The human body, it turns out, is surprisingly good at making stone.
Give it enough time and the right conditions and it will go about crystallising minerals, hardening secretions and, in rare cases, turning tragedy into rock. Gallstones. Kidney stones. Tonsil stones. Salivary stones. And, in one of the strangest and saddest corners of medical history, stone babies.
In the second episode of The Conversation’s Strange Health podcast, we take a tour through the stony side of human anatomy and ask why this keeps happening, where these stones form and which ones you actually need to worry about.
Strange Health explores the weird, surprising and sometimes alarming things our bodies do. Each episode takes a bodily mystery or viral health claim and traces it back to anatomy, chemistry and evidence, drawing on researchers with first-hand experience of these processes. Some discoveries are not ideal mealtime material.
This episode’s guide is Adam Taylor, professor of anatomy at Lancaster University and long-time contributor to The Conversation. Taylor has spent years studying stones in both everyday and extraordinary contexts, including a rare genetic condition called alkaptonuria. In people with this condition, the body cannot properly break down certain proteins, leading to blackened cartilage, dark urine and an unusually high risk of stone formation throughout the body. It is exactly as unsettling as it sounds.
Stones, Taylor explains, form when substances that normally stay dissolved stop behaving themselves. Calcium, phosphate, uric acid and one of the building blocks of protein called cysteine can all crystallise if conditions are right. Once a few molecules stick, more follow. The process snowballs. Over time, a stone appears.
Kidney stones and gallstones are the most familiar examples, and among the most painful. Their jagged crystal edges scrape delicate tissues, trigger spasms and cause bleeding as the body desperately tries to force them through narrow ducts never designed for sharp objects. Larger stones can block urine flow entirely, damaging the kidneys and, if left untreated, causing serious harm.
Smaller stones can form elsewhere. Tonsil stones develop when food debris, bacteria and dead cells collect in the crevices of the tonsils and harden. Salivary stones can form when ducts become blocked by bacteria or foreign material, sometimes something as mundane as a stray toothbrush bristle. These stones are rarely dangerous, but they are often unpleasant, painful and, judging by social media, irresistibly watchable when removed.
Then there are stone babies, or lithopedions. In extremely rare cases, a pregnancy that cannot continue is not expelled from the body. Instead, the immune system encases the remains in calcium, effectively mummifying them to prevent infection. Some have been discovered decades later, only after death.
What unites all of these stones is not toxins or detoxing, but chemistry and fluid balance, and sometimes bad luck. Taylor stresses that dehydration is one of the biggest risk factors. When fluids slow down, materials that are normally carried in fluid begin to solidify. Stones follow.
Listen to Strange Health to understanding why solid things form inside something that is mostly water, and why some stones are medical emergencies while others are just deeply, memorably gross. You have been warned about watching while eating.
Strange Health is hosted by Katie Edwards and Dan Baumgardt. The executive producer is Gemma Ware, with video and sound editing for this episode by Sikander Khan. Artwork by Alice Mason.
In this episode, Dan and Katie talk about a social media clip from tonsilstonessss on TikTok.
Listen to Strange Health via any of the apps listed above, download it directly via our RSS feed or find out how else to listen here. A transcript is available via the Apple Podcasts or Spotify apps.
Katie Edwards works for The Conversation.
Adam Taylor and Dan Baumgart do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
A new trade agreement between India and the UK is due to come into force this year.
The deal is expected to completely remove tariffs from nearly 99% of Indian goods, including clothing and footwear, that are headed for the UK.
In both countries, this has been widely celebrated as a win for economic growth and competitiveness. And for Indian garment workers in particular, the trade agreement carries real promise.
This is because in recent years, clothing exports from India have declined sharply as well-known fashion brands moved production to places like Morocco and Turkey, which were cheaper.
India’s internal migrant workers (those who move from one region of the country to another looking for work) have been hit hardest, often waiting outside factories for days for the chance of a single shift of insecure work.
Against this backdrop, more opportunities for steadier employment and a more competitive sector under the new trade agreement looks like a positive outcome. But free trade agreements are not merely economic instruments – they shape labour markets and working conditions along global supply chains.
So, the critical question about this trade deal is not whether it will generate employment in India – it almost certainly will – but what kind of employment it will create.
Few sectors illustrate this tension more clearly than the manufacture of clothing. As one of India’s biggest exports, its garments sector is expected to be one of the primary beneficiaries of the trade deal.
But it is also among the country’s most labour-intensive and exploitative industries. From denim mills in Karnataka to knitwear and spinning hubs in Tamil Nadu, millions of Indian workers receive low wages and limited job security.
Research also shows that gender and caste-based exploitation is widespread.
So, if the trade deal goes ahead without addressing these issues, it risks perpetuating a familiar cycle where we see more orders and more jobs, but the same patterns of unfair wages, insecurity and – in some cases – forced labour.
Marginalised
For women workers, who form the backbone of garment production in India, these vulnerabilities are even sharper.
Gender-based violence, harassment and unsafe working conditions have been documented repeatedly across India’s export-oriented factories. Regimes which bound young women to factories under the promise of future benefits that often never materialised show how caste- and gender-based discrimination have long been embedded within the sector.
Even in factories that formally comply with labour laws, wages that meet basic living costs remain rare. Many workers earn wages which are not enough to pay for housing, food, healthcare and education, pushing families into debt as suppliers absorb price pressures imposed by global brands.
On the plus side, the India-UK agreement does not entirely sidestep these issues. There is a chapter which outlines commitments to the elimination of forced labour and discrimination.
But these provisions are mostly framed as guidance rather than enforceable obligation. They rely on cooperation and voluntary commitments, instead of binding standards.
While this approach is common in trade agreements, it limits this deal’s capacity to drive meaningful change. But perhaps even more striking is what has been left out.
Despite the role India’s social stratification system, known as caste, plays in shaping labour markets in India, it is entirely absent from the text of the agreement.
Yet caste determines who enters garment work and who performs the most hazardous and lowest-paid tasks. A significant proportion of India’s garment workforce comes from marginalised caste communities with limited bargaining power and few alternatives.
By addressing labour standards without acknowledging caste, the free trade agreement falls short. It could have required the monitoring of issues concerning caste and gender, and demanded grievance mechanisms and transparency measures that account for social hierarchies.
Instead, a familiar gap remains between commitments to “decent work” on paper and the reality which exists on factory floors.
Missed opportunity
If the India-UK deal is to be more than a tariff-cutting exercise, protections around caste and gender must be central to its implementation.
The deal is rightly being celebrated in both countries as an economic milestone. For the UK, it promises more resilient supply chains and cheaper imports. For India, it offers renewed export growth and the prospect of some more stable employment.
But the agreement’s long-term legitimacy will rest on whether it also delivers social justice.
India can use the deal to strengthen labour protections and ensure growth does not come at the cost of dignity and safety. The UK, as a major consumer market, can use its leverage to insist on enforceable standards for fair wages and decent work.
