@jonathanrowson.bsky.social
Writer, Speaker, and Publisher. CEO at Perspectiva (but personal posts here). Scottish Londoner and dad. Erstwhile chess grandmaster.
More than a year old now but if you want an overview or what’s happening in the world there are worse places to start.
20.12.2025 12:47 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0🙏
20.12.2025 12:45 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
“St Andrew’s Day is a construction, but not an illusion, because Scotland is a nation, and nations are real. More to the point, nations have a certain kind of reality that is worth attending to today, and every day.”
open.substack.com/pub/jonathan...
"The message that jumps out above all others is that previous IPCC reports, going back to 1990, have not been heeded. Where is the report on that? Because that’s the one we really need."
13.11.2025 17:40 — 👍 0 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
With COP 30 👮♂️ underway in Brazil, I thought I’d better write something about climate change.
open.substack.com/pub/perspect...
Interesting development & substack post by @jonathanrowson.bsky.social. open.substack.com/pub/jonathan...
04.11.2025 13:18 — 👍 1 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
“Perhaps I should set aside all this heady stuff, ever yielding to the mind’s compulsions? I am told I should BREATHE, and get back into the body. It’s not clear what happens next, and I’m not supposed to ask…”
open.substack.com/pub/jonathan...
Yes, good chance at some point. Though nothing is currently planned.
05.05.2025 21:37 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
“In a world that can seem shallow, chess meets a longing for depth. In a world that can feel lonely and confusing, chess offers the experience of shared meaning and mattering. In a world of shrill whataboutery, chess offers rule-bound intellectual clarity.”
open.substack.com/pub/grandmas...
If someone invites you to dinner and says “no gifts”, “please don’t bring anything apart from yourself” do you take them literally, or bring something anyway?
20.04.2025 17:44 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 2 📌 0
“I turned 48 yesterday. Forty-eight. When put that way, it sounds Biblical. I am not quite feeding the five thousand, nor am I one of the twelve disciples, but I am now implicated in the declaration that forty people shared a meal.”
open.substack.com/pub/jonathan...
I know I’m a bit late to this, but I’ve started watching The Sopranos…
31.03.2025 21:48 — 👍 3 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
If you’re struggling in any way, and the rain just came on, this Annie Lennox rendition of her Eurythmics classic: *Here Comes the Rain Again*, live from New York, always “falls on my head like a new emotion..”
And might be timely for someone…
🌧️🥲😔🙂🥹🙂🤪🙃🌧️🌈
music.youtube.com/watch?v=TB0E...
Since the USA now faces a full blown “constitutional crisis” and we’ll all be hearing this term a lot, I thought it might help to reflect on what crisis means.
(From *Prefixing the World*: open.substack.com/pub/perspect... )
Important & widely relevant on the mass demonstrations in Serbia from @jonathanrowson.bsky.social: "What do all these people want? The real demand is terrifying for those in power: "Can you please ensure that our institutions work as they are supposed to?"
jonathanrowson.substack.com/p/whats-happ...
Trump is not a Russian asset in the same way that Trump is not a fascist.
He is authoritarian and he is working for Russia.
But he is a unique case, sui generis, so these conventional terms don’t ring true.
The key is not to label, but to disclose as precisely as possible what is happening.
I’ve discovered a hitherto unsuspected connection between the stag and the potato.
06.03.2025 14:59 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 2 📌 0Perhaps the issue is not so much that Trump is a Russian asset (though he might be) or is on Russia’s side as such(though he seems to be). It seems as likely that if your perception is plutocratic, amoral and transactional, Russia’s way of thinking and acting is relatively syntonic to work with.
02.03.2025 10:26 — 👍 3 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0NATO is a zombie alliance.
If the point of NATO is for Europe to have back up from the US if Russia attacks, but the US is no more on Europe’s side than Russia’s, then NATO makes no sense.
Ukraine is Europe and Europe will have to protect itself.
I’m not a huge fan of Keir Starmer in general, but I felt proud of the way he appears to have handled his meeting with Donald Trump today. I felt he played a difficult hand very well.
27.02.2025 21:12 — 👍 4 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
Enjoyed a couple of days off in Cambridge - “the other place”.
19.02.2025 20:46 — 👍 4 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0
What does it mean to me to be British, while also being a “Scottish Londoner” ?
I enjoyed this chat with Layman Pascal of The Integral Stage, which includes reflections on the 2014 Scottish referendum and broader geopolitical issues.
youtu.be/2Q2dMzVe5WE?...
The talk of security guarantees for Ukraine seems, sadly, bogus.
In light of the failure of the Budapest memorandum I don’t understand how America could ever trust Russia.
In light of Trump/Vance Europe can’t now trust America.
And in light of fickle electorates, Ukraine can’t trust anyone…
🇺🇦
What does it mean to me to be British, while also being a “Scottish Londoner” ?
I enjoyed this chat with Layman Pascal of The Integral Stage, which includes reflections on the 2014 Scottish referendum and broader geopolitical issues.
youtu.be/2Q2dMzVe5WE?...
Amusing.
The glitch is that while Greenland is part of Denmark and Denmark is part of the EU, Greenland is not part of the EU, but merely has an “overseas countries and territories” associative relationship with the EU. Moreover, Canada’s CETA with the EU is already a very close trading relationship
Yes, nice idea indeed. Unfortunately the small print is a bit awkward. Greenland is part of the kingdom of Denmark but it has enough autonomy to choose not to be in the EU and it does. And Canada already has CETA which is already a pretty tight trade deal with the EU.
16.02.2025 23:00 — 👍 2 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0Since the US is relinquishing allies, here’s a silly idea:
Greenland is technically Danish, not EU but has OCT; and since Hans Island is a land border between Canada and Greenland, would it not be *fitting* for Canada to leave CUSMA, join Europe’s single market and become an EU associate member? 🙃
Heartened by this speech by Germany’s defence minister Boris Pistorius, which appears to be a direct response to JD Vance.
Colonial history and Brexit notwithstanding, I love Europe, and it is now up to Europeans to protect what we love.
youtu.be/n0qlKwHi2VM?...
I know it’s complicated, and I don’t mean any personal offence to Americans, but in light of Vance’s speech in Munich and Trump’s chumminess with Putin and plans for Ukraine, I hope Europe (including the UK) can quickly find the optimal way to tell the new USA administration to f*** off.
15.02.2025 21:54 — 👍 17 🔁 2 💬 4 📌 0I always feel heartened by your political beermanship, going back to the post about Clapham back in the day.
13.02.2025 19:13 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
