FIGHTING FIRE WITH FIRE: SOCIAL MEDIA, CELEBRITY, AND MIGRANT RIGHTS ACTIVISM IN ITALY

Posted on March 29, 2021 by Norwich Radical in Inter|national and tagged Aboubakar Soumahoro, activism, agriculture, campaign, cheap labour, digital media, Donald Trump, exploitation, featured, human rights, immigration, Italia, Italy, labour rights, mafia, migrant rights, politics, popular support, Salvini, social media, trade union, twitter.

CW: Murder, suicide, abuse

by Alessandra Arpaia

In recent years, Italy has undergone enormous internal change as a result of mass immigration from sub-Saharan African countries. The situation has been exploited and manipulated from every angle by the Italian media, politicians and organised crime gangs, fostering hostility towards migrant labourers as well as fuelling their exploitation. Right-wing political elites are adept at harnessing the power of social media to influence the masses; but this is a tactic that needn’t be irreplicable for social justice movements and activists on the Left, too.

SHELTERED, BUT NOT FROM MUCH: CLASS-BASED BARRIERS TO STUDENT HOUSING

Posted on September 19, 2020 by Norwich Radical in Student and tagged acorn, campaign, Community, coronavirus, covid, Covid-19, featured, guarantor, house, housing, international students, landlord, norwich, private accommodation, rent, social status, students, UEA, UEA SU, uk, university, University of East Anglia, working class.

by Kasper Hassett

This month, many returning university students are settling into house-shares in the private rental sector, as the first-year intake prepares to move into halls of residence shortly after. However, for students whose families live in poverty, there are a number of barriers to accessing rental homes, which have worsened this year due to the coronavirus pandemic, which has also constructed new obstacles to prevent poorer students from relying on campus accommodation.

THE GREEN PARTY CAN BECOME THE PARTY OF THE RADICAL LEFT IN WALES

Posted on October 18, 2018 by Norwich Radical in Inter|national, Perspectives and tagged campaign, elections, featured, green politics, Labour, leadership, left, Plaid Cymru, politics, radical, Wales, Wales Green Party.

By Chris Jarvis

Earlier this week, the race to crown the next leader of the Wales Green Party kicked off. Mirka Virtanen, Deputy Leader since 2017 was the first to declare her candidacy. Two other candidates were announced in an email to party members but, at the time of writing, neither have announced their candidacy publicly.

THE FATAL FLAW IN ECONOMICS FUNDING

Posted on December 19, 2017 by Norwich Radical in Student and tagged academics, bias, campaign, climate change, curriculum, department for education, economics, education, finance, financial crisis, funding, future, gender, higher education, inequality, Laura Bannister, learning, market, post-growth, quality of life, REF, reform, research, Rethinking Economics, students, teaching.

by REFunding Economics

As the old saying goes, ‘He who pays the piper calls the tune’. This week, a coalition of economics students, academics and campaigners gathered to get inside the piper-paying process – the funding of economics research – to create an economics fit for the real world.

THE 2017 PAPUA NEW GUINEA ELECTION: BAD LUCK?

Posted on November 2, 2017 by Norwich Radical in Inter|national and tagged campaign, corruption, elections, equality, farce, fraud, Human Rights Watch, international, minorities, Papua New Guinea, Parliament, Peter O'Neill, PNG, police, student, student activism.

by Maud Webster

The 2017 Papua New Guinea election was fraught with allegations, violence and anger. Yet the object of the disquiet – Peter O’Neill – was still re-elected as Prime Minister. He represents the People’s National Congress Party, which has been rising rapidly in popularity over the past couple of decades. In 2002, they were in opposition with two votes, but entered government in 2007. Now, they hold twenty-seven. O’Neill has held the position since 2011 and just about holds it still, by obtaining support from minor parties and scrabbling together support for his party’s re-election. Following coalition discussions, his vote support margin stood at sixty votes to forty-six.

The election itself was blighted by disorganisation and electoral roll irregularities, in addition to initial dissatisfaction with O’Neill’s first term. Voters expressed concerns about the chaotic economy, rife with extensive borrowing. Whilst statistics show growth in GDP, growth has dropped from 13.3% in 2014 to a mere 2% in 2016.

The election itself was an appalling farce. Continue Reading

REFLECTIONS ON #METOO FROM A TIRED SURVIVOR

Posted on October 28, 2017 by Norwich Radical in Perspectives and tagged #metoo, #SolidaritynotSilence, activism, activist spaces, ally, Alyssa Milano, attack, awareness raising, BME, campaign, detailed accounts, domination, Donald Trump, Ebony, facebook, gendered violence, Harvey Weinstein, hashtag, hashtag activism, legal systems, liberalisation, masculinity, me too, organisation, patriarchy, perpertrator, pervasive, power, practical steps, rape, sexual assault, sexual harassment, sexual violence, social media, structural issues, Survivor, Tarana Burke, toxic, transaction, triggering, university, victims, women, workplace.

by Anonymous

Content warning: mentions sexual violence, abuse, sexual harassment, rape, domestic abuse and violence

Last week saw the hashtag #MeToo achieve viral success, following the accusations multiple women made again Hollywood director Harvey Weinstein. The hashtag started when actress Alyssa Milano, tweeted “If all the women who have been sexually harassed or assaulted wrote ‘Me too’ as a status, we might give people a sense of the magnitude of the problem”.

