The Guardian Opinion

The removal of an opposition party leader and closure of a liberal university show an authoritarian democracy moving closer to one-man ruleTurkey’s next presidential election is scheduled for 2028. Many think it will come sooner. But by the time ballots are actually cast, the outcome may already have been decided – especially after the last few days.On Thursday, an appeals court removed the head of the opposition Republican People’s party (CHP), Özgür Özel, by annulling its 2023 leadership conte

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The trumpeter, composer and band leader still towers over jazz because he treated reinvention not as a betrayal, but as necessary for its survivalThe space reserved for Miles Davis in the pantheon of 20th-century music is not simply because he mastered jazz, but because he refused to let it stand still. As musicians and fans mark the centenary of his birth , Davis’s work still feels limitless. “I always thought that music had no boundaries,” he wrote in his 1989 autobiography, “no limits to wher

Readers respond Devi Sridhar’s call for the world to act now over the outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the CongoDevi Sridhar is right that this Ebola outbreak needs urgent attention (Ebola in the DRC needs the world’s attention now – if your neighbour’s house is on fire, you don’t wait and watch, 19 May). Present an engineer with a problem needing a build or fix and you will often hear: “You can have it good, fast or cheap – pick two.” In global outbreak responses, we learn too late every

Readers respond to Emine Saner’s article about the ubiquity of pooches in public spacesYour article on dogs was uncannily timely (‘She compared her dachshund to my newborn baby’: should you be able to take your dog everywhere?, 19 May). I have had a phobia of dogs since childhood and can’t get past an unleashed dog. This causes me a problem every couple of years, but in the last week I’ve twice been inconvenienced by thoughtless owners who don’t see the need for a lead while walking dogs on publ

As a mother with disabled children, Anne-Louise Crocker has experienced first-hand how the social care system lets people down. Plus a letter from Dr Brian Fisher At the 2024 Labour conference, Wes Streeting said: “We can’t fix the NHS without fixing the crisis in social care. And we can’t fix social care without the people who work in it … I will deliver a new deal for care professionals: a fair pay agreement, to improve pay and conditions and give staff the status and respect they deserve – ou

Deathbed advice | Dangerous deference | Marks & Spencer | Stephen Yaxley-Lennon | Readers’ readsPolly Hudson’s piece on her relationship with her dad felt so poignant (My dad was far from perfect – but I live by the advice he gave me on his deathbed, 24 May). I lost my dad during Covid and didn’t get to have that deathbed conversation with him and get the sage advice that Polly got from hers. Although we didn’t get to say goodbye, I know he would have said, “Make the most of every day, queen”. A

Project Hail Mary, Jurassic Park: from dino-mosquitoes to a spaceship’s roar, pointless mistakes on the scientific details make me winceOn the advice of my teenage son, I recently went to the cinema to see Project Hail Mary. The film has science in it. I am a science writer and so he was convinced I would like it.Imagine my surprise partway through, however, when I found myself seething so hard I thought I would combust. Ryland Grace – the main character and a molecular biologist who should have

Yes, I could worry about all the money I’ve ‘thrown away’ but, like my fellow renter the Princess of Wales, I’m digging inIt was cheering to read that William and Kate’s new lease for Forest Lodge in Windsor stipulates that they must keep the grounds “clean and tidy” and “free from weeds”. Solidarity, comrades! How relatable. For I too am a renter, and know how it feels to live under the landlord’s cosh. My own tenancy agreement says something similar.Not that the landlords have ever enforced it

As intelligence itself becomes privatised by big tech, allowing your intellectual faculties to wither in service of inane bots seems a dangerous moveLong before the age of multi-billion-dollar AI companies promising to disrupt the field of software development, I was learning to code the hard way.It was the mid-2000s, and I was a child with unmonitored access to the family computer. With the help of a basic text editor program, I learned how to make websites – first basic, then increasingly comp

