John Heathershaw

This is helpful and identifies core political causes rather than "religious" ones. But I suspect that there may be some interesting variations by denomination and that certain theologies of "Christendom" feed into Christian nationalism.

Making a Wasteland and Calling It Peace Genuine and lasting peace prompts lament and repentance, forgiveness and justice. The Gaza ceasefire has elicited triumph and egoism, self-righteousness and impunity.

I tried to write something less triumphalist about Gaza while recognising that this is an important step for the victims of the conflict. I also wanted to look at how "peace" is understood in the Hebrew Bible (Torah) compared to what's going on Gaza.

open.substack.com/pub/johnheat...

@cais-exeter.bsky.social "public" transport for one of our former students. Check out the Trump-esque marble and gold.

Gold Taps and Towel Racks: How a Plane Used by Turkmenistan’s Ruling Family Got a Royal Makeover In authoritarian Turkmenistan, even a single airplane trip abroad is out of reach for most citizens. But the country’s ruling Berdimuhamedov family, which has held power across two generations, recent...

Fantastic reporting by @occrp.org

If you scroll down you can see the Boeing 737 which flew Kerimguly Berdimuhamedov into Exeter, apparently to study for his Politics degree.

occrp.org/en/scoop/gol... via
@occrp.org

The Incumbency Advantage and the Enabler Effect: How Londongrad Beat the UK Anti-Money Laundering Regime The emergence and survival of ‘Londongrad’, despite the UK anti-money laundering regime, is an intellectual and policy conundrum. We analyse an original dataset of £2 billion of domestic real estat...

In @europe-asia.bsky.social we (@tenaprelec.bsky.social et al) show how Londongrad beat the UK AML regime via the incumbency advantage (political elites being in power or favour at home) & enabler effect (networks of highly-skilled legal & financial professionals)
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Grim reading but powerful analysis. TR has gone global.

The Right Response to Christian Nationalism The “Unite the Kingdom” rally was a dangerous post-Christendom moment. UK Christians are caught between shunning Christian nationalism and salvaging an acceptable version. Neither option will do.

I wrote something on one of the urgent political questions of our time: how to respond to Christian nationalism.

open.substack.com/pub/johnheat...

An Extraordinary Peace A guest post by Nick Megoran on the 80th anniversary of an extraordinary peace which shows that true peace does not conform to the patterns of this world.

"Even [the] ugly and dehumanising fusions of religion and militarism cannot obscure our ineradicable sense that human life is a gift of God, that we are created imago Dei, in his image."

johnheathershaw.substack.com/p/an-extraor...

Peter Mandelson seen as ‘worth the risk’ as US ambassador, minister says Peter Kyle says ‘singular talents’ were balanced against warnings as Epstein accuser’s family criticise appointment

It’s not clear to me how Peter Mandelson’s “singular talents” differ from his elite network connections that meant he had a relationship with Epstein (and Trump). Isn’t that why they put him in place?

www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

MICHAEL SHERIDAN: THE RED EMPEROR – XI JINPING An eye-opening portrait of Xi Jinping, the man who presides over 1.4 billion people and the second largest economy on earth. In a compulsively readable narrativ

I’m looking forward to chairing this event at the Appledore Literary Festival. I’ll speak with the journalist Michael Sheridan about his book on China, the Red Emperor. If you’re in Devon, join us!

appledorebookfestival.littleboxoffice.com/events/123175

👏😅

*New & open access*
We draw on our book Indulging Kleptocracy, reflecting on the importance of networks - even more than states, we argue - in today’s global order.

@oxfordacademic.bsky.social
@jheathershaw.bsky.social
@britishacademy.bsky.social

journal.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/articles/13/...

MICHAEL SHERIDAN: THE RED EMPEROR – XI JINPING An eye-opening portrait of Xi Jinping, the man who presides over 1.4 billion people and the second largest economy on earth. In a compulsively readable narrativ

I’m looking forward to chairing this event at the Appledore Literary Festival. I’ll speak with the journalist Michael Sheridan about his book on China, the Red Emperor. If you’re in Devon, join us!

appledorebookfestival.littleboxoffice.com/events/123175

@tenaprelec.bsky.social Tom and I wrote this paper based on @oxunipress.bsky.social Indulging Kleptocracy for @britishacademy.bsky.social journal.

Our global future will be increasingly kleptocratic unless govts enforce their own laws.
journal.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/articles/13/...

How to protect your university against authoritarianism US institutions are facing threats to academic freedom from the Trump administration, yet they must also stay vigilant to authoritarianism from abroad. Here is what university leaders and academics ca...

An excellent book on a topic that many of us have worked on for years. The problem of authoritarianism for academic freedom isn’t purely external (as some on the Right claim) or purely internal (as some on the Left claim). It is both, intertwined.

www.timeshighereducation.com/campus/how-p...

