David Hayes, editor, '9/11, Ten Years On: Reflections, openDemocracy, 7 September 2011 - my contribution: The great interruption The terrorist attacks on the United States on 11 September 2001 had a huge impact on world politics in the following decade, but they did not mark a fundamental change like the 1989-91 upheavals or 2011’s extraordinary… Continue reading The 9/11 Decade: The Great Interruption
Category: Global War on Terror
Mladic, bin Laden and the future of international justice
A new article on openDemocracy.
The Killing of Bin Laden: Revenge but not Justice
With the killing of Osama bin Laden, President Obama has achieved a much-needed conclusion to nearly ten years' efforts to bring the mastermind of 9/11 to heel. Obama claimed to bring bin Laden 'to justice'. But he managed this only in the sense that George Bush evoked in 2001, when he said that bin Laden… Continue reading The Killing of Bin Laden: Revenge but not Justice
The USA’s dangerous allies
draft of new contribution to openDemocracy Many on the left think of the United States as a dangerous force in world politics, a view encouraged by the aggressive interventionism of the Bush administration. Yet the juggernaut of US military power usually moves slowly, and after the disasters of Iraq and Afghanistan, probably with some caution.… Continue reading The USA’s dangerous allies
Iraq, war and WikiLeaks: the real story
After the war logs, my latest take (on openDemocracy) on the scale of, various causes of and responsibility for civilian casualties in Iraq in the seven years since the US-UK intervention.
Turn of the decade: the 2000s in historical perspective
My contribution to Open Democracy's 2010 forum.
From the archive: audio of my speech on 9/11
Speech at Sussex University, 17 October 2001.
Review of John Pilger, Paying the Price: The Killing of the Children of Iraq, 2000
review Paying the Price: The Killing of the Children of Iraq, ITV, 6 March 2000 John Pilger wrote and presented this new 90-minute documentary on Iraqi sanctions, shown on the most popular British channel within mass viewing hours. I was asked by BBC Radio 4's 'The Message' to discuss the programme, with Pilger and others,… Continue reading Review of John Pilger, Paying the Price: The Killing of the Children of Iraq, 2000
Leo Panitch, The New Imperial State, reviewed 2000
Martin Shaw Leo Panitch, The New Imperial State reply to article in New Left Review 2, 2000 Leo Panitch's 'The New Imperial State' is at once a welcome turn of Marxist theory towards the internationalized state, and disappointing in the limited nature of its advance. Although he rightly criticizes Peter Gowan for 'concentrating almost exclusively… Continue reading Leo Panitch, The New Imperial State, reviewed 2000
On Nick Cohen, the left and violence – letter to New Statesman, 19 Feb. 2007
John Kampfner is right to draw attention to the importance of the far-left starting point of Nick Cohen's political journey (Books, 12 February). Cohen rightly pinpointed the failure of the anti-war movement's leadership to see the Saddam regime - with its history of violence - as a problem that needed international action. Yet he himself… Continue reading On Nick Cohen, the left and violence – letter to New Statesman, 19 Feb. 2007
Martin Shaw 