Category: English

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Natalia Zwarts, Research Leader in Wargaming at RAND Europe, RAND Europe

Consider the following scenario. There’s a ransomware attack, enhanced by AI, which paralyses NHS systems – delaying medical care across the country.

Simultaneously, deepfake videos circulate online, spreading false information about the government’s response. At the same time, a foreign power quietly manipulates critical mineral markets to exert pressure on the economy.

The scenario is not just a theory. It is a situation waiting to be rehearsed. And research suggests an old tool called wargaming – an exercise or simulation of a threatening situation – provides the method to do exactly that. Researchers are indeed calling for a new research agenda for experimental design for such games, applied to modern scenarios.

In a world of compounding crises, the UK government has published its first-ever chronic risks analysis, delivering a stark warning. It says the threats of the 21st century are already here and they’re deeply interconnected.

From AI-driven cybercrime to biodiversity loss and demographic shifts, the report maps 26 chronic risks that are slowly eroding national security, economic resilience and social cohesion.

The analysis rightly calls for a broader response, urging collaboration across government, industry, academia and society at large.

If chronic risks are the century’s slow burns, then wargaming is the fire drill we haven’t run. In brief, wargaming is a centuries-old tool to explore “what if” scenarios by simulating real-world crises.

In a wargame, participants take on roles, usually in opposing teams, and make decisions in response to unfolding events. Depending on the scenario, participants are recruited to act in a way that would be characteristic for the military, government, industry or humanitarian organisations.

By revealing gaps, stress points and unexpected outcomes, wargaming helps decision-makers plan smarter and respond faster when the real thing hits. Ignoring these feedback loops risks turning slow moving challenges into sudden, systemic shocks.

Historically limited to traditional warfighting, it increasingly offers a way to stress-test systems against cascading threats, from resource scarcity driving geopolitical tensions to digital exclusion fuelling misinformation.

Beyond war

Wargaming is still popular among organisations across the world. The Pentagon uses red team exercises to anticipate hybrid warfare. Red-teaming includes modelling of the adversary and attempting to predict their reasoning, planning and actions.

Nato’s “locked shields” exercises simulate cyberattacks on critical infrastructure. And the EU runs tabletops, exercises that help help stress-test defence capability development plans.

Developments in AI have recently been translated into gaming techniques. The Rand corporation has run wargames on issues from anti-microbial resistance to climate change.

Singapore has used wargaming to test urban development policies involving climate adaptation, transportation and population growth.

At a recent Rand Europe wargame examining the governance of AI in healthcare, players were asked to act as policymakers deciding whether to impose strict, moderate or minimal regulation on new AI tools such as automated transcription of doctor visits. They had to balance this with concerns about safety, privacy and equitable access.

The game illustrated how competing priorities, such as innovation speed versus regulatory oversight, shape real-world decisions. Despite the complexity of the topic, participants typically reached a consensus within minutes, revealing not only preferred policies but also the trade-offs that were revealed under pressure. The results of the game showed that regulation has to adapt to emerging risks, rather than be rigid.

Exercises like this demonstrate how wargaming can expose underlying assumptions and offer policymakers, practitioners and the public a structured way to debate difficult choices before or as they appear in the real world.

Depending on the scope of the game, you could choose to play one round or scenario, or extend it to more in-depth questions. The game results are the most relevant for those who will have to make such decisions, but it’s also very telling to provide them with pathways chosen by the public.

So what games should we be playing? The rapid evolution of crypto-based scams could be explored through a matrix game that includes financial regulators, banks and tech companies. A matrix game allows for a quick role-play of specific agendas with proposed actions judged by an expert facilitator. Participants would be divided into groups of criminals, law enforcement, industry and financial sector. They would then simulate a scenario where fraud spreads faster than enforcement can respond, revealing regulatory blind spots and communication failures.

In another exercise, policymakers could model how a terrorist group might weaponise AI-generated deepfakes. Participants from law enforcement, public health and social media platforms would need to determine how quickly they could identify and respond to the threat while maintaining public trust.

A third scenario could focus on geopolitical competition over critical minerals. A simulated trigger event involving European, Chinese and African actors would allow players to explore the impacts on trade policy, infrastructure security and diplomatic engagement.

These simulations would not predict the future, but would reveal how different people might behave when systems come under stress. Indeed, research into wargaming shows that while these tools aren’t perfect, they are extremely useful.

Wargaming offers a range of techniques suited to different risks. Matrix games allow multiple actors to make decisions in an evolving scenario. This makes them ideal for exploring uncertainty and conflicting interests. Red teaming helps organisations see their systems from the perspective of an adversary, exposing vulnerabilities that may go unnoticed in internal assessments. And tabletop exercises can help policymakers trace the second- and third-order effects of a crisis.

We conduct fire drills, flood drills and emergency alerts for physical disasters. It is time we have more opportunities to do the same for digital blackouts, deepfake terrorism and financial manipulation. These risks are not theoretical. They are already beginning to reshape our world – governments must take heed.

Reports like the chronic risks analysis are vital for naming and describing the dangers ahead. But they must be matched with tools that prepare us to navigate them. Wargaming gives us a chance to practise the future — to uncover the gaps in our systems, to rehearse our collective response, and to build the resilience we will need in the years to come.

We might not be able to predict the future perfectly given the speed of change. But we can test the options for potential futures. Wargaming is how we start.

The authors 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.

