Category: The Conversation – UK

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Michael Woods, Professor of Human Geography, Aberystwyth University

Wales prides itself in being a pioneer in environmental policy. It was the first country in the world to adopt a statutory duty for public bodies to make development sustainable, in 2015. Yet, environmental issues have rarely featured prominently in elections to the Senedd (the Welsh parliament).

This year is different. Wales votes for a new Senedd in May and parties are using contentious statements around environmental issues to differentiate themselves. Issues including windfarms, expansion of pylons and support for farmers are already starting to be fiercely debated.

For the first time, Reform UK is a major player in Welsh politics, and is using the urban-rural divide as part of its messaging. Recent polling has been suggesting that Senedd control could be a close fought battle between Reform and Plaid Cymru, a centre-left Welsh nationalist party.

But one new poll by YouGov for ITV Cymru Wales and Cardiff University has just suggested Plaid is now pulling ahead, up seven percentage points since September. Analysis suggests this could be most significant election in Wales for 100 years, with a major shift away from Labour.

The Senedd has been led by a Labour government since its creation in 1999, when it was known as the National Assembly. Labour has traditionally held the vote in the urban areas of Wales, while the less populated rural areas historically voted Conservative, Liberal or Plaid.

Farming and the environment

One big issue that shows how the campaign battle is unfolding is around the Welsh government’s new sustainable farming scheme (SFS). Designed as a post-Brexit replacement for the common agricultural policy (which provided support for UK farmers when the UK was an EU member), the SFS ties financial assistance for farmers more strongly to environmental objectives than the EU assistance did.

The original plans proposed that farmers would be required to plant 10% of their land with trees to qualify for support. The proposal provoked vociferous opposition from farmers, who feared that the viability of small farms would be threatened, with several protests across Wales. Over half of farms in Wales are small, under 20 hectares, and typically operate on tight margins.

On average, farms in Wales are the least profitable of farms in the four UK nations. The average farm income for all farm types in Wales was £34,300 in 2021. This compared to £34,402 in Northern Ireland, £39,347 in Scotland and £51,900 in England.

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Read more:
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While the Welsh government backed down and moderated the SFS requirements, the episode has reinforced a perception that Labour doesn’t understand the countryside. The perception has been both stoked and exploited by opposition parties, notably Reform UK, which is targeting Welsh farmers for support.

Reform leader Nigel Farage attracted large crowds when he appeared at the Royal Welsh Show in July 2025 and used a rally in Llandudno in November to attack Labour’s agricultural and environmental policies. Reform’s strategy in Wales is primarily aimed at converting voters from the Conservatives, who have also been vocal critics of the SFS, but rural discontent with Labour could threaten First Minister Eluned Morgan’s chances of re-election in the rural Ceredigion Penfro constituency.

Reform’s messaging to Welsh farmers includes statements opposing mass tree planting and rewilding and backing livestock farming. These positions refer to wider debates in Wales around the contribution of livestock farming to climate change as well as different approaches to land management and food production.

Protesting pylons

Among the most contentious issues is the conversion of land in Wales for renewable energy generation. According to the Campaign to Protect Rural Wales there were over 50 planned onshore windfarm projects in early 2025, many accompanied by local opposition.

Campaign groups are also protesting against plans for new lines of pylons to connect windfarms in upland Wales with urban centres, especially in Powys and Carmarthenshire. Both the Conservatives and Reform UK have backed pylon campaigners but opposition is not limited to those parties.

Plaid has also outlined some opposition to pylon projects, favouring more expensive underground cabling. This position, along with alignment with farmers on the SFS, reflects the importance of rural areas as heartlands for the party.

Yet, some commentators argue that there is a contradiction between these stances and Plaid Cymru’s strong green rhetoric on climate change, that could be targeted by a Labour party willing to defend its policies as necessary pro-climate actions.

Rivers and roads

Several other locally significant issues have potential to be amplified nationally in the campaign. Pollution of the River Wye, which runs along the Welsh-English border, from intensive poultry units helped the Greens to win North Herefordshire across the border in the 2024 UK general election.

It is also a concern in the Senedd constituencies through which it runs, Brycheiniog Tawe Nedd and Sir Fynwy Torfaen. The former is the top target for the Liberal Democrats, who campaigned on water quality in Brecon, Radnor and Cwmtawe during the UK election in 2024.

The long-running issue of the Newport relief road could also be resurrected by parties seeking to advocate a pro-motorist platform. Plans to relieve congestion on the M4 by building a new motorway through the Gwent Levels split the Labour party and were cancelled in 2019 as incompatible with Wales’s sustainable development commitments.

The rise of the Greens

One factor that could help to further propel environment issues to prominence is increased support for the Green party in Wales. The January YouGov poll put the Greens ahead of Labour, in third place on 13%. If that polling trend holds, the Greens could have a decisive role in the formation of the next administration.

The Greens are in competition with Plaid for disaffected Labour voters, but with their key targets in urban south Wales they are less beholden to appeasing rural voters. As such, emphasising more radical positions on agriculture, renewable energy, and river pollution could help to differentiate the Greens from Plaid and set up potential wins in post-election negotiations between the parties.

In May environment issues are likely to play a bigger part in shaping the outcome of the election in Wales than they ever have done before.

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Michael Woods receives funding from UKRI. He is a member of the Liberal Democrats.

– ref. Environment issues have never been so fiercely debated in a Welsh election campaign as they will be in 2026 – https://theconversation.com/environment-issues-have-never-been-so-fiercely-debated-in-a-welsh-election-campaign-as-they-will-be-in-2026-273161

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Anton Roberts, Sociologist and Social Policy Researcher at the Policy Evaluation and Researcher Unit at Manchester Metropolitan University, Manchester Metropolitan University

The government’s recently announced grand plan to end homelessness in England is the latest instalment in a long line of promises (and failures) by governments across the UK. This latest strategy, published in December, promises billions in investment in rough sleeping services, alongside a previous commitment to build 1.5 million new homes by the end of this parliament.

It’s an attempt to address the UK’s acute housing crisis. On the surface, there is plenty to praise in the plan, and these proposals are already receiving support from the wider sector.