For trade deals do not simply move goods across borders – they shape the conditions under which those goods are produced.
Pankhuri Agarwal receives funding from the Leverhulme Trust as an Early Career Research Fellow.
En France, un grand emprunt pourrait-il sauver la situation financière de l’État ? D’un côté, un endettement qui ne cesse de croître, de l’autre, des ménages qui épargnent toujours plus. Et si la solution était de demander aux seconds de financer plus ou moins volontairement le premier. Sur le papier, l’idée semble alléchante d’autant que le grand emprunt occupe une place particulière dans l’imaginaire français. Tentant lorsque l’épargne des ménages est une mesure de précaution pour se protéger des conséquences de l’endettement du secteur public.
Quant à la dette publique, partie de 20 % du PIB en 1980, dernière année d’équilibre des comptes publics, elle culmine à 116 % à la fin de 2025, soit près du double du seuil du Pacte fixé à 60 % du PIB. Ce faisant, elle se situe juste après celle de la Grèce et de l’Italie.
L’inquiétante envolée de la charge de la dette
La longue période de taux d’intérêt très bas voire négatifs auxquels empruntait l’État de 2009 à 2022 était la conséquence directe de l’action inédite des grandes banques centrales pour éviter une dépression mondiale à la suite de la crise des subprimes de 2008. Ce volontarisme monétaire exceptionnel s’est achevé brutalement avec la hausse brutale des taux des banques centrales en 2022-2023 pour juguler la forte inflation qui a suivi l’invasion de l’Ukraine.
En conséquence, les taux d’émission des obligations françaises à dix ans sont passés de 1 % en 2022 à 3,6 % début 2026, soit à des niveaux supérieurs au Portugal et à l’Espagne et même à la Grèce. Plus grave, la charge de la dette publique (les intérêts versés chaque année aux créanciers des organismes publics) passera de 50 milliards d’euros en 2022 à 75 milliards en 2026 (dont 60 milliards pour le seul État).
Fourni par l’auteur
Source : Programme de stabilité de 2024, charge d’intérêts en comptabilité nationale, Finances publiques et économie (Fipeco).
Le précédent de l’emprunt obligatoire
Face à l’Himalaya de la dette diagnostiqué (avec raison mais un peu tard…) par François Bayrou quand il était premier ministre, les députés socialistes ont repris, au moment des débats sur l’instauration de taxe Zucman l’idée d’un emprunt forcé sur les plus riches en référence à une initiative du premier ministre Pierre Mauroy en 1983. Émis à un taux de 11 % (contre 14 % sur le marché à l’époque) celui-ci avait contraint 7 millions de contribuables à prêter 13,4 milliards de francs (soit environ 5 milliards d’euros) à hauteur de 10 % de leur impôt sur le revenu et de 10 % de leur impôt sur la fortune. Prévu pour trois ans, mais très impopulaire, car touchant également la classe moyenne supérieure, il fut remboursé par anticipation au bout de deux ans et ne fit jamais école.
Si cette idée d’un emprunt forcé a été rejetée par le gouvernement et l’Assemblée nationale le 26 novembre 2025, la piste d’un grand emprunt agite toujours les esprits d’autant que le contexte actuel rappelle celui des précédents historiques, en temps de guerre ou face à des crises budgétaires aiguës, et qu’ils ont toujours été couronnés de succès à l’émission.
L’emprunt de Thiers ou la naissance du mythe
Après la cuisante défaite de la guerre franco-prussienne de 1870-1871, le traité de Francfort du 10 mai 1871 impose à la France, outre la cession de l’Alsace-Lorraine, une indemnité de 5 milliards de francs-or (soit 70 milliards d’euros). Adolphe Thiers, le chef de l’exécutif de l’époque, émet alors un emprunt d’État au taux de 5 % sur cinquante ans garanti sur l’or.
L’engouement des épargnants a permis de payer l’indemnité allemande dès 1873 avec deux ans d’avance mettant ainsi fin à l’occupation militaire. Surtout, le succès de l’emprunt a assis la crédibilité de la toute jeune IIIe République. Puissant symbole de la résilience du pays il inspira d’autres emprunts de sorties de guerre, comme l’emprunt dit de la Libération de 1918 et celui de 1944.
L’emprunt Pinay 1952-1958 ou les délices de la rente
Premier grand emprunt du temps de paix, la rente Pinay – du nom du ministre de l’économie et des finances sous la quatrième et la cinquième République – de 1952 était destinée à sortir le pays des crises alimentaires et du logement de l’après-guerre. L’équivalent de 6 milliards d’euros a été alors levé avec un taux d’intérêt plutôt faible de 3,5 %,, mais assorti d’une indexation de son remboursement sur le napoléon en 1985 (date à laquelle l’emprunt a été complètement remboursé) et surtout une exonération d’impôt sur le revenu et sur les droits de succession.
Cette gigantesque niche fiscale pour les plus riches était d’ailleurs discrètement mise en avant par les agents de change qui conseillaient aux héritiers de « mettre leur parent en Pinay avant de le mettre en bière » pour éviter les droits de succession entraînant au passage de cocasses quiproquos familiaux lorsque le moribond reprenait des forces…
Le succès de la rente Pinay fut tel que de Gaulle, revenant au pouvoir, lui demanda de récidiver avec le Pinay/de Gaulle de 1958 destiné à sauver les finances publiques, restaurer la crédibilité de l’État et accompagner la réforme monétaire qui allait aboutir au nouveau franc de 1960.
L’emprunt Giscard, un grand emprunt coûteux pour l’État
Portant le nom du ministre des finances du président Pompidou, cet emprunt émis en 1973 rapportait 7 % et a levé l’équivalent d’environ 5,6 milliards d’euros sans avantage fiscal mais une obscure sous-clause du contrat prévoyait une indexation automatique sur le lingot d’or en cas d’inflation.
L’or s’étant envolé avec la fin des accords de Bretton Woods de 1971-1974, cet emprunt coûta finalement en francs constants au moment de son remboursement en 1988 près de cinq fois ses recettes.
1993, le dernier grand emprunt
Après la crise des subprimes de 2008, Nicolas Sarkozy avait envisagé l’émission d’un grand emprunt de 22 milliards d’euros pour financer cinq grandes priorités : l’enseignement supérieur, la recherche, l’industrie, le développement durable et l’économie numérique. Il opta finalement pour un financement classique sur les marchés au motif – pertinent – qu’il aurait fallu allécher les particuliers par un taux d’intérêt supérieur.
Le dernier grand emprunt national est donc toujours aujourd’hui l’emprunt Balladur de mai 1993 rapportant 6 % sur quatre ans et destiné à mobiliser l’épargne des Français les plus aisés pour financer l’accès au travail des jeunes et la relance des travaux publics et du bâtiment. Initialement fixé à 40 milliards de francs, son succès fut tel qu’il récolta 110 milliards de francs (30 milliards d’euros) grâce à la souscription de 1,4 million d’épargnants. Le gouvernement Balladur s’étant engagé à accepter toutes les souscriptions des particuliers, il ne put satisfaire les investisseurs institutionnels.
