International Viewpoint - online socialist magazine

Why is the British state so undemocratic

Piers Mostyn — 2014-11-09T06:45:56Z

The massive surge in support for Scottish independence in the recent referendum was motivated more by democratic than nationalist sentiment. It was an expression of long term working class alienation from the political decision-making process. The spur was a Tory-imposed austerity the Scots hadn't voted for, following years of disastrous warmongering, neo-liberal economic crisis and growing inequality.

- IV478 - November 2014 / Britain

News Corporation: crime, corruption and class rule

Piers Mostyn — 2011-07-16T14:09:01Z

In the last few years in Britain there have been major scandals concerning Members of Parliament â€” on expenses; banks â€” the buying out of failing banks by the government and yet enormous payments of salaries and bonuses to those responsible; and now in the media. On Thursday July the 7th, Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation announced that the 168-year old News of the World (one of the biggest-selling English-language Sunday newspapers in the world) would close down, thus creating over 200 job losses. This followed allegations that journalists and investigators had not only hacked into the mobile telephones of celebrities and Premier League footballers (considered fair game by a large section of the tabloid-reading public) but also of Millie Dowler, a thirteen-year old girl murdered in 2002, and families of British military killed in Afghanistan and Iraq. This swung public opinion firmly against the powerful media company whose top executives have been on close terms with leading British politicians on both sides for years. â€” IV

- IV438 - July 2011 / Britain

Britain 2010: Watershed Election

Piers Mostyn — 2010-04-03T14:48:46Z

The outcome of the British General Election may be looking less and less certain. With the media consensus that it's “time to give the opposition a chance” there's a temptation to maintain a sceptical distance. After all, the three main parties occupy the same political space, defined by spending cuts and war. But, argues PIERS MOSTYN, that would be a mistake.

- IV423 - April 2010 / Britain

Israel's new Lebanon war

Piers Mostyn — 2006-08-02T12:31:07Z

The USA and Britain have been steadfast in providing unconditional and uncritical support for Israel. This support for the deliberate mass murder of civilians has been transparently obvious to the whole world despite the paper-thin attempt to hide it behind the diplomatic nicety of “opposing an immediate ceasefire” or “the necessity of laying out the basis for a lasting peace”

- IV380 - July-August 2006 / Israel, Lebanon

No renewal for New Labour

Piers Mostyn — 2006-05-12T12:07:52Z

Labour did catastrophically in the May 6th local elections and seems on a spiral of decline. Meanwhile all three major parties are converging on the neoliberal centre-right, and more space is being opened up to their left and to their right.

- IV378 - May 2006 / Britain