Keeping in touch with Conter...
Coming to you every Monday. Podcasts, articles and analysis inside.
Dear subscribers..
Firstly, thank you to taking the time to join the Conter mailing list. As you will be aware, our use of Substack has been fairly erratic. This is something that we are going to be changing - starting from today. So, every Monday you will receive a digest of all our latest content, plus some notes on the big issues shaping the week ahead. From the latest articles on our website, to our regular podcasts and in-person events, you will be kept in the loop.
In addition, we will be posting full articles here too, with the aim of increasing the reach of our output. As historic events restructure the post-1945 world order, there is not shortage of topics. Marxist ideas and debates on socialist strategy are vital if we are to rebuild the left in a meaningful way. Internationally, and here in Scotland.
Conter is a contribution to that process, and we want to keep in touch with you throughout the journey. So, until next week, please find a review of our latest commentary and analysis.
From the site…
Struggling Universities In Scotland: Where Next?
“The UK Higher Education sector is facing significant problems. Over a third of HE institutions are running at a loss. Multiple universities have engaged in cost-cutting measures, including painful redundancy programmes. Several are teetering on the edge of bankruptcy. Scottish institutions, sometimes assumed to be partly insulated from the sharpest effects of the crisis, have followed suit. After Robert Gordon University in Aberdeen announced up to 135 jobs could be made redundant following a shortfall in student intake, Dundee University publicised a staggering £30 million deficit and job cuts.” Dr Jenny Morrison and and Dr Vladimir Unkovski-Korica on the crisis in Scottish universities.
Taking Liberties: Palestine Solidarity And The Right To Protest
“The erosion of democratic rights is not unique to Britain but reflects a broader trend among centrist governments in the West struggling to maintain a grip on their waning popularity. Macron’s France, Trudeau’s Canada, and Scholz’s Germany have all resorted to increasingly authoritarian measures to counter popular challenges.” Conter Editorial Board member and Stop the War Coalition Scotland national secretary, Sophie Johnson, on the attacks on Palestine solidarity.
Anti-Imperialism And Repression: Defending The Movement
“Gradually, successive British governments have accelerated a coordinated campaign of civic repression which aims to demobilise mass-political expression and limit the agency of the British public. Having promised “a politics that treads a little lighter on all of our lives”, Keir Starmer’s cabinet have inherited this project with renewed zeal. Using the long arm of the state to crackdown on popular dissent, Starmer hopes to minimise popular confrontation with his leadership – just as he and his allies did inside the Labour Party after 2019.” Monthly columnist Coll McCail on the history of anti-imperialism and repression.
Trump And The Multi-Polar Order
“Britain then in 2025 stands aside in bewilderment as the pre existing shift in the balance of power in world forces continue to gallop and gather apace. Our transition to a multi-polar world of China, Russia, the US and increasingly Turkey and India leaves a once powerful state even as closely as the early noughties rendered utterly irrelevant in most of the major conflicts facing the world today.” Monthly columnist Liam McLaughlan on Trump’s presidency and the world.
Understanding Trump’s New World Order
“We are entering a new historic era. We are leaving behind the era of globalisation and what the liberal political centre like to think of as the ‘rules-based international order’. This transition is as important as the transition from the welfare-state consensus of the post Second World War era to the neoliberal era that began with Reagan and Thatcher.” Author and socialist campaigner John Rees on the restructuring of the global system.
Patreon exclusive podcasts…
Troops in Ukraine: Scottish Politicians in Lockstep
Coll McCail and David Jamieson discuss Britain's lurch towards a more assertive military posture, and why Scottish First Minister John Swinney is eager to march along. How does renewed militarism dovetail with Scottish industry? What does Swinney expect to get from his loyalty to the US? Why can't commentators break from the idea they represent sense, even now their Ukraine policy has failed?
In conversation with Matt Kennard
While working for the Financial Times, investigative journalist Matt Kennard had unbridled access to the crème de la crème of the global elite. From slanging matches with Henry Kissinger to afternoon coffees with the man who captured Che Guevara, Kennard spent four years gathering extraordinarily honest testimony from the horse's mouth on how the global economic system works away from the convenient myths.
It left him with only one conclusion: the world as we know it is run by an exclusive class of American racketeers who operate with virtually unlimited weapons and money, and a reach much too close to home.
We speak to Matt about his investigations, the nature of US imperialism and his recent work on the Middle East.
Lindsey German: Palestine solidarity under attack
The MET police violently arrested Chris Nineham, a founding member of the Stop the War Coalition and Chief Steward on anti-war demonstrations in London for over 25 years. Ben Jamal, the Director of the well established Palestine Solidarity Campaign has also been charged with public order offences.
In addition, and quite incredibly, the former Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn MP and former Shadow Chancellor, John McDonnell MP, were called in to be interviewed by police under criminal caution after attending a Palestine demonstration. At least 70 others were arrested.
To discuss this, we spoke to Lindsey German, convenor of the Stop the War Coalition.
The Mass Psychology of the Palestinian Genocide
We spoke to Sabby Sagall, genocide scholar and author of 'Final Solutions: Human Nature, Capitalism and Genocide' about the political and psychological history of genocide in Palestine:
How does Israeli state ideology justify the dehumanisation of Palestinians?
How have the conditions of the state's birth and growth accelerated violence?
Where is the radicalisation of Israeli society heading?
How is western foreign policy proliferating the danger of extreme ethnic violence and hatred?