– ref. Wargaming: the surprisingly effective tool that can help us prepare for modern crises – https://theconversation.com/wargaming-the-surprisingly-effective-tool-that-can-help-us-prepare-for-modern-crises-266907

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Malcolm Claus, Senior Lecturer, Astronautics and Space Technology, Kingston University

An experimental supersonic aircraft called the X-59 took to the skies for the first time in October.

The plane lifted off from Skunk Works, the famed research and development facility in California owned by aerospace giant Lockheed Martin. It cruised for about an hour, before landing at Edwards Air Force Base 85 miles (136km) away.

Nasa’s X-59 is designed to test technology for quiet supersonic flight. In the US, loud sonic booms led to a five-decade ban on non-military supersonic aircraft flying over land.

The ban was lifted this year by the US president Donald Trump, via an executive order. In the UK, supersonic flight over land needs to be specifically approved by the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), which functions independently of government.

The X-59 aims to turn sonic booms into a quieter “sonic thump”. So if this proves possible, how likely is it that we will see a return to commercial supersonic air travel – not seen since the Concorde passenger jet was retired in 2003?

Beginning in the 1950s, the race to achieve commercial supersonic travel was a long and technically challenging one. Teams from the UK and France, consisting of the companies British Aircraft Corporation and Aerospatiale, the US (Boeing) and the Soviet Union (Tupolev) worked on three aircraft to meet this challenge.

Out of these three competing designs only two: Concorde (UK and France) and the Tupolev TU-144 (Soviet Union) produced prototype aircraft and follow-on planes that entered commercial operation.

In the US, the Boeing 2707 aircraft would have carried between 250-300 passengers, three times that of Concorde, and would have done so at a higher cruise speed. However, rising costs, uncertainty about the market for flights and concerns about noise led to the cancellation of the American plane in 1971.

The Soviet TU-144 took to the skies first, on December 31, 1968, while Concorde’s first flight took place in March 1969. The service life of the TU-144 was relatively short, however, lasting from 1975 to 1983.

It initially carried mail, in preparation for passenger services which began in November 1977. However, safety incidents and concern about the economic viability of the plane led to these flights were cancelled in June 1978.

Once passenger flights had been discontinued, the then-Soviet airline Aeroflot operated an updated variant, called the TU-144D, on freight-only services. The withdrawal from service of the TU-144 left Concorde as the only operating commercial supersonic passenger aircraft.

As the standard bearer for supersonic travel, Concorde carried passengers from London and Paris to destinations such as New York, Washington, Rio de Janeiro and Mexico City. But its routes were limited by the US ban on non-military supersonic aircraft flying over land.

The plane operated successfully until July 2000, when Air France flight 4590 crashed shortly after take-off, killing 109 passengers and four people on the ground. Flights by both British Airways and Air France were suspended after the crash, returning only in November 2001. But a lack of confidence and other factors led to the retirement from service of Concorde in 2003.

But within 13 years of the withdrawal of Concorde there was fresh impetus for supersonic travel. In 2016, Nasa launched the Quiet Supersonic Technology (Quesst) project. The aim of Quesst is to investigate aircraft designs which would reduce the sonic boom typically associated with supersonic flight. The centrepiece of the Quesst project is the X-59 an experimental aircraft built by Lockheed Martin at its experimental Skunk Works site in California.

Flying experiment

The X-59 has been designed, manufactured and flown to test both the theories and assumptions relating to low boom technology and to demonstrate that such an aircraft can operate over land without causing disruption on the ground.

The aircraft will act as a flying experiment, collecting data from its test flights which will be disseminated within the aerospace community. This will support current efforts by the companies Boom Supersonic and Spike Aerospace, both of which are proposing their own supersonic aircraft.

So how does the X-59 achieve this? The short answer is in its configuration. The aircraft design has been reached after detailed design work both through extensive computer simulations and through the use of a wind tunnel test programme.

The final configuration which has been reached in effect reshapes the shockwaves produced during supersonic flight, changing the associated boom to a quieter sound. As a result, however, the X-59 does not resemble any conventional aircraft flying today.

The unusual design of the X-59 prevents the shock waves generated at supersonic speed from merging (which would produce the loud boom).

The long, thin tapered nose and other features of the aircraft will mitigate against this by producing a “quieter” boom. This nose, resembling a spear, means that the cockpit for the pilot is located almost halfway down the length of the aircraft.

Its location means that a conventional cockpit window, as seen on all aircraft,` is not possible. Consequently, a number of high-resolution cameras and monitors allow the pilot to fly the aircraft and see what is going on outside.

The X-59 will provide useful flight data on supersonic boom mitigation, which could be applied to future aircraft.

But even when boom mitigation has been addressed, there are still a number of challenges which need to be overcome in order for a new generation of supersonic aircraft to enter service.

A clear and well developed business case will be needed, taking into account the potential customer volume and number of aircraft required. The economics will need to be worked out, such as how much the aircraft costs to operate, its fuel costs and the price of maintenance.

There will also be environmental issues to consider, such as the fuel efficiency of new propulsion systems that can operate for long times under supersonic conditions.

If these challenges can’t be overcome, the rebirth of commercial supersonic travel might remain a distant dream.

Malcolm Claus 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.

– ref. Is supersonic air travel about to return, two decades after the last Concorde flight? – https://theconversation.com/is-supersonic-air-travel-about-to-return-two-decades-after-the-last-concorde-flight-269990

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Simon Goodman, Associate professor, De Montfort University

Keir Starmer has called on Nigel Farage to address allegations of racism in Reform UK, and antisemitic and xenophobic comments and bullying allegedly made by Farage while he was at school. Farage has denied the accusations.