Millions are being dragged into starvation, while people everywhere pay a Trump war tax. But there are plenty of powers who could bring him to heelWith the deadlocked war in Iran about to enter its fourth month, loose comparisons with previous US quagmires in Iraq, Afghanistan and Vietnam are bandied about. When the conflict began, warnings of another “forever war” seemed exaggerated. No longer. As matters stand, the negative international humanitarian, economic and geopolitical fallout from thi

The Married at First Sight rape allegations have again highlighted the ethics of reality TV. For things to change, better welfare provision is crucialWhen I joined the cast of Love Island in 2021, I already semi-knew that reality TV wasn’t “real”. I grew up with parents who constantly reminded me not to believe everything I saw on TV or online. But I was not fully prepared for just how constructed reality TV actually is: producers shape narratives, conflict drives engagement and contestants ulti

The Russian dictator’s dreams of greatness threaten Nato and the EU, not just Ukraine. Here are eight ways in which he can be thwartedNo dictator lasts for ever. One day Vladimir Putin will be gone. Recent reports suggest growing weakness in the Russian economy, discontent in society and a waning of confidence inside his regime – but it would be foolish to conclude the end is near. Only death or Russia can depose Putin, and nobody knows when or how that will happen. What democracies in Europe an

The conservative tycoon’s grip on media and cinema is unhealthy. An EU fund could protect democracy in perpetuityThe shadow of Joseph McCarthy’s “red scare” loomed over the storied steps of this year’s Cannes film festival. Echoing the mid-20th-century blacklist, which shut out about 300 suspected communists from Hollywood, the French media group Canal+ announced an effective ban on twice that many French cinema professionals, including actors such as Juliette Binoche and film directors such as

The award-winning Tate design at the Chelsea flower show reveals how urban spaces can be transformed by bringing art and nature togetherNever mind a gnome, no other garden at this year’s Chelsea flower show can boast a Barbara Hepworth sculpture like the RHS gold-award-winning Tate Britain garden. And few will have such a significant afterlife. Designed by the landscape architect Tom Stuart-Smith, it is a microcosm of a major redesign for the gallery’s Millbank garden, opening next spring.Visito

The sensational victory didn’t happen by accident, it took years of dedication and clever planning, something the PM – himself a fan – should noteObviously, I know that politics and football are different. One is a high-stakes endeavour that affects the lives of hundreds of millions of people, with an impact felt around the globe and down the generations – and the other is politics. I know too that there will be plenty of readers who will be like I was until nearly a couple of decades ago: cheer

Forgive me if I’m not congratulating officers for investigating Andrew now – instead of, say, many years ago when they were with him in Jeffrey Epstein’s houseHow noble that Thames Valley police has let it be known that its misconduct-in-public-office investigation into Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor is also considering potential offences including corruption and sexual misconduct. On Friday, it made a public appeal for potential victims and witnesses to come forward.Obviously, the best time for the

Call it a mix of collectivism and entrepreneurialism or just an overarching vibe, but the mayor’s philosophy could be on the way to WestminsterAmong the underrated later work of those revered sons of Manchester the Smiths, there is a completely jaw-dropping song simply titled London. Full of fury and excitement, it depicts a Mancunian as he boards a train, travelling to the capital full of ambition and hope, but also gripped by a gnawing ambivalence. Andy Burnham, whose love of the band is hardl

The allegations of rape and sexual assault made by ‘brides’ on the show reflect what many other women experience. Sadly, so do the responsesShe said no. She didn’t want it, she made that very clear, but he did it anyway; pushing her feelings aside as though they didn’t matter, because to him they seemingly didn’t. It’s a story so depressingly common that most women probably carry a private version of it in their heads, either buried in their own memories or confided to them by a friend. But stil

The government is in thrall to the sunk-cost fallacy. Scrap the project, and use the money for a renaissance in urban transitSo it is official, as if that makes a difference. After a 15-month review by the new chief executive, the transport secretary, Heidi Alexander, has revealed that HS2 will now cost up to £102.7bn and trains may not start until 2039. Alexander called the original design a “massively over-specced folly” and called the increase in time and costs “obscene”. Indeed it possibly r