centre-right People’s party and the far-right Vox failed in its bid for power, largely because the Vox vote plummeted, while the incumbent […]

Categories: International, Politics • Tags: afd, brexit, brothers of italy, european way of life, eurowhiteness, far right, giorgia meloni, hans kundnani, marine le pen, viktor orban, vox

THE SAUDIS PLAYING A GAME LONG ESTABLISHED

July 26, 2023 by Kenan Malik

This essay, on Saudi sportswashing, was my Observer column this week. It was published on 23 July 2023, under the headline “Saudis don’t need the money that flows in modern sport, but they do crave the kudos”. Jordan Henderson has been captain of Liverpool FC for eight years. He is a senior member of the England squad. He has been one of the most a vocal champion of LGBT rights within football. “I do believe when you see something that is clearly […]

Categories: International, Sport • Tags: football, gay rights, hypocrisy, jamal khashoggi, jordan henderson, lgbt rights, mbs, premier league, saudi arabia, sportswashing

THE AMBIGUITIES OF MILAN KUNDERA

July 19, 2023 by Kenan Malik

This tribute to Milan Kundera was published in the Observer on 16 July 2023, under the headline “It’s in Milan Kundera’s ambiguities and contradictions that we find his truths”. The novelist, Milan Kundera once observed to fellow-writer Philip Roth, “teaches the reader to comprehend the world as a question”. He feared that in a world in which people “prefer to judge rather than to understand, to answer rather than ask… the voice of the novel can hardly be heard over the noisy […]

Categories: Culture & Books • Tags: central europe, europe, european, milan kundera, national identity

FRANCE AND AMERICA, RACE AND RACISM

July 12, 2023 by Kenan Malik

This essay, on the different approaches of France and America to issues of race and racism, was my Observer column this week. It was published on 9 July 2023, under the headline “France has been laissez-faire on race, the US proactive. Clearly, neither of them has it right”. Should public policy be “race conscious” or “colour blind”? Should it target the specific inequalities faced by minority groups or treat all citizens equally without any reference to individuals’ racial and cultural backgrounds? The […]

Categories: International, Justice & Liberties, Race & Immigration • Tags: affirmative action, assimilationism, black middle class, black working class, france, identity politics, inequality, multiculturalism, nahel merzouk, racism, universalism, usa, william julius wilson

TALKING NOT SO BLACK AND WHITE

June 29, 2023 by Kenan Malik

I have been taking part in a number of podcasts and interviews, talking about the themes of Not So Black and White. Below are three of my most recent ones, focussing mostly on the issues of race and class. The We Society podcast with Will Hutton The Popular Show podcast with James Smith ABC’s Late Night Live interview with Philip Adams Interview with Philip Adams

Categories: Kenan Malik, Not so Black and White