For example, the scrapping of the two-child benefit limit will lift many vulnerable children out of poverty. And the strategy hints at more preventative approaches to the problem of homelessness.

But there’s a problem. Can the government achieve this objective within the narrow political window that this parliament offers? If not, perhaps it should consider whether this is the most effective use of public money.

One striking omission in the strategy is the absence of a commitment to the “housing first” model which, as the name suggests, would provide immediate access to housing for a homeless person. This omission is surprising, given the report’s repeated emphasis on housing as a solution.

Housing first combines an unconditional home with range of wraparound services for things like mental health problems or addiction. It’s distinct in being a genuinely long-term housing intervention, catering to those with multiple and complex needs. It is one of the most robustly evidenced homelessness interventions.

There are some isolated case studies of housing first mentioned in the report, but responsibility once again falls to the third sector. Charitable organisations are already forced to compete for insufficent funding pots, while also working alongside cash-strapped local authorities.

The average cost of housing first support per person is highly economical, according to the government’s own cost-and-benefit analysis data. The expected benefits to society have been calculated at £15,880 per person, which is more than double the £7,737 average cost.

According to a recent report from the charity Crisis evaluating housing first trials, a national roll out would cost £226 million per year. But this would be offset by reductions in provision burdens, equivalent to £280 million per year. This equates to total cost of £17,068 per individual per year, with a related saving surplus of £3,313.

The false economy of ‘business as usual’

Moral and human costs aside, homelessness is astoundingly expensive. Temporary accommodation alone costs billions each year. Although exact data on this is sparse, people experiencing rough sleeping are often referred to as “frequent flyers” through public services such as A&E departments, police and the courts.

The most recent calculation from Crisis, which goes back to 2015, estimated the annual cost of rough sleeping to be around £20,000 per person (or £27,872 when adjusted for inflation). This is due to things like use of NHS services, policing and the courts system. As seen with the government’s own rough sleeping snapshot, it continues to rise in the UK.

Arguably, business as usual isn’t working. There is little point in diverting funding to services that don’t work, or funding housing programmes for people with complex needs who may not be ready for a tenancy. If the aim is to reduce or end homelessness sustainably, the answer is not more short-term funding, but significant structural reform.

In my research with my colleague, Joanne Massey, we explored some of these wider structural constraints facing people in poverty. We framed these constraints as forms of intentional and unintentional harms by the state. They include a welfare system where, despite annual rises, the range of benefits remains out of touch with living costs, alongside things like universal credit sanctions that make already difficult lives even more challenging.

Without confronting these, homelessness cannot be prevented or reduced. As such, the report falls short. For this to be a pragmatic and cost-effective strategy, the system must change from one of economically wasteful short-termism. There is no shortage of impactful and evidence-based examples – including housing first.

However, merely increasing funding will not achieve the necessary changes. The government must also commit to a public health approach. This means prioritising prevention through early intervention, as well as tackling the causes of homelessness at their structural root. Homelessness is a problem for all of society to address.

And merely listing poverty as a cause of homelessness does nothing to address it permanently, nor replace what has been lost from hundreds of billions of pounds of cuts to public services. A public health approach to homelessness would address challenges like these at the individual, community and societal levels simultaneously. It would also be a better use of taxpayer funds.

As an example, efforts in Wales to improve health with a prevention strategy produced a £14 return for every £1 invested using a public health approach. There was an annual saving of £9,266 per person when using preventative homelessness programmes. This approach combines the third sector, council services, education, health and the criminal justice system into one coherent strategy.

The government’s homelessness strategy is a positive start, but it will not replace what has been lost. Nor, as it stands, will it address the complex reasons why homelessness persists.

Anton Roberts 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. The UK spends millions on services for homeless people. Housing them could make more economic sense – https://theconversation.com/the-uk-spends-millions-on-services-for-homeless-people-housing-them-could-make-more-economic-sense-272569

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Paul Whiteley, Professor, Department of Government, University of Essex

British electoral politics in the 1980s were dominated by Margaret Thatcher, the prime minister for the whole of that decade. Similarly, Tony Blair dominated elections when he was in Downing Street from 1997 to 2007. In sharp contrast, the decade from 2015 to 2025 saw no fewer than six prime ministers come (and mostly go) – five Conservatives and Keir Starmer for Labour.

Traditionally, Labour has been reluctant to sack its leader, but if the May elections turn out to be as bad as the polls suggest, the party might well adopt the Conservative strategy of changing its leader as frequently as premier league football managers.

However, the data suggests that sacking Starmer after those elections would be a mistake. This is because voters focus much more on the performance of the government overall than the prime minister when it comes to casting a ballot.

If he were removed, it would also trigger a serious internal conflict in the party on the scale of the turmoil in the Conservative party over Brexit. This played a major role in explaining the Tories’ massive defeat in the 2024 general election.

Trends in voting intentions, satisfaction with governments and with prime ministers for governing parties, 2015 to 2025:

To see why this is the case, we can examine polling data on perceptions of the performance of incumbent governments and prime ministers alongside data on voting intentions for their parties over the decade since 2015. The key comparison is between the effects of the performance of governments with that of prime ministers on the vote.

The relationship between these variables is very strong, with correlations all greater than 0.80. It is tricky to find out which of the satisfaction measures is most important for predicting the vote, but this can be done with the help of multiple regression. This is a statistical technique that can predict changes in vote intentions from the satisfaction measures together with some other variables which also influence voting for governing parties.

These other variables in the analysis relate to challenger parties affecting both Conservative and Labour governments. The three national challenger parties are Reform, the Liberal Democrats and the Greens.

In the case of Reform, I’ve included vote intentions for its ancestor parties, UKIP and the Brexit party, since it did not officially exist until 2021. The focus is on explaining voting intentions for the Conservative government from 2015 to 2024 and subsequently the Labour government up to 2025.

The effects of the satisfaction measures and the challenger parties on support for the governing parties appear in the chart below. The analysis identifies the impact of each variable on changes in vote intentions for the governing party.