A few weeks before the allegations about Farage emerged, Reform MP Sarah Pochin was accused of racism after saying that it “drives me mad when I see adverts full of black people, full of Asian people”. Farage said that while Pochin’s comments were “ugly”, they did not amount to racism, explaining: “If I thought that the intention behind it was racist, I would have taken a lot more action than I have to date. And that is because I don’t.”

This reaction suggests that, to some extent, it is still a taboo to be seen as racist. But is this taboo losing its strength? As scholars of the social psychology of racism, we think so.

In a recent interview, health secretary Wes Streeting noted that rising racism faced by NHS staff was similar to the “ugly” racism of the 1970s and 80s in the UK.

Streeting made the worrying claim it had now become “socially acceptable to be racist”. Hate crime statistics and other reports support this idea and suggest racism is widespread. Quotes in news reports have echoed the idea that the present climate is reminiscent of overt and violent racism of the recent past.

Social psychologists have shown that people generally do not want to come across as prejudiced. Academic Michael Billig describes this as the “norm against prejudice”.

The overtness of racism and its social acceptability are intertwined. Subtle or hidden racism, by its nature, is hard to call out and easy to deny, so in effect becomes socially acceptable in many situations. Overt racism, on the other hand, breaches common understandings – norms – that racism is wrong.

Anti-immigration

Much research has shown how talk about restricting migration is regularly argued to be prejudiced or racist. Historically, calls for restricting migrants, in the UK at least, have been about excluding ethnic and racial outgroups like Jews, black and brown people or eastern Europeans.

However, because of the norm against prejudice, people typically do not offer openly derogatory descriptions of migrants, such as that they are sexual deviants, lazy, or are inferior to the resident population. However, some high-profile figures and their supports are, arguably, increasingly comfortable doing so.

In 2011, scholar Frank Reeves examined political discourse about race in the House of Commons in the context of the 1962 Commonwealth Immigrants Act. His research showed how MPs would frame calls for stricter migration in terms of problematic race relations between black and “resident” or white populations, instead of saying anything about the supposed superiority of white people.

Similar findings are noted across parliaments in the UK, Australia and Europe, where immigration controls are routinely argued for and justified in terms that do not make racism explicit.

But the current situation suggests this is changing. Anti-migrant protests and demonstrations in the UK show that migrants and refugees are being directly demonised, often from a racist, religous or ethno-nationalist viewpoint. This has included calls to deport asylum seekers and migrants, irrespective of their legal status in the UK, and demonising Islam and cultures that are allegedly not “British”.

Weakening norms

In the last few months, overt anti-migrant racism targeting non-white people has become public around the world, as seen in the riots and racist attacks in Ireland, Australia and the Netherlands. In the UK, attacks on mosques and migrant properties are not unheard of.

In September 2025, the UK saw its largest ever far-right march, the “Unite the Kingdom” rally. Several of the speakers openly called for the removal of migrants or foreigners in the UK, and to transform it into a Christian nation. Such claims could readily be seen as racist.

Read more:
A contemporary history of Britain’s far right – and how it helps explain why so many people went to the Unite the Kingdom rally in London

But for many others on the march, the norm against prejudice appeared to be in operation. When interviewed, people largely gave specific reasons for why they had attended these protests or, to them, why it was okay (and perhaps necessary) to protest.

Racism as a political tool

Accusations of racism are still taboo and treated as unfair labelling. But psychology professor Kevin Durrheim and colleagues have shown how the norm against prejudice is weakening in rightwing populist spaces.

The researchers illustrated this point with a comment from a supporter of Farage during the UKIP years: “I see uncontrolled immigration when I look around. If that makes me racist then so be it. I live in a predominantly racist country (many people share my view) so be it. If you want to call me a racist then go ahead, but please don’t try to tell me up is down and down is up.”

Other research shows that radical right politicians sometimes deal with accusations that they are racist by embracing it and using it to present themselves and their supporters as targets.

It is not a precondition for the rise of the far right that norms against prejudice are weakened, but it does make it harder to challenge. If it is no longer a problem to be viewed as prejudiced, then intimidating marginalised others and calling for deportations becomes easier.

Simon Goodman receives funding from the ESRC and the British Academy

Rahul Sambaraju receives funding from British Academy.

– ref. Is racism becoming more acceptable in the UK? – https://theconversation.com/is-racism-becoming-more-acceptable-in-the-uk-269838

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Anna-Louise Milne, Director of Graduate Studies and Research, University of London Institute in Paris

All along Paris’s River Seine, private foundation money has been pouring into older Parisian institutions to make their buildings hospitable to large modern conceptual works.

Crowds flock to the Bourse du Commerce, for example: once a grain and later a labour market, it has now been transformed by Japanese architect Tadao Ando into clean, white spaces. The same has happened at the recently opened Cartier Foundation, previously a hotel and commercial spaces. French architect Jean Nouvel has redesigned it as a vast contemporary art museum. Inside, it is all sharp lines and glass.

The Petit Palais, in contrast, has preserved its fin-de-siècle curves and contorted ironwork. It’s calm and free to enter, as all Paris city museums are. But there is more to why the Petit Palais is a particularly Parisian exception to the ever-richer landscape of art along the Seine.

In this grand old building, surprisingly, we encounter the “thrill of the modern”, as poet Charles Baudelaire defined it – when the fleeting occurrence meets the gravitas of the eternal in art.