This is an excellent blog on how working politically in aid is hampered by large disbursements.

“As one staff member put it: 'generally, [aid] money disrupts change, it does not promote it'.”

Ergo: don’t scale up.

Small disbursements via small often faith based agents.✅

odi.org/en/insights/...

‘Come meet us in Dubai’: the new offshoring of grand corruption Sensitive business is moving towards more permissive jurisdictions in response to tighter regulations and greater media attention.

A cracker from my colleague John Heathershaw and his co-author
Ricardo Soares de Oliveira. #Capitalismisthecrisis

@jheathershaw.bsky.social

Thank you!

Darwin says “unfinished” in the sense of contradictory processes which were not resolved. I’d want to emphasise legacies especially the offshore system created under English common law including some extant colonies and expanding well the time (including to Astana and Baku)!

Again, right out of the authoritarian playbook. All very familar to me from living in West Africa and Central Asia.

The killing of Gazan children, moral injury, and the church Most Western Christians expect Hamas to kill innocents but when Israel does so, many try to justify these deaths. The idea of "moral injury" helps explain IDF war crimes and Christian justifications.

In war, even the victors and their supporters who are physically unharmed can be morally injured. What else explains lack of due regard for the killing of children (including by those who claim to be humanitarians and Christians)?

open.substack.com/pub/johnheat...

A glimpse of Gaza’s miserable future The territory will remain at the mercy of outsiders for years to come

Netanyahu is like the head teacher of a school which stops the kids getting food, where part of the playground is run by bullies, and whose teachers kill lots of the kids as punishment. When inspectors question the head’s decisions, he blames the bullies.

economist.com/middle-east-...

"One of the defining features of the Trump decade is the strange combination of conservative Christians’ fervent loyalty to the president and Trump’s obvious ignorance of Christianity. Playing to his base, Trump pretends to be an ardent follower of a faith he couldn’t care less about."

‘Come meet us in Dubai’: the new offshoring of grand corruption This article explores how professional enablers of grand corruption are shifting operations to permissive financial hubs like Dubai, enabling illicit…

“Come meet us in Dubai.”
An offhand remark, but one that captures a seismic shift in global corruption.
Professor's Ricardo Soares de Oliveira and John Heathershaw reveal how professional enablers are redrawing the map of illicit finance.

Read here: www.oxfordmartin.ox.ac.uk/blog/come-me...

Unfinished Empire A both controversial and comprehensive historical analysis of how the British Empire worked, from Wolfson Prize-winning author and historian John Darwin The British Empire shaped the world in countless ways: repopulating continents, carving out nations, imposing its own language, technology and values. For perhaps two centuries its expansion and final collapse were the single largest determinant of historical events, and it remains surrounded by myth, misconception and controversy today. John Darwin's provocative and richly enjoyable book shows how diverse, contradictory and in many ways chaotic the British Empire really was, controlled by interests that were often at loggerheads, and as much driven on by others' weaknesses as by its own strength.

Much of my research in the last few years has been about the entangling of two unfinished empires. Here's the book of the same title of the other one. Congratulations on your book. www.penguin.co.uk/books/130910...

The Politics and Theology of Gaza’s Famine In the modern age, malnutrition and starvation are always man-made. The famine in Gaza is a consequence of political decisions & the theological ideas of movements behind the Israeli & US governments.

The Israeli Far Right and Christian Zionists in the US, together with the governments of both countries, are the most responsible for the famine in Gaza.
open.substack.com/pub/johnheat...

Apparently I said: "Donald Trump is normal". That needs to be heard in context.

Trump’s ties to the Russian mafia go back 3 decades Journalist Craig Unger talks Russia, Trump, and “one of the greatest intelligence operations in history.”

“The Russians simply exploited our own corrupt system. They studied America’s pay-for-play culture, found its weak spots, and very carefully manipulated it."

It's worth going back to this Vox interview with Craig Unger.

It's not about regimes, its about networks.

www.vox.com/world/2018/9...

Balancing Act: Azerbaijan’s Energy Links to Russia and the Sanctions Regime - Dr. Gubad Ibadoghlu explores Azerbaijan's covert delivery of sanctioned Russian oil and the limitations of the international sanctions regime.

Gubad Ibadoghlu, still under house arrest, shows how the UK's sanctions on entities affiliated with Azerbaijan involved in the sale and transit of Russian oil exposes both the limits of the current regime and the possibilities for secodnary sanctions.

crudeaccountability.org/balancing-ac...

‘Come meet us in Dubai’: the new offshoring of grand corruption Sensitive business is moving towards more permissive jurisdictions in response to tighter regulations and greater media attention.

Laws and rules to counter kleptocracy must have greater extraterritorial reach and/or more effective multijurisdictional partnerships to meet a challenge which is becoming even more transnational in form.

With Ricardo Soares de Oliveira.

theconversation.com/come-meet-us...