BFM Business, 2025.
Pas (encore) de problèmes de financement pour l’État
Un grand emprunt pourrait-il être la solution dans le contexte actuel pour financer les déficits, comme on l’entend parfois ?
Malgré la dérive des comptes publics, en France, l’État reste crédible avec une note de A+ attribuée par Standard & Poors et par Fitch, et de Aa3 par Moody’s (soit l’équivalent de 16 ou 17/20). Par ailleurs, le Trésor n’a aucune difficulté à emprunter 300 milliards d’euros par an (la moitié pour financer le déficit de l’année et l’autre pour rembourser les emprunts arrivant à échéance), si ce n’est à un taux d’intérêt supérieur de 80 points de base (0,8 %) au taux d’émission des obligations allemandes à dix ans (3,6 % contre 2,8 %). Aujourd’hui la dette publique française s’élève à environ 3 500 milliards d’euros et 55 % de la dette négociable est détenue par les non-résidents.
Aujourd’hui, les ménages semblent se conformer à la théorie de l’économiste David Ricardo : inquiets de la situation financière du pays, ils augmentent leur taux d’épargne passé de 15 % de leurs revenus en moyenne avant la crise à 18,4 % en 2025. Et leur épargne financière, qui représente 10 % de leurs revenus, culmine à 6 600 milliards d’euros, un niveau bien supérieur à la totalité de la dette publique.
C’est pourquoi un grand emprunt national proposé par un gouvernement stable disposant d’une majorité solide rencontrerait sans doute un grand succès. Il aurait le mérite de redonner confiance au pays et de conjurer ce que The Economist identifie dans un tout récent article publié le 11 janvier 2026 comme le principal problème économique mondial : le pessimisme.
Éric Pichet ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d’une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n’a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.
Cassiopea jellyfish seem to have a sleep state despite the fact they don’t have a brain.THAIFINN/Shutterstock
An upside-down jellyfish drifts in a shallow lagoon, rhythmically contracting its
translucent bell. By night that beat drops from roughly 36 pulses a minute to nearer 30, and the animal slips into a state that, despite its lack of a brain, resembles sleep.
Field cameras show it even takes a brief siesta around noon, to “catch up” after a disturbed night.
A new Nature Communications study has tracked these lulls in cassiopea jellyfish, which belong to a 500 million year-old lineage, as well as in the starlet sea anemone nematostella. The study findings may help settle a long-running debate among biologists about what sleep is for.
Does sleep conserve energy, consolidate memories – or do something more biologically fundamental? Until recently, most evidence for a “house-keeping” role for sleep came only from vertebrates.
When mice sleep, brain and spinal cord fluid surges through the brain and washes away metabolic waste. And a 2016 mouse study found that some types of DNA breaks are mended more quickly during sleep. Time-lapse imaging in a 2019 study of zebrafish showed that sleep lets neurons (nerve cells) repair DNA breaks that build up during waking hours.
The new study showed for the first time that the same process occurs in some invertebrates. That while the jellyfish and sea anemone are awake, DNA damage accumulates in their nerve cells and when they doze, that damage is repaired.
The work pushes the origins of sleep back more than 600 million years, to before the cnidarian branch (jellyfish, anemones, corals) split from the line that led to worms, insects and vertebrates roughly 600–700 million years ago. It also gives weight to the idea that sleep began as a form of self-defence for cells.
The new work moves the discussion to creatures whose nervous systems are much simpler than ours and are little more than thin nets. If sleep repairs their neurons too, that function is probably fundamental because simpler nervous systems evolved first.
The researchers first had to figure out when a jellyfish or anemone is asleep. This is surprisingly tricky: even when they rest, bell muscles keep twitching or the polyp drifts in slow motion. To do this they filmed the animals under infrared light and flashed white light at them or a pulse of food (a tiny squirt of liquid brine-shrimp extract).
Jellyfish that had been pulsing below 37 beats per minute for at least three minutes, and anemones that had stayed still for eight minutes, reacted more slowly. This meets the “reduced responsiveness” criterion for sleep, which is the same across the animal kingdom.
Next, the scientists stained nerve cells in tissue taken from jellyfish in a lab tank to mark where DNA breakages happened. The number of breakages peaked at the end of each species’ active spell (mid-morning for the jellyfish and late afternoon for the anemone) and dropped after a long rest.
When the scientists kept the animals awake by changing the tank’s water currents, both the DNA breaks and the next day’s sleeping time increased, similar to classic “sleep rebound” in humans where your body catches up on sleep.
To test cause and effect, the team shone ultraviolet-B light, which damages DNA, on the animals. This treatment doubled the number of DNA breaks within an hour and prompted extra sleep later the same day. When the animals had dozed, the breaks reduced back toward baseline and the jellyfish resumed their usual daytime rhythm.
Melatonin, the overnight hormone familiar to jet-lag sufferers, was added to the tank water and caused both species to doze during what should have been their busiest stretch (daytime for the jellyfish, night-time for the anemone), leaving their usual rest period unchanged.
The new finding is surprising because melatonin’s soporific role was thought to have evolved alongside vertebrates with centralised brains and circadian rhythms that respond to light cues. Seeing it work in a brainless animal suggests that this evolution took place much longer ago.
Putting these pieces together, it seems wakefulness gradually stresses the DNA in nerve cells. Sleep offers a period of sensory deprivation during which repair enzymes that stitch or swap the components of DNA can work unimpeded.
This logic fits with experiments in fruit-flies and mice which have linked chronic sleeplessness to neurodegeneration. Insomnia has also been linked to build-ups of reactive oxygen molecules (highly reactive by-products of normal metabolism that can punch holes in DNA, proteins and cell membranes).
If jellyfish need sleep to keep their nerve nets intact, the need to sleep probably predates the evolution of brains, eyes and even bodies that are the same on both left and right sides. In evolutionary terms, a nightly repair window could have been vital. Ancient organisms that skipped it may have accumulated mutations in irreplaceable neurons and slowly lost control of movement, feeding and reproduction.
The new study tracked two species in the lab and one in a Florida lagoon, but cnidarians live in many different light levels and temperatures. To be able to generalise this finding, future work will need to confirm that DNA-repair during sleep happens in similar animals that live in different conditions such as cold, deep or turbid waters.
Does this study settle the debate? Not entirely. Sleep almost certainly carries more than one benefit. Tasks such as memory consolidation could have been layered onto an ancient physiological maintenance programme as nervous systems grew more complex.
Yet the new findings strengthen the view that guarding DNA is a core purpose of sleep.