The fleeting occurrence in this instance is Paname, an exhibition by the emerging painter Bilal Hamdad. It is a brilliant display of Baudelaire’s magical combination: a fresh, vibrant take on city life installed amid the treasures of the museum’s permanent collection. The show features 20 of Hamdad’s works, including two specially created that were inspired by the museum’s collection.

Born in Algeria in 1987 and now based in Paris, Hamdad is a regular visitor to the Petit Palais, where he has absorbed the lessons of great masters like Claude Monet, Paul Gaugin and Edgar Degas. His work draws from them in his compositions of ordinary life in contemporary cities. Solitude is a regular theme – as it was for Baudelaire who, like Hamdad, paid particular attention to the city’s labourers as he trudged along the Seine, toolbox in hand.

In Hamdad’s glorious large-format oil paintings, we see women with bags on both shoulders waiting for the metro, and young men perched on railings waiting for whatever work or encounter might come their way. There are market scenes with older women selling corn on the cob from shopping caddies, and boys shifting contraband cigarettes to middle-class folk with their sunglasses and carefully strapped handbags.

Though Hamdad works from photographs, which he has described as his sketchbook, his works have a depth and intensity that transforms the ordinary into the mythical, casting the details of contemporary fashion and posture in a timeless, mysterious light. Most enigmatic in this show is the subtle reworking of Édouard Manet’s 1882 painting Un bar aux Folies Bergère, which hangs in the Courtauld Gallery in London.

In the original, Manet plays with the effects of a large, tarnished mirror behind the bar. The mirror reflects the hidden back of a barmaid who looks blankly outwards alongside the bottles and other enticing offerings on the bar. In the reflection, Manet depicts her both as the object of our peering gaze and as removed from us, more delicate and perhaps more vulnerable.

Hamdad’s Sérénité d’une ombre (Serenity of a shadow, 2024) develops the intimacy of Manet’s back view, pushing it further into the shadows. The brightly lit foreground shows us the bar, recognisable as Manet’s with an equally beautiful bowl of shiny oranges and a delicate rose composition. In the background, we can just make out a barman – dressed in a white shirt that suggests the crumples of a working day moulded onto a working body.

The moment is wistful and withdrawn, yet it echoes with the clatter and confusion of the contemporary city. It hangs, as does all of Hamdad’s installation, among the eclectic galleries of the Petit Palais – a window onto a different sort of time. In this conversation between old and new, the viewer knows immediately that this work is here to last.

Bilal Hamdad’s Paname is on at the Petit Palais in Paris until February 8 2026

Looking for something good? Cut through the noise with a carefully curated selection of the latest releases, live events and exhibitions, straight to your inbox every fortnight, on Fridays. Sign up here.

Anna-Louise Milne 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.

– ref. Bilal Hamdad’s Paname shows the thrill of new art when embedded within the grandeur of the old – https://theconversation.com/bilal-hamdads-paname-shows-the-thrill-of-new-art-when-embedded-within-the-grandeur-of-the-old-270196

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Jack Shelbourn, Senior Lecturer and Director of Photography, University of Lincoln

Millions of us unwind with reality television. It’s comforting, social and, when the format is good, brilliantly engineered drama. But there’s an invisible carbon cost to all that escapism.

Plenty of attention has been paid to the carbon footprint of big Hollywood productions, but less so to unscripted TV. Yet the key emitters are similar: travel, energy and materials.

The British Film Institute’s Screen New Deal, a landmark 2020 report on the environmental impact of UK Film Production, found that an average tent-pole show (a high-budget feature that is expected to be a success) produces around 2,840 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO₂e) during production. That’s roughly the annual absorption of more than 3,000 acres of forest, and the equivalent of 11 one-way trips to the Moon.

In television, the pattern persists. Bafta’s latest industry data, drawn from thousands of UK and international TV productions, reports about 174,000 tonnes of CO₂e were generated from productions completed in 2024. Travel and transport made up around 65% of that footprint, and energy a further 21%.

These productions burned some 3 million litres of generator fuel last year, while only 2% of recorded car journeys were electric. Flights alone contributed about 30% of total industry emissions in 2024.

And these numbers cover only the “making of” column. They don’t include the downstream emissions from distribution data centres and the devices we watch on. Nor do they capture what economists call “induced demand” – when screen stories inspire consumption.

The Traitors and the carbon of desire

Take The Traitors. The BBC show’s core is psychological: people at a table trying to read each other. Yet the look and feel are scaffolded by a language of luxury adventure – convoys of vehicles, helicopter shots and speedboats.

When a prestige reality show glamorises high-carbon lifestyles, it doesn’t just burn emissions during production – it normalises this behaviour. Research on ITV’s dating show Love Island has shown how a programme’s aesthetic and product associations can directly spike audience consumption patterns, from fast fashion to cosmetic procedures.

Bafta’s climate content analysis also highlights how screen narratives can legitimise environmentally harmful choices through repetition and tone. This fits within a wider media pattern where screen culture reinforces certain identities, aspirations and ways of living. When the “aspirational” look is carbon-heavy, the influence is felt far beyond the set.

In the Traitors, contestants are driven around the Scottish Highlands in vintage Land Rover Defenders, complete with custom number plates. The car-selling website Autotrader saw 90,000 searches for this model in January 2024 when The Traitors was on air – a spike seen again in 2025 during Celebrity Traitors.

