British Society

When Britannia Ruled the Waves Gerry Hassan Scottish Review, October 22nd 2014 The act of sailing has long been one of the ways humans have tested themselves, measuring their endurance, reflecting on life and its meaning, from Ernest Hemingway to Jonathan Raban’s ‘Coasting’, an account of sailing round Britain at the time of the Falklands war. The experience of cruising in pleasure boats, ocean liners and luxury ships is a very different world. One filled with images of a mix of ‘Casino Royale’ and Monte Carlo stereotypes, rich playboys, people gambling and endless hedonism. The reality is a bit different

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The Battle for Britain and Daring to Believe We Can Do Better Gerry Hassan The Scotsman, January 11th 2014 In the last couple of weeks, two visions of Britain have been articulated. Both are clear, concise, utterly sure of themselves and the justice of their case, and both are equally partial. One is Tory MEP Daniel Hannan’s notion of a free floating, buccaneering, outward looking UK, which would slip its moorings with the European Union and reposition itself in new waters – mixing the English speaking world of the Anglosphere with re-establishing old connections with the Commonwealth and new ones

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The Unions of the United Kingdom are Changing Gerry Hassan The Scotsman, October 26th 2013 This week the British media turned its attention to the christening of the Royal Baby with the headlines ‘Gorgeous George’, continued its obsessions with who said what and apologised for what in ‘Plebgate’, and allowed for an occasional airing of the issue which rocked Scotland: the potential closure of Grangemouth petrochemical plant. Such coverage shows the growing divergence between the London media and political world and the concerns of Scotland, but a small part of the thoughtful English media turned its attention to the implications

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The Dangers of the Right-Wing Revolutionaries in the UK and US Gerry Hassan The Scotsman, October 13th 2013 The world as we know it stands on the brink of extinction. It could literally come to an end next Thursday on October 17^th. This is not some Nostradamus style prediction but the stand-off between Democrats and Republicans in the US over whether to raise the debt ceiling. There have already been two weeks of the US shutdown with numerous levels of government inactive. There have been no food inspections or publically funded medical drug trials, while 800,000 government employees remain furloughed.

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The UK is not skint – it is a playground for the rich and privileged Gerry Hassan The Scotsman, September 21st 2013 It has been Scotland’s week in the news with British and world media flocking north to cover the story of one year to the referendum. Such coverage paints a particular Scottish story by necessity and tends to leave the wider picture of what has changed and what needs to change at a British level. The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is a strange land; not technically a nation but a state. It is a unique

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What happens after the demise of ‘the Holy Trinity’ of Britishness? Gerry Hassan The Scotsman, August 17th 2013 It has been a week of momentous events. The unfolding Egyptian tragedy, the restarting of Palestinian-Israeli peace talks, and in our corner of the world, the first Scotland v. England match in over a decade. It feels inappropriate and insensitive to mention a mere football match in the company of such historic events. Yet, I think with that caveat the game mattered because it offered a glimpse of future possible arrangements. Two neighbours and friends with a rich, shared history, but who

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Britain – no longer the land of the future, but one living in the past Gerry Hassan The Scotsman, July 27th 2013 Once upon a time many years ago, like many other Scots, I believed in Britain. Britain seemed the future: it had appeal, appeared modern, progressive and full of promise. That now seems a world away from the Britain of today: one which looks to have given up on the future and instead appears content to live permanently in a fictitious past. This is the fantasyland Britain we see before us this week - of a society, culture and

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Britain has become an Unequal and Unfair Society Gerry Hassan The Scotsman, July 13th 2013 Britain has been mired by scandal this week: MPs proposed pay rise, BBC Executive payouts, and the controversy of G4S and Serco engaging in corporate abuse of power. Yet through all this people tell themselves that one of the central characteristics of being a civilised country is progressive taxation and the degree to which we successfully redistribute resources from those who have the most to those who have the least. This week the Office for National Statistics (ONS) released figures which showed what many have

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On Living in an Old Country: The Power of the Past after Thatcher Gerry Hassan The Scotsman, April 15th 2013 The last week has effectively been an elegy on Britain’s recent past and present rolled into one. This is not just about Thatcher, but the numerous references to the Churchill and Attlee funerals and how we marked these past titans. Is this who we really were, we ask with curiosity? Are we still that same people who dreamed dreams, stood alone against the Nazis, and built a welfare state, we ask, with a hint of anxiety? Britain seems increasingly a

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Four Nations and a Funeral: The Demise of the British Welfare State Gerry Hassan The Scotsman, March 30th 2013 The British welfare state is meant to be one of the ties that bind us together; along with the NHS and the BBC representing our common strands of citizenship. Each has been remarkably eroded in recent years but on Monday April 1^st huge changes will occur in the first two - the welfare state and NHS in England – which will have massive consequences for hundreds of thousands of people up and down this country already hard pressed and vulnerable, and

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