To illustrate, a score of 1.0 would mean that a 1% increase in the satisfaction with government would produce a 1% increase in voting intentions for the governing party. In fact, the coefficient is 0.2, a lot less than 1.0 but nonetheless highly significant. An increase of 10% in government satisfaction increases government vote intentions by 2%.

Impact of variables on voting intentions for governing parties:

The same cannot be said about the effects of satisfaction with the prime minister. This had a negligible impact on voting for the government. It’s not surprising that polling on the popularity or unpopularity of the prime minister attracts a lot of media attention. After all, they are the main spokesperson for the party. But when it’s time to vote, this evidence shows people judge the government in general rather than the spokesperson.

A clear example of this is the fact that the rapid changes in the leadership of the Conservative party had little overall effect on the party’s support in the long run. They ended up losing terribly in 2024 despite the tendency to replace their leaders.

To be fair, there were exceptions to this, as can be seen in the first chart. After David Cameron resigned following the Brexit referendum his successor, Theresa May, was more popular than her party.

Satisfaction with her government rose, but satisfaction with her performance rose faster. However, she was subsequently brought down by her decision to break a promise and call an early election in 2017.

She nearly lost that election and as a result was unable to get a “soft” Brexit deal through Parliament and had to resign. Boris Johnson did win the 2019 general election, but his chaotic government prepared the ground for the electoral rout for the Conservatives in 2024

The challenger parties

Challenger parties all influence voting for the governing party. The strongest impact is seen in vote intentions for Reform and its ancestor parties. Reform took votes away from both Labour and the Conservatives when each was in government. An increase of 10% in the Reform vote reduces the support for the governing party by 2.5%.

The impact of the Liberal Democrats on the governing party has been negative when they are looked at without considering the complex interactions of voting in a five-party system in England and six-party systems in Scotland and Wales.

These complexities ensured that Liberal Democrat support increased with government support as some voters were drawn to Reform, or when Labour took over as the governing party. Finally, the impact of the Greens on government support was negligible.

These results suggest that a change of leadership in the Labour party will not have any significant effects on vote intentions for the party. The only way to improve things is for Labour to deliver on its manifesto promises, particularly on economic growth and so change the mood of the country.

Paul Whiteley has received funding from the British Academy and the ESRC.

– ref. Data suggests Labour would be making a mistake if it ousted Keir Starmer after May elections – https://theconversation.com/data-suggests-labour-would-be-making-a-mistake-if-it-ousted-keir-starmer-after-may-elections-273048

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Neil Dawson, Research Fellow in International Development, University of East Anglia

The success of restoration efforts hinges on involving local communities. That was the finding of our recent study which explored restoration programmes around the world.

From the English fens, where soils are degraded from decades of intensive farming, to the cattle rangelands of the Brazilian state of Rondônia where the Amazon rainforest clearance has been extensive, the best option for nature may not be conservation, but restoration.

Conservation involves preventing harm to existing nature, while restoration is the repair of ecosystems that have degraded over long periods or due to specific events like an oil spill.

Our research found that many restoration projects are run by governments or private organisations with a target-driven focus on planting trees, improving soils or reintroducing species, with limited local input. This often fails to achieve lasting results because of the mismatch with the lives and livelihoods of those most connected to the landscape.

Restoration can more effectively reverse degradation, address its causes and benefit local people if communities can shape and lead initiatives to align with their own needs, knowledge and aspirations.

Restoration programmes are being established around the world at a staggering rate. For example, 196 nations are signatories to a UN target to start restoring 30% of the world’s degraded land and sea by 2030. Worldwide, pledges have already been made to restore over a billion hectares – an area bigger than the US.

This level of ambition is welcome, but there are social and political challenges to be confronted.

Degraded lands and seas are nearly always occupied, most often by farming communities. Some are cherished, like the UK’s much-loved “sheep-wrecked” uplands where high numbers of livestock suppress the diversity of vegetation in many places.

Restoration may sound universally desirable. Who could be against planting lots of trees or restoring fisheries? But people actively resist restoration that’s imposed on them without their involvement. They might experience harms as well as benefits.

In Wales, plans to require farmers to have trees on 10% of their land were dropped after protests. The Scottish government also dropped plans to designate 10% of its seas as highly protected marine areas (areas of the sea where certain activities – usually fishing – are banned), due to a lack of community input and protests.

A promising alternative centres on local communities shaping the restoration process. We have identified four levels of involvement for Indigenous and local communities in ecological restoration: exclusionary (fully imposed), managerial (with limited consultation or incentives), collaborative (a more genuine partnership) and just and transformative (led by local ideas and values).

Four levels of community involvement

With a short-term focus on environmental results such as area of trees planted, exclusionary restoration projects may ignore local perspectives or even displace Indigenous people or local communities with rights to the land.

In Kenya, logging and charcoal production destroyed parts of the Mau forest affecting downstream water supplies. Since 2009, the government has tried to restore the area, but measures included evicting many Indigenous Ogiek who had sought to protect their forest home. Despite a 2017 ruling of the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights supporting their ancestral claim, the Ogiek’s struggle continues.

Sometimes locals are invited to consultations or to manage land for nature, but cannot influence decisions. One example of this managerial approach is Vietnam’s 30-year tree planting programme. While tree planting was performed by smallholders, these farmers had little input and many lacked land rights. The focus on growing commercial trees to fell and sell also meant forests were not native and did not mature, so benefits for nature were limited.

In collaborative approaches, a more balanced negotiation means locals may influence what is to be restored as well as where, how, by whom and how any benefits will be allocated. In northern India, forest planting projects have involved both the Himachal Pradesh Forest Department and communities. In some areas, local people selected which tree species would be most suitable for fuelwood and livestock fodder, or have planted trees and monitored their progress.

“Just and transformative” restoration approaches centre around local values, decisions and stewardship. This tends to be more successful for people and nature. The Miawpukek First Nation in Newfoundland, Canada, based restoration around species that are culturally significant to them, like the caribou, blueberries and Labrador tea.