Under Bafta’s sustainability framework, most UK broadcasters now require a carbon action plan before filming begins, and must measure their full carbon impact after completing each show. Compliance is encouraged through certifications and is increasingly written into broadcaster contracts.

That’s progress – but the Bafta data shows stubborn problems remain: planes, road fleets, diesel power and material waste.

Practical fixes exist – trains instead of short-haul flights, economy class where flying is unavoidable, electric vehicles instead of diesel, plant-forward catering and circular set design.

Cutting one in four flights and switching a third of road journeys to electric vehicles would, on Bafta’s modelling, significantly reduce the sector’s footprint. Replacing diesel with hydrotreated vegetable oil and prioritising hybrids could drive further reductions.

Changing what ‘exciting’ looks like

The most powerful lever isn’t always new technology, it’s commissioning – choosing formats that don’t need high-carbon logistics to feel exciting. We don’t need to cancel fantasy to cut emissions – we need to change what “exciting” looks like. Three shifts would get us there fast:

1. Rebalance the grammar of spectacle.

Reality TV doesn’t become dull when you strip out the expensive convoy. The Traitors proves the opposite. The most gripping moments in the show happen around the table, not behind the wheel. Drama doesn’t need horsepower to hold our attention.

2. Localise by default.

The biggest savings come when productions avoid flights altogether. Productions that hire local crews and cast and choose accessible locations can slash travel emissions while investing in communities. The BFI Sustainable Screen: Black Samphire report shows how integrating local action, from beach cleans to a “climate positive clause” in production, can turn community engagement into both a sustainability and legacy strategy.

3. Design low-energy craft into the look.

Cameras and lighting can now deliver strong results with smaller, fewer fixtures and more reflective control, cutting power and transport without harming picture quality. In my teaching and research, I’ve demonstrated that replacing all the lights and clutter on a film set with a single light source, which is then bounced around the set to create the illusion of many lights, can replace multi-head rigs for many scenes, slashing energy use while improving speed and safety.

Productions that rely less on diesel and long-haul logistics are cheaper to insure, easier to schedule, quieter on location and more resilient to fuel-price shocks and grid constraints.

Audiences aren’t powerless. I love The Traitors – I’ve watched all the UK seasons and some international ones too. It’s a great way to get through the post-Christmas blues. But it’s time we asked broadcasters to publish their carbon action plans in plain English – and for us to celebrate productions that make their low-carbon choices visible through smart logistics and elegant craft.

We’ve learned to recognise intimacy coordinators and accessibility credits – sustainability leads should be there too.

Reality TV isn’t the villain of the climate story. But it is a powerful amplifier of taste. If commissioners prioritise formats that deliver drama without flights, convoys and diesel, and crews embrace low-energy craft, the sector can cut much of its footprint – while telling even better stories.

The climate crisis has a communications problem. How do we tell stories that move people – not just to fear the future, but to imagine and build a better one? This article is part of Climate Storytelling, a series exploring how arts and science can join forces to spark understanding, hope and action.

Jack Shelbourn is affiliated with The Green party of England and Wales, as a member.

– ref. The hidden carbon cost of reality TV shows like The Traitors – https://theconversation.com/the-hidden-carbon-cost-of-reality-tv-shows-like-the-traitors-269675

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Bran Nicol, Professor of English, University of Surrey

From HBO drama Succession to Netflix reality show Selling Sunset, TV depictions of work tend to treat it as a vehicle for social betterment rather than a means to survival. The Chinese writer Hu Anyan’s arresting memoir, I Deliver Parcels in Beijing, just published in an English translation, provides an alternative perspective.

The book began life as a lockdown blog post about its author’s experiences in a logistics warehouse. When it went viral, he reshaped it into a book about his time working as a courier and in a range of other low-paid positions, from waiter to gas station attendant.

It has now sold almost 2 million copies in China, and nearly 20 countries have translation rights. The 46-year-old Hu was dubbed “one of China’s most remarkable new literary talents” by the Financial Times.

Despite documenting hardship and frustration, I Deliver Parcels in Beijing is narrated in an intimate and witty style – for which English translator Jack Hargreaves deserves great credit.

It’s an unforgettable portrayal of the gruelling realities of work in the gig economy. The book covers the dire effects on sleep and health, punishing shifts without breaks, stressed-out bosses and rivalries between workers. It’s packed with engaging stories about the people Hu works with and delivers to.

Though the central theme is about work in general, the book’s title shrewdly highlights one job which now occupies a particularly prominent position both socially and culturally. During the pandemic online delivery driving was termed a new “emergency service” – a function which had been prophetically mythologised in the 2019 action-adventure video game, Death Stranding, which casts the courier as post-apocalyptic saviour.

Read more:
Souleymane’s Story: the quietly devastating tale of an immigrant worker’s struggles in Paris

Earlier this year Stephen Starring Grant’s touching memoir Mailman showed that the true purpose of being a letter carrier in rural Appalachia was to provide a lifeline for the isolated and lonely.

Autobiographical writing such as Grant’s – and now Hu’s – shows that the narrow perspective of one person’s experience can also illuminate something much broader. By presenting his life as a patchwork of all the jobs he has had, Hu provides a powerful insight into a much larger system – or rather into three vast systems which have profoundly shaped contemporary existence.