The next week, social media was bombarded with personal account of sexual harassment, abuse, rape, assault and domestic violence. Famous celebrities talked about their experiences and within 24 hours, Facebook reported that 4.7 million people engaged with the #MeToo hashtag with over 12 million posts and comments. Most of the media’s reaction has been positive – finally we are acknowledging that sexual violence is a pervasive problem rather than a few isolated incidents, they say.Continue Reading

IGNITING STUDENT ACTIVISM #2 – ESCALATION

Posted on August 17, 2017 by Norwich Radical in Student and tagged activism, activismd, campaign, campus, compromise, direct actione, escalation, goal, group, group work, Igniting Student Activism, news media, occupation, plan campaign, social media, student, student activism, university.

by Bradley Allsop and Calum Watt

Rarely in our lifetimes has there been a more exciting time for young people to engage in politics. Change is in the air and nowhere else offers more opportunities to engage in this conversation, to learn valuable skills and to help shape society than university campuses. This series of articles seeks to offer some guidance for those aiming to ignite student activism at their institutions. Drawing on our experiences as campaigners we hope to highlight some common challenges and give you some advice on how to combat them.

The first article in this series looked at early steps of any campaign: doing your research, setting your goals, getting the message out there and beginning to grow your movement. This time we’ll be taking a look at some of the issues that occur as you begin to develop as a group.Continue Reading

TURNING THE TIDE ON THE “WORRY TREND” OF JOURNALISM IN BRITAIN

Posted on May 2, 2017 by Norwich Radical in Arts, Inter|national and tagged action, arts, Benjamin Franklin, campaign, democracy, election, espionage, fake news, free press, government, investigative journalism, journalism, law, legal defence fund, media, MSM, news, opinion, petition, press, Reporters Sans Frontieres, Reporters Without Borders, security, theresa may, tony blair, World Press Freedom Index.

by Richard Worth

You might have seen the worrying news that Britain has slipped further down the World Press Freedom Index. This index, monitored by Reporters Sans Frontiéres, rates the freedoms (duh) of the press to report what they like without fear of governmental repercussions. For a breakdown of why Britain is doing so poorly, take a look at the RSF website.

A brief summary is that our governments (those loveable scamps) are trading off the freedom of the press for national security. What’s worse is that there is a potential new law on the horizon that would allow journalists to be treated and sentenced as spies in cases of leaked information. After all, these are the “enemies of the people”. Though this absurd bit of legislation has been temporarily halted, there is serious concern that, much like Tony Blair, it could return and ruin everything.Continue Reading

DO WE LIVE IN A DEMOCRACY?

Posted on March 28, 2017 by Norwich Radical in Perspectives and tagged business, campaign, capitalism, ceo, consensus, corporate sponsor, democracy, economics, equality, flaw, governance, government, horse and sparrow, influence, linguistics, nation, opposition, plutocracy, plutocratic state, political commentary, political influence, political power, political theory, pressure, regulation, system, trickled down.

by Richard Worth

Depending on how you feel, questioning whether we live in a democracy is either incredibly stupid or incredibly scary. In a democracy, every member who is eligible helps to decide how they are governed. Essentially everyone has the same voting power, the same level of influence over government, and the same means of expressing that influence.

But in reality this is an idealised version of democracy. In truth, we admit that there simply isn’t time for us to all have a say in every matter that affects us. Instead we elect officials who more or less represent what we want; accepting that they may stand for a few policies that we don’t agree with but we take the rough with the smooth. After all, the nature of democracy means one doesn’t get their choice every time. It’s the nation’s consensus.Continue Reading

SISTERS ARE DOING IT FOR THEMSELVES – SISTERS UNCUT, YARL’S WOOD AND DIRECT ACTION

Posted on November 30, 2016 by Norwich Radical in Inter|national and tagged anti austerity, austerity, campaign, campaigning, cuts, direct action, disabled people against cuts, domestic abuse, domestic violence, grassroots, immigration, international, intersectional feminism, intersectionality, london radical housing network, migration, Movement for Justice, non-violent direct action, nvda, student rent strikes, Yarl's Wood.

TW: Violence against women, domestic abuse, rape

By Abbie Mulcairn

The debate over the effectiveness of ‘traditional’ forms of campaigning like phone banking, door knocking, compared with ‘direct’ actions like demonstrations, protests and occupations, is long-running, but ultimately counter-productive. As part of this debate, direct action is often attacked for ignoring or speaking over the voices of ‘ordinary people’, or for having little impact in the ‘real world’.

campaign

THE GREEN PARTY CAN BECOME THE PARTY OF THE RADICAL LEFT IN WALES

THE FATAL FLAW IN ECONOMICS FUNDING

THE 2017 PAPUA NEW GUINEA ELECTION: BAD LUCK?

TURNING THE TIDE ON THE “WORRY TREND” OF JOURNALISM IN BRITAIN

SISTERS ARE DOING IT FOR THEMSELVES – SISTERS UNCUT, YARL’S WOOD AND DIRECT ACTION

Support the Radical

Subscribe

Share this:

Like this:

by Kasper Hassett

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Support the Radical

Subscribe