Timothy Hearn does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Source: The Conversation – in French – By Folahanmi Aina, Lecturer in Political Economy of Violence, Conflict and Development, SOAS, University of London
Le Sahel, région semi-aride d’Afrique qui s’étend de l’océan Atlantique à l’ouest à la mer Rouge à l’est, est devenu l’épicentre du terrorisme mondial, en raison du nombre élevé d’attaques perpétrées par des groupes armés et des pertes humaines qui en résultent, y compris parmi les civils. Cette évolution trouve son origine dans un enchevêtrement complexe de facteurs. Parmi ceux-ci figurent la fragilité des États, les économies illicites, la présence limitée du gouvernement dans les zones rurales et les conflits liés à la raréfaction des ressources due aux chocs climatiques.
Je suis politiste et spécialiste des conflits, de la sécurité et du développement en Afrique de l’Ouest. Dans une récente note d’orientation rédigée pour un programme de recherche, j’ai exposé comment les efforts d’atténuation du changement climatique dans les communautés sahéliennes ont intensifié les tensions préexistantes.
La recherche a donné lieu à un travail de terrain approfondi et à des entretiens menés en juillet et août 2025 auprès de membres de communautés au Burkina Faso, au Mali, au Niger et au Nigeria. L’objectif était de comprendre l’interaction entre divers points de tension et les crises auxquelles ils font face.
Les moyens de subsistance sont mis à rude épreuve en raison du changement climatique. Les ressources deviennent rares et réparties de manière inégale. Les structures de gouvernance sont faibles et les groupes armés se disputent le contrôle des territoires.
Les conclusions de l’étude sont claires : l’action climatique peut soit exacerber les crises, soit contribuer à les atténuer.
Ces projets sont considérés comme essentiels pour réduire l’empreinte carbone. Mais leur mise en œuvre dans des États fragiles présente un risque. Au Sahel, une élaboration de politiques de sécurité environnementale mal conçue peut avoir des effets néfastes et même alimenter l’insécurité qu’elle vise à prévenir. Les approches imposées d’en haut entrent souvent en contradiction avec les réalités sociales et écologiques locales.
A partir de ces constats, je suis arrivé à la conclusion que l’approche des Nations unies en matière d’atténuation du changement climatique au Sahel nécessite une réévaluation. Il faut privilégier des actions d’adaptation :
sensibles aux conflits
menées par les communautés et adaptées au contexte
conçues dans le cadre d’un processus transfrontalier. En effet, les interventions sont susceptibles d’influer sur les économies politiques, les dispositifs de sécurité et les relations communautaires au-delà des frontières, et pas seulement à l’intérieur de celles-ci.
Un environnement fragile
Mes recherches confirment que le changement climatique dans les communautés sahéliennes a exacerbé les tensions préexistantes. Parmi celles-ci, on peut citer :
Insécurité : Les populations locales sont exposées à des conflits aggravés par les pressions induites par le climat. Il s’agit notamment des conflits entre agriculteurs et éleveurs liés à la diminution des pâturages, des affrontements intercommunautaires pour l’accès aux ressources en eau limitées et des tensions ethniques et religieuses aggravées par la concurrence pour les moyens de subsistance.
Les entretiens menés avec des agriculteurs, des éleveurs et des chefs de communauté, entre autres, ont mis en évidence la manière dont les changements dans les régimes pluviométriques, les longues sécheresses et les récoltes imprévisibles compromettent directement les moyens de subsistance. Les populations sont contraintes d’adopter des stratégies de survie au quotidien qui accentuent parfois les conflits locaux.
Fragilité de l’État : Les entretiens menés avec des informateurs clés, notamment des membres des milices locales, montrent l’incapacité des gouvernements à assurer la sécurité, à fournir des services de base ou à servir de médiateurs dans les conflits de plus en plus nombreux.
En conséquence, les communautés sont obligées de se tourner vers d’autres formes de gouvernance et de protection. Il s’agit notamment des milices locales, des autorités traditionnelles et des comités informels de gestion des ressources.
Réseaux criminels : La vulnérabilité climatique et la fragilité de l’État ont créé un environnement qui permet à des organisations extrémistes violentes d’opérer et d’étendre leur influence.
Ces groupes vont de simples bandits armés aux organisations extrémistes violentes telles que Boko Haram et Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM). Ils ne sont pas seulement le résultat d’une idéologie. Ils sont le produit d’un système en crise. Ils exploitent stratégiquement l’insécurité et les griefs créés par le changement climatique et la fragilité de l’État.
Un leader communautaire malien l’a parfaitement exprimé. Il a averti que si une communauté
devient une terre aride … le groupe armé peut profiter de cette occasion pour s’y implanter.
Vers une approche sensible aux conflits
Les propos recueillis lors des entretiens mettent en avant des solutions simples, mais profondes.
Le message principal est clair. Il faut une appropriation locale et une implication de la communauté.
Un chef traditionnel du Burkina Faso, par exemple, a insisté sur le fait que :
si des projets sont mis en place, ils doivent inclure la communauté dès le début, afin que les gens se sentent respectés, que la confiance s’instaure et que les solutions répondent aux besoins réels.
Une personne interrogée au Nigeria a également expliqué que « lorsque les habitants s’engagent auprès du gouvernement, de nombreuses solutions voient le jour ». Au Niger, un acteur local a souligné la nécessité « d’impliquer davantage la population dans le processus décisionnel qui la concerne ».
Ces témoignages plaident pour de nouvelles orientations politiques. Ils militent en faveur d’un abandon du modèle de développement imposé d’en haut, et piloté par les experts.
Pour que l’atténuation du changement climatique soit un facteur de paix, elle doit être intégrée aux efforts de consolidation de la paix et de renforcement de l’État. La participation des autorités locales et des institutions communautaires à la prise de décision peut conduire à des interventions adaptées au contexte, plus légitimes et plus en phase avec les réalités locales.
Cela veut dire concrètement relier le financement climatique à des projets qui ne se limitent pas à des infrastructures d’énergie renouvelable, mais s’étendent aussi à des écoles, des centres de santé et des moyens de subsistance durables. Cela implique un dialogue transparent, mené par la communauté, afin de résoudre les conflits avant qu’ils ne s’étendent à toute la région du Sahel.
Quelques pistes de soltions
La situation critique du Sahel est une leçon importante pour la communauté internationale. L’interconnexion entre le changement climatique, la fragilité des États et les conflits constitue un système complexe et interdépendant. Elle ne peut être résolue par des interventions sectorielles isolées. Les défis sont trop étroitement liés et les enjeux trop importants.
Les politiques internationales en matière de développement et de climat doivent évoluer. L’atténuation du changement climatique n’est pas un exercice technique, mais une occasion de reconstruire les contrats sociaux rompus, de renforcer la résilience des communautés et de promouvoir un développement équitable.
S’attaquer aux causes profondes plutôt qu’aux symptômes peut transformer un cercle vicieux de fragilité en un cercle vertueux de paix et de développement.
Folahanmi Aina does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Dos agentes federales de inmigración de la ciudad de Minneapolis están acusados de haber derribado al suelo y luego disparado mortalmente a Alex Pretti, un enfermero de cuidados intensivos de 37 años. El asesinato tuvo lugar a poco más de un kilómetro y medio del lugar donde, semanas antes, otro ciudadano estadounidense, Renee Good, fue presuntamente asesinado a tiros por agentes federales.