Women in India’s Western Ghats are carefully nurturing the plants, creepers and mosses that hold the forest ecosystem together. And community networks lead mangrove restoration in Thailand’s Phang-Nga Bay.

Restoring the ability of local communities to be the custodians of nature is a promising approach to both ecological and social recovery – and ultimately environmental justice.

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Neil Dawson is affiliated with the Commission on Environmental, Economic and Social Policy of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature.

Adrian Martin receives funding from the UK Natural Environment Research Council

Iokiñe Rodríguez works for the University of East Anglia (UEA). She receives funding from the UK Research Councils.

– ref. Why restoring nature can work so much more effectively when led by local people – https://theconversation.com/why-restoring-nature-can-work-so-much-more-effectively-when-led-by-local-people-272289

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Dr Konstantinos Mersinas, Senior Lecturer in Information Security, Royal Holloway, University of London

When a protest by angry traders about what they see as the Islamic Republic’s poor handling of the economy morphed into a national uprising across Iran, the authorities moved quickly to shut down the internet. It’s a tactic the regime has used before. Closing down communications makes it harder for resistance to organise. It also makes it hard for people protesting in Iran to communicate with and enlist support from the outside world.

Authoritarian regimes, such as the Islamic Republic in Iran, tend to rely on two distinct modes for managing information and collective action. The first is surveillance. Communications are monitored, platforms filtered, metadata analysed, and users channelled toward spaces that remain visible to the state. In such conditions, limited circumvention is often tolerated.

The regime allows the use of virtual private networks (VPNs) for example, since only a fraction of the population is technically savvy enough to use them. A VPN is a tool that routes a user’s internet traffic through an external server, masking its destination and bypassing local restrictions. In practice, VPNs can help users evade censorship and reduce visibility to domestic internet controls by making their connections appear to originate from outside the country – though they still depend on the underlying internet infrastructure to function.

The second mode is shutdown, deployed under exceptional conditions. When people start to mobilise and their protests start to exceed the ability of the authorities to control them with surveillance and become visible to the outside world, the authorities escalate from monitoring communications to disrupting them.

Shutdowns are indiscriminate and economically damaging. But they sever the connective infrastructure that allows protest movements to form, share information, coordinate and scale up. Iran’s repeated shutdowns in 2019, 2022, and 2026 illustrate this transition from surveillance as a norm to shutdown as an emergency instrument of rule.

In Iran, shutdowns are implemented in stages rather than a single intervention. Early stages typically involve bandwidth throttling, unstable connections or selective blocking of platforms.

As protests intensify, authorities escalate by disabling mobile data, restricting broadband access and withdrawing routing information that allows Iranian networks to be reached from the global internet. Government directives instruct providers to shut down services and block routes to the outside world. This effectively removes Iran’s digital address from the global network.

In Iran this week, internet traffic monitoring indicates near-total isolation. Connectivity is reported to have fallen to around 1% of normal levels.

Enforcement is neither uniform nor static. Restrictions are reported to be geographically targeted at those neighbourhoods most prone to protest. They tend to be synchronised with mobilisation and are adjusted in real time as required. Communications disruption now extends beyond the internet to include mobile and landline phones and basic digital services. At this point, the objective is to immobilise information flow across the whole of society.

Shutdowns as a political tool

Authorities have repeatedly justified shutdowns as necessary for national security or cybersecurity. Yet analyses indicate such measures as ineffective against state-level cyber operations. What shutdowns primarily restrict is societal access to information and communication, both internally and externally.

The fact that Iran persists with shutdowns despite the often severe economic and humanitarian costs, shows how effective they judge them to be. Each blackout disrupts banking, payments, logistics and everyday life. Yet authorities repeatedly accept these costs when legitimacy risks threaten regime survival. Shutdowns thus function as coercive signals as much as technical means, demonstrating a willingness to suspend digital society itself.

VPNs are widely used in Iran to bypass censorship and surveillance. Research shows that VPN use is often tolerated outside crisis periods, operating as a managed pressure valve while allowing the state to keep an eye on the sort of people who use them. At the same time, VPN traffic is detectable, providers are routinely blocked or throttled, and legal ambiguity enables selective enforcement.

Crucially, VPNs depend on underlying connectivity. Once authorities escalate to disruption on an infrastructure level, VPNs become ineffective because tunnels (encrypted connections that carry internet traffic) cannot be established. This explains why VPN use is significantly reduced when shutdowns are imposed. The same holds for the Tor network (a decentralised system that routes internet traffic through multiple relays to obscure users’ identities and locations). This has been used by Iranians in the past.

Satellite internet, particularly Starlink, enabled limited information flows during recent shutdowns. This allowed some reporting to the outside world. By bypassing domestic infrastructure, satellite connectivity undermines territorial control over data flows – but access remains uneven because connectivity depends on equipment which is scarce, expensive and difficult to distribute discreetly.

Possessing or operating such equipment carries personal risk, particularly during periods of heightened repression. Even when available, connectivity is not guaranteed – satellite links can be degraded andobstructed, and are vulnerable to disruption through signal interference. As a result, satellite internet provides limited, uneven connectivity rather than a reliable substitute.

Shutdown conditions also create fertile ground for social engineering attacks. Fake “Starlink apps” and misleading claims about other circumvention tools can exploit citizens by harvesting data or identifying users.

Shutdowns are rarely the first choice for a regime like the Islamic Republic. They are deployed when mobilisation becomes rapid, visible, and difficult to contain. A recurring feedback loop follows: protesters adapt through VPNs or alternative channels, authorities escalate to infrastructure-level disruption, and this escalation fragments coordination while intensifying perceived injustice.

This explains why shutdowns may suppress mobilisation in the short term yet worsen instability over time. It’s a pattern that was evident across Iran’s previous blackouts.

When they feel under threat, regimes move from monitoring private communication to restricting information flows at scale. This trajectory underscores a broader warning for democracies: the erosion of privacy initiates a shift in power toward the state by normalising control infrastructures that can be activated during crises. This is a dynamic the Iranian case illustrates, manifesting in the disruption of communication itself.

