Friday 8th August 2025

Opinion

The Encaenia is PR without the public (or anyone else)

Wholesale reform is the last thing Encaenia needs. If only people knew what it is, it would be a well-suited PR exercise for a modern Oxford.

This is how we combat the crusade against universities

It’s easy to think of an arts degree as a fruitless pleasure. But education and academic study are intrinsically valuable.

From pensioners to students, all should fear the Palestine Action ban

If you think this is a win for one side over the other in relation to Israel’s war on Gaza, be careful what you wish for.

Trashing rules save face, not students

Trashing is banned. But what does the banning achieve except pushing students further from...

General Motors’ stake in China’s Electric Vehicle market

"The Chinese government is, on the whole, more committed to the EV transition and they have promising start-ups. I forecast that China’s EV market will continue to lead global demand and there will be a rise of Chinese automakers." Gabriel Ng looks at the future of electric vehicles and General Motors' involvement in a burgeoning Chinese market.

The Next Giant Leap

"Developing nations just simply have seldom attempted things like this before, but these programs would be a good chance to set up governmental, industrial, and academic infrastructure that would place them at the frontier of development in space." Harry Chapman argues that the outlook for Thailand's new lunar programme is anything but negative and why developing nations participating in space exploration might be a better idea than it seems.

As a non-Zionist Jewish student, David Miller’s rhetoric harms me too

CW: antisemitism. If you asked me to sum up what I think of when considering my own Jewish identity, the images that would come to...

Navalny: A New Hope?

“Why are you still alive?” CBS news show 60 Minutes’ Lesley Stahl asked Alexei Navalny in 2017 as he was building momentum in Russia...

“There Is No Pandemic”: A First-Hand Insight into Oxford’s Anti-Lockdown Protest

"He agreed to talk to us, but only after insisting that we remove our face masks (“unless you’re undercover police”)."

A Return to the Roaring Twenties

Some modern writers however are predicting that the pandemic will have changed our attitudes towards intimacy forever. Some have even gone so far as to declare the death of the handshake and the hug. However the 1920s is not just renowned for a cultural revolution but also a sexual one.

Banglatown: why Brick Lane cannot fall victim to the gentrification of East London

The Truman development should not go ahead at any cost. Brick Lane is one of the many locations that make London such a diverse, vibrant and welcoming city. We cannot as a community or a country allow commercial profit and gain to take precedence over years of history that form part of a collective identity.

Valuing the Future-Present: How to be Taiwan

"By acknowledging that the future will eventually be the day we wake up to and the problems we encounter, we can make a greater conscious effort to make that future-present a better one."

It Can’t Happen Here … Again? The GOP After Trump

As tempting as it may be to simply move on from the Trump presidency, four cathartic years now over and the American republic redeemed, we ought not to look upon the political currents which swept the 45th President to power as mere spent forces never again to re-emerge.

In Praise of the UK’s Vaccine Rollout

I would argue that the vaccine rollout has been one of the few British successes to quietly emerge from the pandemic, primarily as the government has taken a step back and left it to non-partisan public bodies to head the process.

Why Social Media’s Donald Trump Ban Should Scare Us

"We must wrest back control of the internet so that incidents such as the silencing of Donald Trump can be enjoyed, not mired in suspicion."

Challenging the Myth of Brazil’s “Post-Racial” Society

"Attitudes towards racial identity in Brazil are more fluid, and so it is often harder to define discrimination in Brazil using our own standards. Race is a social construct, and Brazil makes this incredibly apparent as their attitudes towards defining race are so different from our own."

One Thing the Trump administration got right: U.S. foreign policy on CCP

In a rare display of bi-partisan agreement, Biden's nomination for Secretary of State has said he agrees with his predecessors conclusions on the Xinxiang atrocities. And atrocities they are.

What If Cummings Was Right?

"What if Cummings was right? What if Westminster really is an anachronism- enough to warrant such nutty behaviour and the entrance of such a nutty man? What if it is as hostile to diverse thinkers as he makes it out?"

So long, farewell: the UK’s decision to leave Erasmus

Like a parent disguising a plate of vegetables as a dessert, Johnson desperately promises, in true Trumpian fashion, a ‘bigger and better’ programme. See previous claims on a ‘world-beating’ track and trace scheme, if you need reminding of how boasts work out in this government.

The Punjabi Farmers Standing up for India’s Democracy

Photographs of the ongoing Indian farmer strikes have trickled through to social media feeds across the world, in stark contrast with the relative silence...

Northern Neglect: COVID-19 Restrictions and the North-South Divide

"In COVID-19 policy and beyond, the government continues to view the North as expendable, both politically and economically, putting lives and communities at stake."

Why 2020 Should Not Be Forgotten

Many want a Men in Black-style mind wipe that will erase the past year from our collective memory, only to be recalled 50 years down the line when a funky new virus dredges up the memories from the bottom of the dustbin. This, I think, is a mistake.

Capitol Riots: Putsch and Prejudice

'It is difficult to overstate the rage I feel against America’s right wing for allowing us to get to this point. Shame on Mitch McConnell. Shame on Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley. Shame on every Republican who acquitted Trump of impeachment charges. Shame on the entire Trump family and every single one of his enablers.

Opinion: On Scotland, Devolution, and The Labour Party

Unionism can only work if all nations are satisfied: a real regard for the Scottish people must be made. Such regard that is formed by compassion and a distribution of wealth, power and opportunity would ensure that this positive situation is not only made but sustained.

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