El último incidente provocó airadas protestas de los habitantes de Minneapolis, que quieren que se ponga fin a las operaciones de control de la inmigración en su ciudad.
¿Por qué el envío de agentes federales de inmigración ha causado tantos problemas en Minnesota?
Donald Trump ha descrito la inmigración ilegal como “la mayor invasión de la historia”. De hecho, desde su regreso a la Casa Blanca, en enero de 2025, varias ciudades de Estados Unidos han asistido al despliegue de la Guardia Nacional con la intención de sofocarla. Aunque el Tribunal Supremo dictaminó que Trump no tenía autoridad para tales despliegues, hemos visto a agentes federales de la Oficina de Aduanas y Protección Fronteriza y del Servicio de Inmigración y Control de Aduanas de Estados Unidos librando la batalla principalmente contra las minorías en ciudades con liderazgo demócrata. Entre ellas Mineápolis, una ciudad gobernada por los demócratas en un estado liderado por los demócratas.
El gobernador es Tim Walz, que se presentó a la vicepresidencia en la candidatura de Kamala Harris contra Trump en las elecciones de 2024. Walz se ha enfrentado a acusaciones, que él niega, de pasar por alto un supuesto fraude generalizado en la financiación de programas de seguridad social, en el que supuestamente estarían involucrados sectores de la comunidad somalí-estadounidense.
Aunque la mayoría de estas acusaciones han sido refutadas, dieron a Trump motivos para enviar agentes federales. Esto ha aumentado las tensiones entre los funcionarios estatales y la administración, provocando muertes brutales e innecesarias en la comunidad y enfrentando a los ciudadanos de Minnesota con los funcionarios del gobierno federal.
El derecho a portar armas
La segunda enmienda se introdujo en la Constitución de los Estados Unidos en 1791 a través de la Carta de Derechos, debido a una profunda desconfianza hacia el poder militar centralizado y al deseo de garantizar que el recién formado gobierno federal no pudiera desarmar a la población.
Los padres fundadores concebían un “derecho natural de resistencia y autoprotección”. Las acciones de Trump al enviar agentes federales armados para llevar a cabo operaciones de aplicación de la ley en varios estados parecen cumplir las preocupaciones de los padres fundadores.
¿Cómo han afectado los tiroteos mortales a la popularidad de Trump?
La popularidad de Trump está en declive. Su incapacidad para cumplir las promesas económicas esbozadas en su campaña electoral, su enfoque disperso de las relaciones internacionales y la creciente brecha entre la retórica y los logros han dañado su posición en las encuestas.
En una encuesta de la CNN publicada el 16 de enero, casi seis de cada diez encuestados describieron el primer año de Trump en el cargo como un fracaso, ya que el presidente se centró en prioridades equivocadas.
Y el apoyo del que goza está disminuyendo rápidamente, ya que los agentes federales de inmigración parecen estar fuera de control, persiguiendo a muchos más ciudadanos documentados que a inmigrantes ilegales, sembrando el miedo y actuando como si estuvieran por encima de la ley.
Ante lo que parece ser un alto nivel de manipulación psicológica por parte de los funcionarios de Seguridad Nacional, los votantes se están volviendo en contra de la creciente autocracia de esta administración. Y empiezan a creer más en las pruebas difundidas por los medios de comunicación que en las declaraciones altamente polémicas de los lugartenientes de Trump.
Barack Obama y Bill Clinton rompen el silencio
En Estados Unidos existe una larga tradición, y un acuerdo implícito entre los expresidentes, de evitar las críticas públicas al presidente en ejercicio. Esa reticencia a hablar es, por lo general, una muestra de respeto hacia el cargo y un reconocimiento de los retos únicos y difíciles que plantea la presidencia.
Pero Trump 2.0 no es una presidencia normal. El estilo del 47 º presidente es combativo y vengativo, y parece haber una sensación cada vez mayor de que está desfasado con respecto a los deseos y los intereses del país que dirige.
La marcha de Trump hacia la autocracia crea crisis en las que se considera a sí mismo el héroe que el país necesita para superar sus males. Pero us predecesores tienen una opinión diferente.
Tanto Obama denunciando el ataque a los valores fundamentales estadounidenses como Clinton expresando su condena de las “horribles escenas” de Minneapolis, que califica como “inaceptables” y evitables, los expresidentes demócratas no se han contenido. Cabe destacar que el único expresidente republicano vivo, George W. Bush, se ha mantenido hasta ahora en silencio.
¿Qué se puede hacer para evitar más violencia?
Lo más sencillo sería que Trump pusiera fin al despliegue de agentes federales de inmigración en Minneapolis y se abstuviera de tomar medidas similares en el futuro. Es evidente que está buscando una salida y enviar a su “zar de la frontera”, Tom Homan, a Minneapolis para dirigir las operaciones podría ser el primer paso para rebajar la tensión. Pero Trump detesta que le señalen sus errores y, al menos más allá de Minneapolis, es mucho más probable que redoble las actividades de control de la inmigración.
Siendo realistas, lo más probable es que el Congreso muestre su fuerza y se niegue a financiar más actividades federales de control de la inmigración. Los demócratas podrían forzar otro cierre del Gobierno por esta cuestión, y solo necesitan que unos pocos republicanos cambien de opinión para rechazar el presupuesto de 2026 del Departamento de Seguridad Nacional.
A nivel público, cuanto mayor sea el escrutinio de las agencias de control de la inmigración, más rigurosa será la verificación de las declaraciones oficiales y más unánime será la oposición a la política de deportación de Trump.
Estamos en año de elecciones intermedias y, si la presión pública aumenta, los legisladores republicanos podrían alejarse de la línea de Trump. Aunque actualmente controla las palancas del poder, ese control sigue siendo frágil. Incluso Trump podría darse cuenta pronto de que una autocracia abierta, violenta y coercitiva no es sinónimo de votos.
Mark Shanahan tiene una nueva colección editada, Trump Unbound, que saldrá a la venta en octubre de 2026 y será publicada por Palgrave Macmillan.
Federal immigration officers are seen outside the Bishop Whipple Federal Building in Minneapolis on Jan. 12, 2026.AP Photo/Jen Golbeck
A federal judge heard arguments on Jan. 26, 2026, as the state of Minnesota sought a temporary restraining order to stop the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement operation in the state. The administration has sent some 3,000 immigration agents to Minnesota, and attorneys for the state have argued, in part, that it amounts to an unconstitutional occupation, on 10th Amendment grounds. Alfonso Serrano, a politics editor at The Conversation U.S., spoke with Andrea Katz, a law scholar at Washington University in St. Louis, about the Minnesota lawsuit and its possible legal implications.
What’s the legal issue at stake in this court case?