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. Iran: how the Islamic Republic uses internet shutdowns as a tool of repression – https://theconversation.com/iran-how-the-islamic-republic-uses-internet-shutdowns-as-a-tool-of-repression-273519

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Stefan Wolff, Professor of International Security, University of Birmingham

Russia’s so-called “special military operation” in Ukraine passed a significant milestone on January 13. It has now outlasted the 1,418 days it took Vladimir Putin’s notorious predecessor, the Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin, to bring his war against Nazi Germany to a successful conclusion.

The two wars are hard to compare in any reasonable way. But there are nonetheless some important parallels worth pointing out. Perhaps the most wishful parallel is that aggression never pays.

After some initial setbacks, Stalin’s Soviet Union turned things around on the battlefield and drove the German aggressors and their allies out of the country. This was possible because of the heroism of many ordinary Soviet citizens and because of the massive support the US gave to the Soviet war effort.

Ukrainian heroism is unquestionably key to understanding why Russia has not prevailed in its aggression against Ukraine. Support from western allies is, of course, also part of this explanation. But the inconsistent, often hesitant and at times lacklustre nature of this support also explains why Kyiv is increasingly on the back foot.

It would be easy to put most of the blame for recent Ukrainian setbacks on the US president, Donald Trump, and his approach to ending the war. Back in the second world war, there were several German attempts to cut a deal with the western allies in order to be able to focus the entire war effort against the Soviet Union. Such efforts were consistently rebuffed and the anti-Nazi coalition remained intact until Germany’s surrender.

Now, by contrast, a deal is more likely than not to be made between Trump and Putin. Emboldening rather than weakening Russia, such a deal would come at the steep price of Ukrainian territorial concessions and the continuing threat of further Russian adventurism in Europe.

But it is also important to remember that Trump has only been back in the White House for a year, and that Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine started almost four years ago. During the first three of these years, the western coalition supporting Ukraine firmly stood its ground against any concessions to Russia in the same way as the allies of the second world war rejected a deal with Germany.

What they did not do, however, is offer the unconditional and unlimited support that would have put Ukraine in a position to defeat the aggressor. Endless debates over what weapons systems should be delivered, in which quantities, how fast and with what conditions attached have rightly frustrated Ukrainians and their war effort. This may have become worse under Trump, but it did not start with him.

Nor can all the blame for the dire situation in which Ukraine now finds itself be attributed only to the imperfections of the support it received. Lest we forget, Russia committed the unprovoked crime of aggression against its neighbour and is violating key norms of international humanitarian law on a daily basis with its relentless campaign against Ukraine’s critical infrastructure.

Yet several major corruption scandals in Ukraine, including one that left key energy installations insufficiently protected against Russian air raids, have hampered Kyiv’s overall war effort as well. They have undermined the country’s resilience, weakened public and military morale and have made it easier for Ukraine’s detractors in the west to question whether defending the country is worth taxpayers’ money.

The parallel to the second world war is again interesting here. There is now much hand wringing in the west over corruption in Ukraine – a problem as old as the country has been independent – and the democratic legitimacy of its president, government and parliament.

Volodymyr Zelensky, the democratically elected and still widely supported leader of a country defending itself against an existential threat, also has to justify constantly why he will not violate his country’s constitution and sign over territory to its aggressive neighbour.

But back in the 1940s, western allies had few qualms to support Stalin. They supported Stalin despite him being a murderous dictator who had used starvation as a tactic to commit acts of genocide against Ukrainian farmers, executed almost the entire officer corps of the Polish army and was about to carry out brutal mass deportations of tens of millions of people.

On the fence

The choices the western allies made in the 1940s when they threw their support behind Stalin may have been morally questionable. But they were driven by a keen sense of priorities and a singular focus on defeating what was at the time the gravest threat.

That too is missing today, especially in Trump’s White House. Not only does Trump seem to find it hard to make up his mind whether it is Putin or Zelensky who is to blame for the war and the lack of a peace deal, he also lacks the sense of urgency to give this war his undivided attention.

Worse than that, some of the distractions Trump is pursuing are actively undermining efforts to achieve peace. Threatening to take over Greenland, an autonomous part of staunch US and Nato ally Denmark, hardly sends the message of western unity that Putin needs to hear to bring him to the negotiating table.

Other distractions, like the military operation against Venezuela and the threats of renewed strikes against Iran, create yet more uncertainty and instability in an already volatile world. They stretch American resources and highlight the hypocrisy and double standards that underpin Trump’s America-first approach to foreign policy.

Putin is neither Hitler nor Stalin. But Trump is not comparable to American wartime leaders Roosevelt or Truman either, and there is no strong leader like Churchill in sight in Europe. The war in Ukraine, therefore, is likely to mark a few more milestones of questionable achievement before there might be another opportunity to prove again that aggression never pays.

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.

– ref. Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine outlasts the Soviet fight with the Nazis – here’s what history tells us about Kyiv’s prospects – https://theconversation.com/russias-full-scale-invasion-of-ukraine-outlasts-the-soviet-fight-with-the-nazis-heres-what-history-tells-us-about-kyivs-prospects-273383

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Gemma Ware, Host, The Conversation Weekly Podcast, The Conversation

In a moment being celebrated by global marine conservationists, a new UN high seas treaty comes into force on January 17 providing a new way to govern the world’s oceans.

Formally known as the Biodiversity Beyond National Jurisdiction agreement, it will allow for the creation of protected areas in international waters, like national parks. It will also set out ways of sharing genetic materials from the high seas – and any future profits derived from them.

Agreed in June 2023, the treaty enters into force after Morocco became the 60th country to ratify it in September. Since then it has been ratified by a further 21 countries, and signed by another 64 who are committed to doing so. There are some notable absences. Russia has not signed the treaty. The US signed it in 2023 under the Biden administration, but has not ratified it.

The treaty has some grey areas – notably its powers to regulating fishing in international waters. It also won’t be able to regulate mining on the seabed, something already covered by the International Seabed Authority.

