The openMovements series invites leading social scientists to share their research results and perspectives on contemporary social struggles. Anti-nuclear protest, Tokyo, 2012. Demotix/Nodoka Ishida. All rights reserved.What do you know about Japan? Answers to this question vary, but I can guess how familiar someone is with Japan by paying attention to the Japanese loanwords he…

Though the odds were against him, Donald Trump has managed to secure the presidency after gaining the necessary 270 electoral votes to defeat his Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton, The Associated Press reports. Additionally, CNN reports Hillary Clinton has called and conceded the race. Despite denigrating countless women, African Americans, immigrants, Hispanics, Muslims, and the parents of a…

Mayor of London Sadiq Khan speaking at the candlelight vigil in Trafalgar Square, London to remember those who lost their lives in the Westminster terrorist attack. Lauren Hurley/Press Association. March 23, 2017. All rights reserved.Islamist extremism is real, and it’s not going away. The Westminster attack is yet another reminder of that. But defeating it…

Early Wednesday afternoon, Secretary of State John Kerry prepared to deliver his final address as America’s top diplomat to the United Nations’ climate conference in Marrakech. Meanwhile, in a tent next door, the United Nations Development Programme released a report that anticipated many of the themes that would mark Kerry’s speech—chief among them that committing…

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan gives a speech during an event to close the electoral campaign in Sariyer, near Istanbul, Turkey, 15 April 2017. Michael Kappeler/Press Agency. All rights reserved.Citizens of Turkey are about to vote in a referendum to decide whether to abandon the country’s parliamentary regime for an exceptionally powerful executive presidency. Constitutional…

Scrutiny of homophobia in soccer has drawn renewed attention of late. According to a recent BBC Radio 5 Live survey, Eighty-two percent of fans in England, Wales, and Scotland are comfortable with their club signing an openly gay player. But more concerning, the survey also found that 8 percent of soccer (football) fans would stop supporting their…

Before Parker Brothers turned Monopoly into a fun and capitalism-fetishizing way to spend hours arguing with friends and family over who gets the race car, the game from which it evolved was called The Landlord’s Game. Its anti-monopolist inventor, Elizabeth Magie, wanted to teach the values of market socialism espoused by 19th century economist Henry George. It wasn’t the last board game with radical politics. London…

Click:12 watt street light In September 2014, a month after the bombing campaign against Islamic State started,  President Obama confirmed that the United States did not yet have a strategy. The comment was pounced on by his political opponents. At the end of this week’s G7 meeting in Bavaria he made a similar comment, although…

Perfectionists get things done, right? They’re more detail-oriented, meticulous, and effective than the rest of us—or so we’ve been led to believe. But new research out of the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, published in the open-access online journal PLOS ONE, has upended that longstanding myth: When put to the test, perfectionists don’t actually work…

Last week’s shoot-out in the sleepy Transcarpathian town of Mukacheve in western Ukraine has had a serious impact on the country's politics. In just one week, both the governor of Transcarpathia and top officials in the local security ministries have lost their jobs. Talk of a Third Maidan—even of a coup—has returned. With several Rada…