In Minnesota v. Noem, attorneys for the state are arguing that the federal government is acting illegally by intruding on a sphere of state power (the police power). They’re claiming violations of the 10th Amendment, which is this idea that under the U.S. Constitution, states are reserved powers that existed before the Constitution was drafted, powers that are not delegated to the federal government.
They’re also making this rather new claim under what’s called the equal sovereignty principle, which is that states all have to be treated equally by the federal government. There’s also a First Amendment claim, and an Administrative Procedure Act claim, which is that the government is acting illegally in an arbitrary and capricious way. I think the 10th Amendment arguments are ones that I would say are kind of unprecedented, rather untested waters.
On that note, when does a federal law enforcement response cross the line and violate the 10th Amendment? Is there precedent for this?
The question you just posed is one that the district judge, Kate M. Menendez, seems to be nervous about having to hear. This is essentially asking a federal judge to sift into different buckets that which is federal power and that which is state power. And I can say there’s not a lot of case law on this issue.
The most filled-out doctrine under the 10th Amendment is the anti-commandeering doctrine. It holds that the federal government cannot use the state government as a sort of puppet. The federal government can’t use state officers forcibly against the state’s will to enforce the law. Now that is not, strictly speaking, what’s going on here, because Minnesota is complaining about the presence of federal agents enforcing the laws in ways that it thinks are illegal.
A woman is detained by federal agents in Minneapolis on Jan. 13, 2026. AP Photo/Adam Gray
And so it seems to me that the 10th Amendment has been most developed in this area that Minnesota is not touching on, and so for that reason, I think their invocation of it is pretty unusual. They’re essentially claiming that the 10th Amendment protects their police powers and that the federal government is intruding on that. I think that’s a novel argument in court, and my suspicion is that it is not likely to be a winning argument in court.
Yeah, I think that’s correct. Again, I want to make clear that Minnesota has made many arguments against the Trump administration, and I’m just focusing on the merits of this 10th Amendment argument.
There was a sort of undeveloped strand of cases in the mid-20th century where the Supreme Court tried to develop this idea of core state powers. And so it said the federal government couldn’t act in a way that violated a state’s core powers, like where to put your state capital, or control over natural resources, or defining salaries for state government employees. The court said these are core state powers.
But then in a famous case called Garcia v. San Antonio Metropolitan Transit Authority, in 1985, the court overruled itself and said – and this is still where we are – federal courts cannot be in the business of defining what constitutes a core state power. It’s too open-ended, undefined. It’s a political inquiry. It’s not something that’s appropriate for a judge.
And so I think on this 10th Amendment argument, Minnesota is essentially asking the courts to revive this core state powers doctrine, which I think the court is unlikely to do.
What repercussions could the judge’s ruling have?
Minnesota has already filed, in a case called Tincher v. Noem, a more conventional set of claims, which is that ICE agents broke the law, are violating rights, acting in excess of their authority. They have already gotten preliminary relief on this first set of claims, although Judge Menendez’s order is now on hold, pending appeal before the 8th Circuit court.
Fireworks are set off by protesters outside the Bishop Henry Whipple Federal Building in Minneapolis on Jan. 12, 2026. AP Photo/Jen Golbeck
That is different from this 10th Amendment claim. In the 10th Amendment argument, one of the arguments that Minnesota has made is the equal sovereignty principle. The equal sovereignty principle was articulated in the 2013 case, Shelby County v. Holder. This is the famous case where the Supreme Court struck down an important part of the Voting Rights Act that prevented Southern states from restricting the vote, apparently on the basis of race. In Shelby County, the court said that the Voting Rights Act, which subjected certain states with a pattern of racial discrimination on the vote to a preclearance process where the federal government had to approve their laws before they passed them, treated different states differently.
Of course, in that case, the federal government said those are states that have a history of discrimination, so the federal government was justified in treating them differently.
But Chief Justice John Roberts, who wrote the Shelby County opinion, said the 10th Amendment means that the government can’t treat different states differently.
Now it’s not a well-regarded doctrine, so it’s kind of shocking that Minnesota is invoking it here. For one reason, the equal sovereignty principle has not been well developed since Shelby County. The second reason it would be a big deal – quite shocking to me, if the judge enforced it – is that Shelby County was talking about legislation that treated different states differently.
If we pass a rule where the executive branch can’t treat different states differently, you’re essentially denying the existence of discretion in enforcement, which is very quintessentially an executive power, right?
It could, for example, lead to states saying that federal agents can’t come in to help people in a natural disaster. So again, I think this argument, like the rest of the 10th Amendment arguments, suffers from being undeveloped in the case law and potentially carrying a risk of kneecapping the federal government’s ability to enforce the law, which sometimes does, for totally good-faith reasons, require treating different states differently.
Any final thoughts?
The first Trump administration was highly disorganized and didn’t take concerted action for a while. The second Trump administration was the precise opposite of that. They acted quickly and in a very organized fashion, pushing power as far as it can go in a number of agencies.
And I think the question this gets back to is how the federal courts have reacted to this barrage of executive orders, of new applications of old laws, of new forms of government power exercised in a way that threatens federalism.
To me, this is sort of a brave new world, whether we’re going to see courts relax their deference toward the executive branch. And I mean, we are in kind of a brave new world. We have videos all over the internet showing the facts of the Alex Pretti shooting. But I just want to note that, from a separation of powers point of view, it’s very interesting to see federal judges seeming to distrust official accounts of events from the executive branch. I think this is an area in which the doctrine seems to be moving, and we’re watching it in real time.
Andrea Katz does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
The Labour party’s National Executive Committee (NEC) has voted to block Andy Burnham from seeking selection for the vacant Gorton and Denton parliamentary seat. The move and its fallout have exposed fault lines within the Labour party that go beyond a single byelection.
What might otherwise have been a routine internal procedural matter has instead become a revealing episode about authority, legitimacy and control inside the party – and how Keir Starmer understands both internal democracy and political risk.
The vacancy itself arose from the resignation of the Labour MP, Andrew Gwynne. A byelection must now be held in a constituency long assumed to be safely Labour. The party won 50% of the vote at the last general election with Reform second on 14%. Recent electoral volatility, however, has made even such strongholds less predictable.
This context matters. Byelections are no longer cost-free exercises in party management. They can become national political moments, particularly when they intersect with questions of leadership and direction.
Burnham’s interest in returning to Westminster must be understood against this backdrop. Since leaving parliament and becoming mayor of Greater Manchester in 2017, Burnham has established himself as one of Labour’s most recognisable and electorally successful figures.
His mayoralty has given him a distinct political identity, rooted in devolution, public services and a forthright northern voice. His approach has often contrasted with the more centralised and cautious tone of Starmer’s leadership since 2020.
And with Burnham consistently cited as a contender to replace Starmer, it’s difficult to separate his desire to return to parliament from his desire for the leadership. A return to Westminster could provide Burnham with influence, visibility and long-term options that a regional office, however powerful, cannot fully provide.