Yet, at a time of heightened geopolitical tensions, this is a rare moment when most of the world has come together in agreement to try and protect our oceans. In this episode of The Conversation Weekly podcast, we speak to Callum Roberts, professor of marine conservation at the University of Exeter in the UK, about how the treaty came to be and the challenges now facing its implementation.

“I think that the high seas treaty will be breaking new ground for international regulation because at the moment what we have doesn’t do the job effectively,” says Roberts, adding that “this will be a test of our ability to move in a cooperative direction.”

Listen to the interview with Callum Roberts on The Conversation Weekly podcast. You can also read more about the high seas treaty on The Conversation.

This episode of The Conversation Weekly was written and produced by Mend Mariwany and Gemma Ware. Mixing by Michelle Macklem and theme music by Neeta Sarl. Gemma Ware is the executive producer.

Newsclips in this episode from France 24 English.

Listen to The Conversation Weekly via any of the apps listed above, download it directly via our RSS feedor find out how else to listen here. A transcript of this episode is available via the Apple Podcasts or Spotify apps.

Callum Roberts receives funding from Convex Insurance Group and EU Synergy, and UK Natural Environment Research Council. He is a board member of Nekton and Maldives Coral Institute. He was awarded a Pew Fellowship in Marine Conservation in 2000.

– ref. Most of the world just agreed on something: a new treaty to protect our oceans – https://theconversation.com/most-of-the-world-just-agreed-on-something-a-new-treaty-to-protect-our-oceans-273500

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Anna Katila, Presidential Fellow, School of Policy & Global Affairs, City St George’s, University of London

Danish foreign minister, Lars Løkke Rasmussen, has said there is still a “fundamental disagreement” over the future of Greenland following talks at the White House.

The US president, Donald Trump, has repeatedly stated that he wants Greenland to become part of the US, warning that only America can protect Greenland from Russia and China. As Vice-President J.D. Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio were meeting the Danish and Greenlandic foreign ministers, the White House posted an image on X portraying Greenland at crossroads between the sunny US and the doom of Russia and China.

The meeting was held amid announcements that Denmark and Greenland are strengthening military presence in the Arctic with European Nato allies.

Denmark’s leaders have reacted strongly in rejecting the push by Trump to acquire Greenland, saying that the island, as a territory of the Kingdom of Denmark, must not be either sold or taken by force. But Greenlandic politicians were dissatisfied with the early exclusion of their voices in Copenhagen’s action.

Representatives of Greenland were angered following a fractious online meeting on January 6 between Danish and Greenlandic politicians. Pipaluk Lynge, the co-chair of Greenland’s foreign affairs committee, criticised the failure to invite Greenlanders to participate in an important meeting about the unfolding situation.

Lynge stated that the exclusion was “neo-colonialist”. With around 90% of Greenlanders being Indigenous Inuit, the Danish failed to respect the Indigenous rights and follow the principle: nothing about Greenland without Greenlanders.

Leaders of Greenland’s five political parties recently released a statement, underlining their right to self-determination: “We don’t want to be Americans, we don’t want to be Danish, we want to be Greenlanders. The future of Greenland must be decided by Greenlanders.”

The US threats to acquire Greenland – if necessary by force – and the Danish government’s firm response revealed the issues of who has authority in Greenland’s foreign affairs, and whether Indigenous voices are being listened to.

Some Greenlanders feel that the Danish government should let Greenland lead its foreign policy. Greenland’s foreign minister, Vivian Motzfeldt, suggested they meet with the US alone..

Under the Danish constitution, Denmark controls foreign affairs for the kingdom as a whole, including Greenland. But the 2009 Self-Government Act mandates cooperation with Greenland.

Also Greenland’s government, the Naalakkersuisut, has powers to act on its own in limited foreign policy matters that exclusively concern Greenland. The Greenlandic government and parliament extensively decide about the domestic affairs.

Denmark recognises Greenland’s right to seek independence. If the people of Greenland are in favour of independence, they can initiate a process of negotiations between the Danish government and Naalakkersuisut. The agreement would be put to a referendum in Greenland, and it would need the consent of the Danish parliament.

Relationship between Denmark and Greenland

Over centuries, the relationship between Denmark and Greenland has been chequered by a number of issues. The legacy of the colonial period, underdevelopment, and the way in which historic and ongoing human rights violations have been addressed remain significant points of contention.

In the 1960s and 1970s, Indigenous women faced forced birth control measures by Danish doctors. The Danish prime minister, Mette Frederiksen, made a formal apology on behalf of Denmark last September after the conclusion of a three-year long investigation into the scandal.

Danish social services only stopped using parental competency tests, which failed to account for cultural and language differences, on Greenlandic families last May. The tests had been used to justify the removal of Indigenous children from their families. Greenlandic parents were nearly six times more likely to have their children taken by social services, with the Danish government now looking to review 300 cases of forced removal.

In 2014, Denmark rejected the invitation to participate in the Greenland Reconciliation Commission established by the Greenland’s parliament, Inatsisartut, indicating there was no need for reconciliation. Things have improved since and, in 2022, Denmark and Greenland agreed to collaborate on a research project to examine the colonial past. But this project only began last year.

Road to self-determination

Greenland’s independence appears unlikely in the near future, despite the burdened relationship with Denmark and strong popular support.

A poll conducted in January 2025 indicated that 56% of Greenlanders were in favour of independence. This figure was 68% as recently as 2019. Crucially, in 2025 85% of Greenlanders were against joining the US.

The poll also showed 45% were opposed to independence if it meant a decrease in living standards. The economic future of Greenland is a key issue in the independence debate with approximately a half of the government’s revenue coming from an annual grant from Denmark.

In the 2025 general election, in which independence and Trump’s earlier statements were key issues, five of the six main parties supported Greenland becoming fully autonomous. However, they disagreed on how fast this should happen.

The Democratic party won, arguing for a gradual approach and entered into a coalition with three other parties. The second largest party, Naleraq, campaigned on having a referendum in the next few years but became the sole opposition.

The question of Greenland’s future is about the next generations of its Indigenous people. With the Danish commitment to allow progress towards independence, becoming part of the US represents a more uncertain future with possibly reduced rights and self-determination. Listening to the Indigenous leaders and decision-makers would allow a more nuanced understanding of the current security crisis and its human consequences.