There is the enormous, largely hidden, network of logistics and “platform capitalism” – the system which uses digital platforms to connect different users in the economic chain – upon which we all increasingly depend. I Deliver Parcels in Beijing allows us to peek inside this world, and learn how it operates – from the bureaucratic labyrinth of being onboarded as a contractor to the frustrations of having to cover the cost of lost parcels, or to wait while customers try on clothes they’ve ordered on the spot.

Then there are the glimpses of everyday life in contemporary China, a driving force behind much of the world’s economy but still mysterious to those in the west. Hu’s book shines a light on the predicament of “internal migrants” – the members of a 300-million strong workforce uprooted from their rural hometowns to find work in cities, where their undocumented status forbids them access to social services.

But it also provides rich insight into all sorts of distinctive aspects of Chinese life, from social and culinary customs to a village in which everyone still shares the same surname.

But enveloping all this is the irrepressible system of late-stage capitalism – which China is able to inhabit so formidably through its unique blend of market economy and state-owned and private business. For those in the west, to read I Deliver Parcels in Beijing is to enter a fascinating parallel universe.

There is no Amazon but the vast Alibaba ecosystem of online retail, WeChat instead of Facebook, and Goade Maps rather than Google Maps. But in its charming, understated way, the book is a vivid account of the process Marxists term “alienation”.

Work in the gig economy is a means to survive rather than a form of self-expression. Its workers do not control their labour nor own its products, and can become dehumanised.

Though too modest and self-deprecating to be a memoir with a strong political message, I Deliver Parcels in Beijing is nevertheless a quietly critical story of how it feels to be stuck in this system.

After a few weeks as a delivery driver Hu begins to notice his personality changing. He finds himself shouting at an annoying customer, and feeling nothing when he makes an old man wait for his delivery on the sidewalk for nearly three hours.

It is reasonable to assume, from his memoir’s inspiring, open-hearted humanity, that this does not represent the person Hu really is. As he writes, however: “There is a reason that deep-sea fish are blind, and animals in the desert tolerant of thirst – a big part of who I am is determined by my environment and not my nature.”

Looking for something good? Cut through the noise with a carefully curated selection of the latest releases, live events and exhibitions, straight to your inbox every fortnight, on Fridays. Sign up here.

This article features references to books that have been included for editorial reasons, and may contain links to bookshop.org. If you click on one of the links and go on to buy something from bookshop.org The Conversation UK may earn a commission.

Bran Nicol 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.

– ref. I Deliver Parcels in Beijing by Hu Anyan: an unforgettable look at gig-economy hardship – https://theconversation.com/i-deliver-parcels-in-beijing-by-hu-anyan-an-unforgettable-look-at-gig-economy-hardship-269157

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Christopher Saville, Clinical Senior Lecturer, School of Psychology and Sport Science, Bangor University

Choking during sex has moved from the margins to the mainstream for many young adults, but the risks have not changed. New research shows how common the practice has become, and how confused many people are about what makes it dangerous.

A survey commissioned by the Institute for Addressing Strangulation (IfAS) has found that more than one-third of people aged 18 to 34 have been choked or strangled at least once during consensual sex. IfAS is a UK-based organisation that aims to reduce harms from strangulation in domestic abuse, sexual contexts and forensic settings – environments where injuries are examined for legal, evidential or investigative purposes.

The survey findings suggest that pornography featuring choking is helping to normalise strangulation during sex among young adults. The report was published as the UK government prepares to ban such content in the upcoming crime and policing bill.

While many participants reported positive experiences, others described deeply negative experiences, and just over one-quarter said they had been choked without agreeing to it first. This raises particular concern because choking during sex sometimes intersects with domestic abuse and non-fatal strangulation is a known predictor of serious harm in intimate partner violence.

When a behaviour that is well documented in coercive and violent relationships becomes normalised in consensual settings, the boundaries can blur. Young people may struggle to distinguish experimentation from harm and may feel pressured to accept acts they do not want. The survey’s accounts of distress and lack of consent highlight how these boundaries can erode.

One of the most revealing parts of the survey explored how people think about danger. Almost three-quarters of respondents described choking during sex as either “very dangerous” or “somewhat dangerous”. However, when asked whether it is possible to strangle someone safely during sex, opinions were divided. Twenty-nine percent believed it is possible, 39% believed it is not and 32% were unsure.

Participants also gave a wide range of answers about how a person might try to make this safer. One important theme was that participants were divided about whether it is more important to avoid pressing on the airway or on the blood vessels in the neck.

This confusion matters because the body responds very differently to these types of pressure. Strangulation denies the brain oxygen and this can happen in two ways.

One involves blocking the airway, which makes breathing difficult or impossible. The other involves interrupting the flow of blood to and from the brain, by blocking blood vessels on the side of the neck.

Some people use the word choking for the first and strangulation for the second, but these terms are often used in confusing ways.

A key difference is how quickly these two types of strangulation affect the brain. Blocking breathing can take around one minute to cause unconsciousness. Blocking blood flow can cause unconsciousness in as little as five to ten seconds.

Another difference is that restricted breathing feels uncomfortable and obvious, while restricted blood flow can be hard to recognise until it is too late. It is not intuitive to people that they can be strangled while still being able to breathe.

Strangulation’s rapid effects happen because the brain depends on a constant supply of oxygen. If oxygen is cut off, the brain can suffer damage very quickly. Some areas such as the hippocampus, which plays a central role in memory, are particularly vulnerable.

As oxygen levels fall, the brain tries to protect itself by reducing its own use of oxygen, which causes unconsciousness. If oxygen is not restored quickly, brain cells begin to die.