It is precisely because Burnham occupies such a prominent executive role that he needed the NEC’s approval to run. Labour’s rules are clear: directly elected mayors must seek permission before becoming parliamentary candidates. This is largely to prevent the disruption and expense of triggering further elections. Burnham would have to be replaced as mayor and a contest would be costly.
On the surface, therefore, the NEC’s involvement was procedurally acceptable. What transformed it into a political controversy was how its decision to block him is being interpreted.
Internal democracy vs central control
Supporters of Burnham argued that the case for allowing him onto the shortlist was strong. At a basic level, they maintained that local party members should have been trusted to decide whether he was the right candidate. This argument drew on long-standing Labour principles about internal democracy and local autonomy.
Burnham’s profile, record of winning elections as mayor and roots in Greater Manchester were seen as assets that could only strengthen Labour’s chances of holding the seat. At a potentially awkward moment in the electoral cycle and with high-profile figures rumoured to be thinking of running for other parties, this is by no means a given.
Beyond electoral calculation, there was also a symbolic dimension. Allowing a figure of his stature to compete would have signalled confidence within the party. It would have shown a willingness to tolerate pluralism and ambition rather than to manage it out of existence.
For some senior figures, including the deputy leader, Lucy Powell (no ally of Starmer) the issue was not whether Burnham should automatically be selected, but whether it was right for the national party to remove him from the contest before it began.
The arguments against Burnham’s candidacy focused on the costs and risks associated with triggering a mayoral election. There was also a concern about distraction. The leadership has been keen to project stability and discipline, and the return of a high-profile figure with an independent political base could complicate this.
Yet it is difficult to ignore the political subtext. Burnham’s record of public disagreement with elements of the leadership’s strategy marked him out as a potential alternative focus of authority within the party.
Blocking his return to parliament therefore carries the appearance, whether intended or not, of pre-emptive containment. For critics, this reinforces a perception that the NEC is being used not simply as a guardian of rules, but as an instrument of political management.
The committee’s eight-to-one vote against Burnham intensified these concerns. Powell was the only member to vote in Burnham’s favour and the chair, home secretary Shabana Mahmood, abstained.
On one reading, this demonstrated that the leadership’s position commanded overwhelming institutional support. On another, it underlined the marginalisation of dissenting voices, even at the highest levels of the party.
That the only explicit supporter of Burnham was also one of Labour’s most senior elected figures lends the episode a particular symbolic weight. Powell won her position via a membership vote rather than being appointed by Starmer.
What happens next
The broader political ramifications of this situation are complex. In the short term, the decision may suit Starmer. Preventing Burnham from re-entering parliament reduces the likelihood of an alternative leadership figure emerging on the backbenches. It also allows the leadership to maintain tight control over messaging and candidate selection at a moment when it believes discipline is electorally advantageous.
However, the longer-term risks should not be underestimated. The episode feeds into an existing narrative that Labour under Starmer is highly centralised and wary of internal competition. For party members and supporters who value participation and openness, this risks alienation.
There is also an electoral gamble in blocking Burnham. Should Labour struggle in or even lose the Gorton and Denton byelection, the decision to exclude Burnham will be retrospectively scrutinised as a missed opportunity. Conversely, even a comfortable victory will not entirely erase the impression that the party prioritised internal control over open debate.
Ultimately, the Burnham affair illuminates a central tension within Labour: the balance between authority and legitimacy. The NEC may have acted within its formal powers, but legitimacy in politics is never solely procedural. It is also relational, shaped by how decisions are perceived by members, voters and the wider public.
Tim Heppell does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky has said a security agreement with the United States has been finalised following his most recent meeting with Donald Trump. Taken at face value, Zelensky’s repeated assertions that the document is ready to sign looks like major win for Kyiv. The reality is very different.
The meeting came after a particularly turbulent period for the transatlantic alliance. The disagreement over Greenland has further undermined western unity and cast yet more doubt on the trustworthiness and dependability of the current incumbent of the White House.
If there was even a hint of Trump being capable of self-reflection, one could add that it was a rather embarrassing week for him – on at least three counts.
First Trump seemed to perform a climb-down in his speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos on January 21 when he ruled out the use of force to acquire Greenland for the US. He also dropped the threat of imposing tariffs on European Nato members which had dispatched military personnel to Greenland in a highly symbolic show of support.
Second, he insisted that the US would always be there for its Nato allies, in contrast to earlier pronouncements that the American security guarantee for Europe was conditional on allies’ financial contributions to Nato. But, as is usually the case with Trump, it was one step forward, two steps back, as he went on to cast doubt on the allies reciprocating in an American hour of need.
Worse still, in a subsequent interview with Fox News, he denigrated the sacrifices of allied servicemen and women in Afghanistan, prompting a chorus of justified outrage from across the alliance.
After a phone call with the British prime minister, Keir Starmer, on Saturday and an expression of concern in a message conveyed “through backchannels” from King Charles III, Trump changed his tune. He did not exactly apologise, but he used his TruthSocial platform to praise the bravery and sacrifices of British soldiers in Afghanistan. No other Nato ally has received even that acknowledgement yet.
Third, by the end of the week we were also reminded that progress on one of Trump’s flagship projects – making peace between Russia and Ukraine – is as elusive as ever. The US president appeared to have had a constructive meeting with Zelensky in Davos.
Contrary to how swiftly the US president threatened the imposition of tariffs on supposed allies for sending a few dozen soldiers to Greenland, Trump failed – yet again – to get tough on Putin. There is still no sign of a vote on a bipartisan Russia sanctions bill which Trump allegedly greenlit in early January.
The bill, in the making since the spring, aims to cripple Russia’s ability to finance its war against Ukraine and “to provide sustainable levels of security assistance to Ukraine to provide a credible defensive and deterrent capability”.
Ominous signs from Washington
One could, therefore, argue that it was a bad week for Trump and a much better week for the rest of the western alliance. After all, Nato is still intact. Europe seems to have discovered more of a backbone. Perhaps more importantly, they are realising that pushing back against Trump is not futile.
The US president has neither abandoned Zelensky nor walked away from mediating between Russia and Ukraine. And Trump might soon get distracted by plans for regime change in Cuba or Iran, preventing him from wreaking any more havoc in Europe.
But such a view underestimates both the damage already done to relations between Europe and the US and the potential for things to get worse. Consider the issue of Greenland. Trump’s concession to renounce the use of force was, at best, only a partial climb-down. Throughout his speech, Trump reiterated several times that he still wants “right, title and ownership” of Greenland.
And, as it’s not at all clear what his framework deal actually entails, his closing comments on Greenland included an unambiguous warning to other Nato members that they can “say ‘yes‘ and we will be very appreciative, or … ‘no’ and we will remember”.
There is already, it seems, some advance remembering happening in Trump’s renamed Department of War, which released its new national defence strategy on Friday night. According to the document, the Pentagon will provide Trump “with credible options to guarantee US military and commercial access to key terrain from the Arctic to South America, especially Greenland, the Gulf of America, and the Panama Canal”.