Anna Katila 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. As US and Denmark fight, Greenland’s voices are being excluded once again – https://theconversation.com/as-us-and-denmark-fight-greenlands-voices-are-being-excluded-once-again-273131

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Scott Lucas, Professor of International Politics, Clinton Institute, University College Dublin

A US intervention in Iran appeared imminent this week. US and UK troops were pulled out of several bases around the Middle East, US military assets had been moved into position and the US president, Donald Trump, had reassured protesters on the streets of Iran that “help is on its way”.

But then the US president told reporters on the afternoon of January 14 that he had received information from “very good sources” that “the killing has stopped” and that planned executions of protesters would not now proceed.

So where does this leave the protest movement in Iran? In two and a half weeks of protests across the country, more than 2,500 people are reported to have been killed and more than 18,000 people arrested. The theocratic regime which has ruled the country since the 1979 revolution has been shaken to its core, but – like on several occasions in the past 25 years – appears to have survived yet another nationwide wave of protest and dissent from a population that overwhelmingly rejects its oppressive governance.

We speak to Scott Lucas, an expert in Middle East politics at University College Dublin, who addresses several key issues.

Do you think a US intervention in Iran is now off the cards?

I hate to make this a story about Donald Trump. It should focus on the important people – the Iranians who are risking their lives to pursue rights and reforms – but here goes.

The logical approach for any US administration considering intervening in a situation like this is to consider both the situation inside Iran as well as the regional dynamics. But the US president does not act logically. He’s a mess of contradictions, wanting to be a bully and a “president of peace” at the same time.

So he blusters for days that he will unleash the US military on Iran’s regime. But he’s also seduced by signals from Tehran that it is willing to enter negotiations with him.

On Wednesday, Trump officials let European and Israeli counterparts know that US strikes are imminent. But Iran’s leaders send another signal: we have stopped killing protesters and we will not execute them. So Trump goes back into his “maybe they will speak to me as the president of peace” mode. So the strikes have been suspended.

Avoiding what could have been a disastrous confrontation between the US and Iran is a relief for the region – and the wider world. But the Iranians risking their lives on the streets will feel abandoned and discouraged.

There have been several waves of protest this century. Are things any different this time?

I think of these nationwide protests, going back more than 25 years, as waves hitting the Iranian shore. There was a first wave in 1999, which began in the universities, for political and social freedoms. Ten years later, there was a far larger wave – the largest since the 1979 Islamic Revolution – after the regime manipulated the 2009 presidential election.

In 2019, the protests were over economic conditions, particularly the prices of petrol, food and essential goods. It was only three years until the next wave, the 2022 marches which lasted for months for “women, life, freedom”.

On each occasion, through the combination of deadly force, detentions, cut-off communication and decapitation of the opposition’s leadership, the regime has quelled the public displays. But both the discontent and the desire for freedoms are below the surface, waiting to propel another wave.

That in December 2025 came the catalyst of the collapsing currency, which fed an inflation threatening both households and vendors. However, the wider aspirations of many Iranians soon expanded this into a renewed challenge to the regime’s legitimacy.

Ali Khamenei is already reportedly planning his retirement. How does the Islamic Republic adapt if it wants to survive?

Personally, I don’t think the supreme leader will quit until he is too ill to carry on. So while less prominent on a daily basis, he is still head of the regime for the foreseeable future.

The other question is even easier to answer because the regime has given its response. It does not adapt: it refers to the same political playbook which it has used since the first big wave of student protests in 1999. Intimidate the opposition and the protesters. Detain them. Abuse them. Force them to “confess”. Kill them if necessary. Restrict communications.

And then call out your supporters to the streets. Use state media and your spokespeople – one of them, the main unofficial English-language talking head, is a former colleague from the University of Birmingham, Seyed Mohammad Marandi – to insist that genuine Iranians back the regime and that the protesters are puppets of the US and Israel.

Israel and the Arab states advised Trump against a US intervention. Why?

While Israel, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and the other Gulf States benefit from a weakened Iranian regime, they do not want one which collapses without an obvious successor.

Paradoxically, they also know that US military intervention could strengthen the Iranian leadership. Since 1999, the regime has relied on portrayal of its opponents as American and Israeli agents. An American attack strengthens that narrative.

But the fundamental calculation is likely that a US assault will result in instability throughout the region. Iran might retaliate against American positions or those of the Gulf States. It could threaten the Strait of Hormuz, through which about 20% of seaborne LNG (liquefied natural gas) and 25% of oil passes. While its allies in the Middle East have been weakened, from Hezbollah to the Houthis, there still could be consequences in Lebanon, Yemen, and other countries.

Could Reza Pahlavi unify the country or provide an interim solution?

I’m sceptical about parachuting the late Shah’s son into Iran as its “leader”, whether on the throne or another seat of power. He left the country at age 18 in 1979. Since then, having declared himself Shah and leader of a government-in-exile, he has forged ties with monarchist groups, but has been rejected by others in the opposition.

Some Iranian diaspora groups and their overseas supporters are fervent proponents of Pahlavi, and some inside Iran no doubt would favour him as an option. But from talking to my personal contacts, and all the evidence you see reported in the media, and in surveys such as the one published in The Conversation on January 12, most Iranians are not looking for a return to the monarchy.

People also know from the experience of neighbouring Iraq in 2003, that imposing a leader from outside may not work out well. The US-supervised administration under Ahmad Chalabi, who – like Pahlavi – had spent more than 40 years outside the country, soon collapsed. Iraq went through an insurgency and civil war in which hundreds of thousands were killed.

That raises a wider, more important issue in which Pahlavi should be set aside. For all the scale and potential of the protests, the opposition does not have the organisation for its political, social and economic ambitions. The regime has seen to that with its decapitation strategy, imprisoning prominent activists from all spheres of Iranian society. How can protesters and the opposition be supported in developing that organisation?

The regime has imprisoned a number of popular democracy figures – could any of them be a credible leader?