Strangulation can also harm the body in other ways. Sexual choking can cause a range of physical and psychological injuries and, in extreme cases, can be fatal. During or after choking a person may experience trouble breathing, pain or difficulty swallowing, loss of bladder or bowel control, memory problems or psychological trauma.

In rare cases, choking during sex can trigger a stroke. This can happen if a blood vessel is damaged and bleeds, or if blood pools behind a blockage and forms a clot that later travels to a smaller vessel.

What can be done?

Public health has two broad approaches to risky behaviour. The first is prohibition, which creates legal or practical barriers to prevent dangerous acts.

The UK government’s plan to ban pornography that shows choking is one example. However, sexual practices take place in private settings and cannot be monitored or restricted in the same way as access to pornography, which limits the reach of prohibition.

The second approach is harm reduction. It accepts that people may continue a behaviour even if discouraged and aims to help them reduce the risks. This approach is complicated in the case of sexual choking, because misinformation is widespread and many online communities promote inaccurate ideas about “safe” practice.

Both approaches attract debate. Prohibition is sometimes criticised as intrusive or unrealistic, and harm reduction as condoning dangerous or immoral behaviours. But they do not have to work against each other. They can operate together by reducing the likelihood of a behaviour while equipping people with accurate information about risk.

The IfAS survey shows that many young people misunderstand what makes strangulation dangerous – and this gap in knowledge could have life-threatening consequences. Education that explains how strangulation affects the body could help reduce harm by giving people a clearer sense of the risks involved.

Accurate information would also support wider public health efforts by helping people recognise why certain sexual practices carry significant danger, and why legal and clinical responses are being developed to address them.

Christopher Saville was a partner on a Home Office funded research project with IfAS, who conducted the survey, and provided some early advice to them about the survey.

– ref. Choking during sex is common among young adults, but the risks are poorly understood – https://theconversation.com/choking-during-sex-is-common-among-young-adults-but-the-risks-are-poorly-understood-270252

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Lewis Eves, Lecturer in the School of Politics and International Relations, University of Nottingham

Tensions are rising between China and Japan again over a dispute in the East China Sea. Such tensions are usually over the Senkaku Islands, an uninhabited chain administered by Japan but claimed by China. The current row, however, stems from international anxiety over a possible Chinese invasion of democratically ruled Taiwan.

On November 17, in her first parliamentary address since taking office in October, Japan’s prime minister Sanae Takaichi suggested that her country could intervene militarily in the event of an attack on Taiwan. Takaichi’s comments sparked anger in China, with state media framing her rhetoric as reminiscent of Japanese acts of violence towards China during the second world war.

Beijing has demanded that Takaichi retract her comments – a call she has rebuffed – and is advising Chinese citizens against travelling to Japan, claiming there has been a deterioration in public security there. China has also introduced a blanket ban on Japanese seafood imports as the row continues to escalate.

The ruling communist party, which frames itself as the protector of the Chinese nation, has long sought to reunify China following the so-called “century of humiliation”. Starting with the first opium war in 1839 and concluding with the end of the second world war in 1945, this period saw China victimised and partitioned by various foreign powers.

Taiwan is thus problematic for the party. The island state broke away from China in 1949 at the end of the Chinese civil war, and its autonomy from Beijing contradicts the goal of national unity that the party has promised. Some observers fear that China will seek reunification through force, with some predictions suggesting it will be ready to invade Taiwan as soon as 2027.

There is no guarantee that an invasion will occur. But the international community, led by the US, is preparing for a confrontation over Taiwan regardless. On the same day Takaichi made her comments, the US government announced it had agreed to sell US$700 million (£535 million) of arms to Taiwan.

In this context, Japan’s show of support for a strategic partner in the region is not surprising – yet Takaichi’s remarks about Japanese intervention are particularly provocative for China. One reason is that Japan occupied and colonised Taiwan from 1895 to 1945, contributing to China’s century of humiliation. This makes Japanese threats to intervene in Taiwan’s defence a contentious prospect for China to consider.

Another reason is that anti-Japanese sentiment is a prominent characteristic of Chinese nationalism. Many Chinese nationalists are vocal in condemning Japan for any provocation, pointing to historical atrocities committed against China as evidence of a need to stay vigilant against renewed Japanese aggression. The idea of Japan intervening to maintain the status quo in what China considers a breakaway province probably falls under their idea of an aggressive act.

Will tensions escalate?

Outright conflict between China and Japan remains unlikely. It is possible that Takaichi’s remarks were simply an effort to shore up domestic political support, rather than a genuine military threat.

Her rightwing Liberal Democratic party (LDP) previously governed Japan in coalition with the centre-right Komeito party. This coalition broke down in October 2025, forcing the LDP to rely increasingly on its nationalist base for support – a group that is generally suspicious of China’s growing military and economic strength.

Irrespective of Takaichi’s motive, China has responded assertively. It sent its coast guard to the Senkaku Islands in what it called a “rights enforcement patrol”. The Japanese government has also accused China of flying military drones near Japan’s most westerly territory, Yonaguni, which is close to Taiwan’s east coast. Any misfire risks open hostility between the two nations.

Relations between Japan and China are tense, yet I see cause for optimism. Takaichi has positioned herself as a successor to the late Shinzo Abe, who served as Japan’s prime minister from 2006 to 2007 and again from 2012 to 2020.

