When our lecturer first told us to talk to each other and we only vaguely knew who he was referring to, I don’t think Lienus or I could have imagined that it would lead to the day when we met with the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Georgia. When we first started discussing the possibility...
“Not the American one.” This is the quantifier required when you tell people in the UK that you are going to Georgia. In fact, many people don’t even know there is a country called Georgia, despite the fact that it is only half the distance from the UK that the state of Georgia, USA is....
In this paper, I will argue that the framing of LGBT rights as human rights should be assessed on two different levels. Precisely I will argue that the use of human rights as an instrument to promote LGBT rights has positive effects in leading the fight against gender discrimination at the international level, often pushing...
Democratic Education Network (DEN) hosted their second international student conference on 11th and 12th May called Global Crisis: Local Voices. The Democratic Education Network is an academic student-led organization of the Department of Politics and International (DPIR). The conference like last year was a two-day long affair packed with stimulating panels, a theatre production and...
This paper investigates the concept of populism, in particular in relation to the way in which left-wing traditional parties and new actors have (or have not) adapted to modern populist discourses in the light of the popular rejection of traditional institutions and parties. The aim of this paper is to establish whether left-wing populism can...
(The following spoken word poetry was performed at a Student Action for Refugees (STAR) event held at the University of Westminster on the 7th of December, 2017. To read the poet’s reflection on the piece click here. If you want to know more about Samia Yusuf Omar and her life, you could begin here) ‘Samia...
(The following article is the author’s reflection on the circumstances which led her to pen a piece of spoken word poetry titled ‘Samia Yusuf Omar.’ It is also a critical assessment of the conversations surrounding the ongoing refugee crisis. The author performed the piece at a Student Action for Refugees (STAR) event which took place...
There are complex relationships, and then there is one that India has with China- not in the binary of agreements and disagreements but convoluted in shades of grey. Until 2015, the most demonstrable achievements of Prime Minister Modi’s first term in office were in the domain of India’s foreign policy. However, over the last few...
Before I began my degree in International Relations in 2015, I was studying Nutrition at Westminster’s Science and Technology Campus on Cavendish. I quickly realized this was not what I wanted to pursue and left this course after a few months. I then began full-time work with a recruitment company in Central London. I was...
In the decades following the end of the Cold War, there have been fundamental changes in the use of violence around the world. We have seen a move away from the classical or ‘Clausewetzian’ type of interstate conflict and into the less easily defined areas of intrastate conflict. Added to this has been the rise...
Reflections on the trip to Delhi, India through the eyes of a student who had never visited a country outside the European continent before… Due to various reasons, the trip to Delhi can be labeled as the ‘trip of my life’. Firstly, I had never visited the Asian continent before, so it was a new...
The trip to Turkey initially promised both a great academic and social experience. Upon arriving at Istanbul’s Ataturk airport in the evening we boarded minibusses towards the city of Kocaeli as the core part of our trip was centered there. The following morning, we headed to the Kocaeli Academy for Solidarity which was a walking...