I don’t think of this in terms of a “leader” but in terms of the organisation to which I just referred.

Long-time political prisoners include politicians such as Mostafa Tajzadeh, the former interior minister who has been behind bars for most of the past 16 years. Then there are human rights activists such as Nobel peace laureate Narges Mohammadi and Majid Tavakoli. There are also lawyers such as Nasrin Sotoudeh, as well as unionists, students and journalists.

Mir Hossein Mousavi was prime minister between 1981 and 1989 (when the regime abolished the role) and the man who reportedly led the first round of the 2009 presidential election, before the regime’s intervention. Mousavi has been under strict house arrest with his wife the artist, academic and activist Zahra Rahnavard, since February 2011.

Mousavi’s release would be important symbolically. Freedom for others would be a practical boost to the opposition: they could provide the makings of an organised movement which could engage the regime for the changes needed for political, economic and social space.

That is why, rather than headlining Donald Trump’s bluster about military action, I wish people would focus on releasing these prisoners as well as opening up communications within Iran, and between Iran and the outside world.

Scott Lucas 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. Iran protests: Trump stalls on US intervention leaving an uncertain future for a bitterly divided nation – expert Q&A – https://theconversation.com/iran-protests-trump-stalls-on-us-intervention-leaving-an-uncertain-future-for-a-bitterly-divided-nation-expert-qanda-273501

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Alex Fisher, Society for Applied Philosophy Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Leeds

Many women have experienced severe distress as Grok, the AI chatbot on social media site X, removed clothing from their images to show them in bikinis, in sexual positions or covered in blood and bruises. Grok, like other AI tools, has also reportedly been used to generate child sexual abuse material.

In response, the UK government has announced it will bring forward the implementation of a law, passed in June 2025, banning the creation of non-consensual AI-generated intimate images. Following bans in Malaysia and Indonesia, Grok has now been updated to no longer create sexualised images of real people in places where it is illegal, which will include the UK.

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Read more:
What can technology do to stop AI-generated sexualised images?

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X’s owner, Elon Musk, has claimed the UK government wants “any excuse for censorship”. The media regulator, Ofcom, is also conducting an investigation into whether X’s activities broke UK law.

Some X users have minimised the harm these “undressed” and “nudified” images cause, describing them as “fake”, “fictional”, “very realistic art at most” and “no more real than a Tom & Jerry cartoon”.

You might think that AI-generated and edited images only cause harm through deception – fake images mislead us about real events. But how can images that everyone knows aren’t real cause harm?

The sexualised content of undressed images is not real, even if they are based on genuine photos. But these images are highly realistic. This, along with the misogyny motivating their creation, is sufficient to cause significant psychological distress to victims.

How ‘undressed’ images harm

MP Jess Asato and other victims report an uncanny feeling at seeing undressed images of themselves: “While of course I know it’s AI, viscerally inside it’s very, very realistic and so it’s really difficult to see pictures of me like that,” Asato told the BBC.

Research in philosophy and psychology can help explain this experience. Think about looking down from a tall building. You know you are completely safe, but might still feel terrified of the drop. Or you watch a horror film, then feel on edge all night. Here, your emotions are “recalcitrant”: you feel strong emotions that clash with what you believe to be true.

Seeing oneself digitally undressed generates powerful recalcitrant emotions. People strongly identify with their digital appearance. And a “nudifed” image really looks like the subject’s body, given it is based on a real picture of them.

So, while knowing these images are fake, their realism manipulates the victim’s emotions. They can feel alienated, dehumanised, humiliated and violated – as if they were real intimate images shared. This effect may worsen as AI-generated videos provide ever more realistic sexual content of users.

Research shows that the nonconsensual sharing of nude or sexual images is “associated with significant psychological consequences, often comparable to those experienced by victims of sexual violence”.

Besides the psychological impact of undressed images, users also feel horrified at the very real motivations behind them. Someone felt entitled to sexualise your photo, directing Grok to strip away clothing and reduce you to a body without consent. Publicly bombarding women with these images exerts control over how they present themselves online.

Sexual deepfake videos and undressed images – whether of celebrities, politicians or members of the public – target women for humiliation. The misogynistic mindset behind these images is real and familiar, even if their content is not.

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Read more:
Taylor Swift deepfakes: new technologies have long been weaponised against women. The solution involves us all

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Virtual harms

The distress caused by “undressed” images resembles another prevalent form of digital misogyny: the assault and harassment of women in virtual worlds. Many women in online virtual reality environments report their avatars being assaulted by other users – a common issue in video games that is worsened as virtual reality (VR) headsets present an immersive experience of being assaulted.

Whistleblowers have claimed Meta has suppressed the lack of child safety on its VR platform, with girls as young as nine frequently harassed and propositioned by adult men. Meta denies these allegations. A company spokesperson told the Washington Post that Meta’s VR platform has safety features to protect young people, including default settings that allow teen users to communicate only with people they know.

Virtual assault is also often dismissed as “not real”, even though it can cause similar trauma to physical assault. The realistic appearance of virtual reality, strong identification with one’s avatar and the misogynistic motivations behind virtual assault enable it to cause serious psychological harm, even though there is no physical contact.

These cases show how misogyny has evolved with technology. Users can now create and participate in realistic representations of harm: undressed images, deepfake videos, virtual assault and the abuse of chatbots and sex dolls based on real people.

These forms of media cause significant distress, but are slow to be regulated as they don’t physically harm victims. Banning social media like X isn’t the solution. We need proactive regulation that anticipates and prohibits these digital harms, rather than enacting laws only once the damage is done.

Victims undressed by Grok or assaulted in virtual worlds are not being “too sensitive”. It is a mistake to dismiss the real psychological impact of this media just because the images themselves are fake.

Alex Fisher has received research funding from The Society for Applied Philosophy, the Leverhulme Trust, the Aristotelian Society, and the Royal Institute of Philosophy.

– ref. How AI-generated sexual images cause real harm, even though we know they are ‘fake’ – https://theconversation.com/how-ai-generated-sexual-images-cause-real-harm-even-though-we-know-they-are-fake-273427