Like Takaichi, Abe promoted an assertive Japanese foreign policy. He oversaw reinterpretations of Article 9, the pacifist clause of Japan’s constitution, to lessen restrictions on his country’s use of military force. This included passing legislation in 2015 which allows Japan’s self-defence force to deploy to protect the country’s allies. This legislation has enabled Takaichi to consider military intervention in Taiwan’s favour.

When Abe entered office in 2012, it was also a tense time for China and Japan. Japanese nationalist activists swam to the Senkaku Islands and raised their country’s flag, triggering massive anti-Japanese protests in China. Tensions remained high for several years, with both countries deploying ships and warplanes to the region.

This resulted in several near-misses that could have escalated into outright conflict. In 2014, Chinese fighter jets flew extremely close to a Japanese surveillance plane and intelligence aircraft near the islands, passing about 30 metres from one plane and 50 metres from another.

However, once tensions passed, Abe and China’s leader, Xi Jinping, oversaw several years of relative calm and cooperation between their two countries. In fact, this is usually linked to the familiarity Abe and Xi developed through their interactions while managing their countries’ mutual animosity over the disputed islands.

So, if Takaichi can follow her mentor’s lead and successfully navigate the tensions to build an effective working relationship with Xi, a more stable relationship between China and Japan in the future is still possible.

Lewis Eves 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.

– ref. Why Japan’s support for Taiwan has gone down so badly in China – https://theconversation.com/why-japans-support-for-taiwan-has-gone-down-so-badly-in-china-270112

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Rowena Hill, Professor of Psychology, Nottingham Trent University

When climate change is discussed, whether at UN climate summits, in company boardrooms or in the media, the focus is often on mitigation (cutting greenhouse gas emissions to achieve net zero). Adaptation, the practical steps to prepare for the consequences of a changing climate, receives far less attention in the UK and globally.

Tech billionaire and philanthropist Bill Gates recently sparked debate by arguing against a mitigation-only approach. His point wasn’t to dismiss climate action, but to stress that adaptation and mitigation should work together alongside health, housing and prosperity needs.

Adaptation centres on how the world should respond to the weather-related effects of a changing climate, resulting from the emissions we have emitted – and continue to emit.

Read more:
How five countries are adapting to the climate crisis

The UN has warned that the world has missed its target to keep global warming in line with 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels. Scientists broadly agree that above 1.5°C, the world will start to experience irreversible tipping points in places like the Amazon rainforest, which risks becoming grassland or savanna, and Greenland, which faces permanent snow and ice melts.

Indeed, referring to climate change as average global rises in temperature hides the extremes many people will experience. Instead of a steady line on a graph, changes in temperature may look more like spiky peaks and troughs, signifying ever-more extreme episodes of flooding and drought.

Even in the usually temperate UK, this more extreme weather may affect people in unexpected ways. For example, during heatwaves above 35°C, children’s sports clubs will need to consider the weather before deciding whether they can continue without breaching their insurance.

The chance of spending time under drought conditions is expected to increase by 86% in the UK, so how people garden and use open water spaces, as well as their activities in and on water, will all probably face more restrictions.

Also, some UK housing may become expensive or impossible to insure, due to the response of the insurance industry to instances of repeat or foreseeable flooding or fire risk. As weather conditions make wildfires more likely, there will be more restrictions on what people can do outside in grass, moorland or forest areas.

Like most countries, the UK has a way to go towards adequately adapting, according to the government’s Climate Change Committee, which monitors both mitigation and adaptation. Its adaptation reports conclude there has been a lack of actionable progress in preparing for the UK’s changing climate, and an absence of leadership and strategy at a national level.

Without forward planning and adaptation measures, managing the effects of storms, floods and extreme heat in UK hospitals, prisons, care homes and social housing will grow ever harder – with severe consequences for the health of many people in the most at-risk communities who live in these buildings.

Getting prepared

My research on societal-wide risk and resilience focuses on how we understand risks and what we can do to prepare for them.

While we cannot stop further increases in the magnitude or frequency of adverse weather, there are things people can do to reduce the consequences on their way of life – by following the principles of adaptation.

Being prepared to protect yourself and vulnerable neighbours in advance of local emergencies such as a flood will become more important as the pressure increases on emergency services. These services will also need different equipment and training to cope with the challenges of responding to such emergencies.

Lobbying supermarkets and asking what they are doing to support food resilience can help build more sustainable food systems, especially as agriculture gets threatened globally and supply chains get more precarious due to extreme weather or crop failure.

Encouraging organisations responsible for people’s recreation, heritage and culture to safeguard precious trees, buildings and other places of importance to communities will protect the things we feel represent us and our way of life. In the UK, we have seen the enormous impact of losing symbolic cultural assets such as the Sycamore Gap tree, or National Trust and English Heritage buildings.

Having discussions in workplaces, schools and community spaces can help spark ideas about how to best plan for people’s wellbeing during heatwaves, storms and other extreme weather. Schools are closed on exceptional “snow days”, for example, but extending their inclement weather policies to cover flooding could help protect more people.

Creating a well-adapted nation is not easy. But positioning adaptation as part of a broader effort to meet wider societal needs (such as poverty, poor housing, health and economic growth) reframes the climate conversation from sacrifice and compensation to resilience and quality of life.

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Rowena Hill receives funding from Research Councils and Local Authorities to complete work on the impacts of climate change. She is affiliated with the Climate Security National Foresight Group.

– ref. What does climate adaptation actually mean? An expert explains – https://theconversation.com/what-does-climate-adaptation-actually-mean-an-expert-explains-269122