Dear IRR News subscriber,

Two weeks is a long time in politics. But as Liz Fekete shows in her overview of the culture wars engulfing Europe, the furore caused by MP Emily Thornberry’s tweet of a flag-decked house in Rochester will not be the last time that the question of a flag generates a media storm. The failure of mainstream politicians to protect black and Muslim representatives from loyalty discourses and patriotic tests, that are driving them out of public life, is highlighted in this comprehensive review. Nor can new migrants, subjected to tabloid vilification, draw much comfort from British Future’s new report analysing and interpreting data derived from opinion polls on attitudes to immigration, examined by Jon Burnett.

Britons reacting to the protests against police killings of black people in the US have little reason to feel smug about the situation in the UK, Harmit Athwal and Arun Kundnani explain, as they point to British black deaths in custody that have gone unexplained and unpunished. Hundreds of protesters also staged a ‘die-in’ in at London’s Westfield shopping centre this week, in solidarity with US protesters and drawing parallels with deaths in custody in the UK.  And the film Burn, by Migrant Media on the death of Mark Duggan and the events that followed, has just been released.

Our regular calendar of racism and resistance, a fortnightly resource for anti-racist and social justice campaigns, highlights key events in the UK and Europe.

And finally, the IRR is offering the DVD Struggles for Black Community for half price until the end of the month.

IRR News Team