Scotland's Sectarianism Problem: Irish Answers?

A series of developments during the 2010–11 football season has led to an intense public debate over the question of the nature and extent of religious sectarianism in Scotland. The Scottish National Party (SNP) government has responded with a new piece of legislation which has been widely criticised and has prompted some commentators to speculate about a political ‘own goal’. This article provides a guide to the debate around sectarianism and its historical and political dimensions. It also suggests that the Irish roots of the problem in Scotland should be properly acknowledged, and that a possible way forward could involve cooperation between Scotland, Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland within the structures and procedures of the British–Irish Council (BIC).

Sustainability-related media coverage and socioeconomic development: a regional and North–South perspective

Abstract. With this paper we discuss the differences between sustainability-related media agendas across different countries and regions. Utilising a sample of 115 leading national newspapers covering forty-one countries, we show that typically no homogeneous global trends exist with regard to sustainability-related media agendas. Instead, significant differences exist regarding the national-level prioritisations of sustainability-related issues in the countries under review. To some extent, these observed differences can be attributed to different levels of socioeconomic development as measured by Human Development Index scores and gross domestic product per capita. Here, generic differences can be identified between newspapers from the Global North and South, with a range of issues such as climate change emerging as typically Northern issues, whereas issues such as corruption and poverty show significantly higher levels of coverage across newspapers from the Global South. We conclude with a discussion of the results in the context of global environmental governance.