On Nato, Trump’s ambivalence towards the alliance goes deeper than his most recent comments. Critically, it is the casual nature with which Trump treats this core pillar of international security that has fundamentally undermined the trustworthiness of the US as a dependable partner.
Combined with the efforts to set up his board of peace as an alternative to the UN, there can be little doubt left that the US president has his sights trained on the very institutions that Washington spent decades building.
Fools’ gold?
When it comes to Ukraine, meanwhile, Trump may well just be dangling the prospect of an agreement to try to get Zelensky to make territorial concessions that will please Putin. If past encounters are any guideline, the Russian president will accept the concessions but baulk at the prospect of the US (or anyone) offering security guarantees.
Trump, going on what we have seen over the past year, is then likely to water down what he apparently agreed in order not to jeopardise a deal with Putin. I think it most likely that Zelensky and Ukraine will, yet again, be left out in the cold.
For Trump, ending the war more and more seems primarily as a way to enable future business deals with Russia, even it means sacrificing 20% of Ukrainian territory and the long-term security of European allies in the process.
The conclusion to draw for European capitals from London to Kyiv from a week of high drama should not be that Trump and the relationship with the US can be managed with a new approach that adds a dose of pushback to the usual flattery and supplication.
After one year of Trump 2.0, America-first has become America-only. Europe and its few scattered allies elsewhere need to start acting as if they were alone in a hostile world. Because they are.
Stefan Wolff is a past recipient of grant funding from the Natural Environment Research Council of the UK, the United States Institute of Peace, the Economic and Social Research Council of the UK, the British Academy, the NATO Science for Peace Programme, the EU Framework Programmes 6 and 7 and Horizon 2020, as well as the EU’s Jean Monnet Programme. He is a Trustee and Honorary Treasurer of the Political Studies Association of the UK and a Senior Research Fellow at the Foreign Policy Centre in London.
On the evening of January 26 1926, members of the Royal Institution and other guests climbed three flights of draughty stairs to a tiny workshop in Soho’s Frith Street. They were there to witness the first public presentation of what inventor John Logie Baird called “true television”. A hundred years later, we are now marking the centenary of British television.
Throughout the following 13 years, until the second world war imposed a seven-year hiatus, television developed rapidly. From November 1936 onwards, a regular “high definition” service was transmitted from the BBC’s television station at Alexandra Palace. Alongside countless variety performances and outside broadcasts of pageantry and sports, television established a productively rich relationship with the arts of 1930s Britain.
More than 300 plays were broadcast in these years, including productions of William Shakespeare, George Bernard Shaw and Noel Coward, with appearances by Laurence Olivier, Ralph Richardson, Valerie Hobson and Sybil Thorndike among many others. West End productions were restaged in the studio and outside broadcast cameras relayed shows such as J.B. Priestley’s When We Are Married, and the Lupino Lane musical comedy Me and My Girl, to tens of thousands of viewers across London.
This article is part of our State of the Arts series. These articles tackle the challenges of the arts and heritage industry – and celebrate the wins, too.
Artists and architects made frequent appearances, as did a regular selection of classical and contemporary works from London galleries. Other visual artists who featured included Paul Nash, Laura Knight and Wyndham Lewis, along with architects Frank Lloyd Wright, Berthold Lubetkin and Serge Chermayeff. There were numerous performances of opera, including excerpts of contemporary work like Albert Coates’ Pickwick and an ambitious staging of Act 2 of Wagner’s Tristan and Isolde.
Ballet once appeared regularly on the BBC.
Once the transmissions could present a full-length figure on the tiny portrait-format screens of the first receiving sets, ballet enjoyed a central presence in TV schedules. Prima ballerinas who performed in the studios included Alicia Markova, Lydia Sokolova and the young Margot Fonteyn.
Touring companies like the Ballets Russes de Monte Carlo and the Ballets Jooss made appearances. The troupes benefited from modest fees, exposure and association with modernity’s latest marvel, while television gained cheap access to the best classical dancers of the day as well as cultural credibility.
In so many ways the end of television as we have known it – when YouTube has topped the BBC in viewing share for the first time – could hardly be more different from its pre-war beginnings. But there are also clear continuities across more than half a century, even if early ballroom dancing lessons have morphed into Strictly, and EastEnders is the soap du jour rather than the sedate five-part romance Ann and Harold. One of television’s left behinds, however, is a close relationship with the arts.
The arts on the BBC today
Writing in The Stage in January 2026, critic Lyn Gardner lamented the limitations of television’s coverage of theatre, arguing that “the BBC remains more interested in Glastonbury than the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, the world’s biggest arts festival” and that the corporation is “more interested in sport rather than culture”.
She also recalled director general Tim Davie’s words from a speech at the Royal Academy in autumn 2024: “The arts remain utterly central to the BBC’s mission. We want to send out a strong signal, that arts and culture matter, they matter for everyone, and they matter even more when times are tough.”
Yet there is no sense that Davie’s words are borne out by the current television schedules. There is no regular slot for imaginative and creative arts documentaries, such as Omnibus which lasted from 1967 to 2003, nor space for reviews and debate, like The Late Show, a nightly arts magazine show that ran throughout the early 1990s. Today’s and tomorrow’s visual artists and performers have only the most minimal presence.
The vanishingly rare presentations of stage work, whether dance, opera or theatre, are invariably acquisitions from cultural organisations that provided most of the funding and all of the production expertise. Complexity and challenging contemporary creativity are almost entirely absent. Far from being “utterly central”, the arts are today utterly marginal to BBC television.
Times are tough, of course, and the BBC faces numerous problems, many of which are the result of a precipitous fall in available funds. Streamers are cannibalising audiences and the licence fee is threatened. The BBC’s response has been to funnel what monies there are to news and current affairs and to high-end drama, which increasingly has to rely on co-production deals.
Television in the pre-war years faced a comparable funding crisis, and yet its producers and executives had confidence and belief in the arts, and were prepared to work collaboratively in partnerships with the cultural institutions of the day. Today, that vision is absent, with little sense of a deep commitment to, or passion for, the arts.
Last year, the BBC sought the views of its audiences with an online questionnaire, and in October a collated report of responses was released as Our BBC, Our Future. In neither the questionnaire nor the report was discussion of the arts “utterly central”.
The arts had next-to-no presence, and as I noted at the time only deep into the report was it acknowledged that: “Among the bigger areas [for which respondents asked] for ‘more’ were: educational content, films and then science and technology, arts and culture and history.”
Fortunately, there is currently a much more substantive and less biased consultation underway. In December, the Department of Culture, Media and Sport published Britain’s Story: The Next Chapter – BBC Royal Charter Review, Green Paper and public consultation, which invites us all to “begin the conversation about how to ensure [the BBC] remains the beating heart of our nation for decades to come”.
In this centenary year for television, this is an important opportunity to express a desire to see the arts returned to the “utterly central” place they occupied in the early years of BBC television.
John Wyver has received funding from the Arts and Humanities Research Council.
