Stunning successes for European extreme-Right and anti-immigrant parties, particularly in France and the Netherlands, have shocked mainstream political parties and led to a vigorous debate about what should be done. Now, new research from the Institute of Race Relations challenges Tony Blair’s hypothesis that Social Democratic parties in Europe must isolate the extreme-Right by tackling
Theme: Health
An unholy alliance? Racism, religion and communalism
For too long there has been a reluctance to discuss the issue of communalism in British Asian communities. Organised religious groups can be powerful forces and their critics are either accused of ‘washing dirty linen in public’ or denounced for a supposed disloyalty. When those who have spoken out have been women, the denunciations have
IRR expresses concern over excessive sentencing of Bradford rioters
The sentencing policy of the Bradford riot trials is meant to discipline an entire community, rather than reflect the severity of each individual’s actions. The riots that took place in Manningham, Bradford, over the weekend of 7 July, 2001, caused over a million pounds worth of damage and left hundreds of police officers injured. Over
The death of multiculturalism
The official response to the summer 2001 riots in the northern towns of the UK is now taking shape. December saw the publication of the Cantle report [1], titled Community Cohesion, which defines the government’s strategy for maintaining order in those towns. [2] At the same time, Home Secretary Blunkett announced that the government was
Blunkett expands prison-asylum complex
Asylum seekers in Britain are increasingly facing a system of imprisonment, detention and slave labour. Despite the government’s softer language on asylum at the Labour Party conference in September, when it feared a fight with the grassroots membership, more asylum seekers are being imprisoned. Then David Blunkett conceded that the practice of putting asylum seekers
The challenge of September 11
The events of September 11 and their aftermath, in terms of government policy, have thrown up a series of contradictions for anti-racists about freedom of expression, human rights, religion and Islam, in particular. CARF asked veteran campaigner and anti-imperialist writer A Sivanandan for some pointers. CARF: You have, for a long time, warned us against
Crimes of NASS
The Home Office and the Scottish Executive ordered civil servants to carry out a thorough review of the dispersal system. Its conclusions are expected any day. But will the racial violence that claimed the life of Firsat Dag be on the agenda? A safe haven? As Europe’s overall approach to asylum seekers gets ever harsher,
From Oldham to Bradford: the violence of the violated
From April to July 2001, the northern English towns of Oldham, Burnley and Bradford saw violent confrontations between young Asians and the police, culminating in the clashes of 7-9 July in Bradford in which 200 police officers were injured. The clashes were prompted by racist gangs attacking Asian communities and the failure of the police
The emergence of xeno-racism
A new racism directed at the displaced, the dispossessed and the uprooted ‘It is a racism that is not just directed at those with darker skins, from the former colonial territories, but at the newer categories of the displaced, the dispossessed and the uprooted, who are beating at western Europe’s doors, the Europe that helped
Poverty is the new black
The roots of this summer’s violence can be traced to the xenoracist culture of globalisation. Racism has always been both an instrument of discrimination and a tool of exploitation. But it manifests itself as a cultural phenomenon, susceptible to cultural solutions, such as multicultural education and the promotion of ethnic identities. Tackling the problem of