In Solidarity - by openDemocracy

Patriarchy refuses to die. In every country of the world, women are oppressed by male violence, patriarchal religions, and ideas of the family. But women are resisting, as Rahila Gupta explains, in a fascinating analysis that takes us from Riyadh and Russia, to Rojava. 

Buy Planet Patriarchy: Global Tales of Feminism and Oppression: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/8711/9781805262879

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https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/newsletters/

In Solidarity is openDemocracy’s podcast about people, power, and politics. Support the show by visiting https://www.openDemocracy.net/donate/

Credits:

Presented by Sian Norris

Edited and produced by James Battershill, Ayodeji Rotinwa & Carla Abreu

Theme song ‘Odyssey’ performed by Edward Abela

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Chapters:

00:00 Introduction

02:30 Why write Planet Patriarchy now?

03:37 The violence of patriarchy

09:47 Family can be a form of violence

11:32 The women-led revolution in Rojava

16:56 The privilege of non-violence

21:07 Rojava's fragile future

22:31 What does solidarity mean to you?

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Content warning: This episode discusses sexual assault, rape and trauma.

When our investigative reporter Sian Norris heard worrying claims about a Silicon Valley-style start-up targeting rape survivors at universities in Bristol, she knew she needed to uncover what exactly was going on.

Over the next six months, Sian interviewed more than a dozen people on and off the record, sent multiple FOI requests and reviewed countless social media posts. 

Working with a Lucy H Watson, a student at Bristol university, Sian uncovered the concerns raised by students, universities and the police about Enough's approach, that sexual violence experts have issues with its methodologies, and that one of the organisation’s co-founders has links to a former beauty queen who described sexual assault as a “multi-billion-dollar industry”.

Read Sian and Lucy’s investigation: 

https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/enough-bristol-diy-rape-kits-bristol-university-start-up-katie-white-tom-allchurch/

Lucy has set up a Student-led Instagram account raising awareness about Enough and their self-swab kits:

https://www.instagram.com/enoughofenoughbristol/

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https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/newsletters/

In Solidarity is openDemocracy’s podcast about people, power, and politics. Support the show by visiting https://www.openDemocracy.net/donate/

Credits:

Presented by James Battershill

Edited and produced by James Battershill, Ayodeji Rotinwa & Carla Abreu

Theme song ‘Odyssey’ performed by Edward Abela

00:00 CONTENT WARNING

00:12 Introduction

02:17 What is Enough?

03:56 Investigating Enough

05:07 The US connection

06:55 Have rape self-swab kits ever been used in a criminal prosecution?

08:42 Experiences of Enough 'in the wild'

11:12 A lack of sensitivity

12:47 How unique is Enough's solution?

16:16 Visibility for victims

19:23 Is there evidence of Enough's 'assault prevention' claims?

20:52 Using the vulnerable as test users

22:38 Is there any harm in using the kits as a backup?

24:41 What data is collected and how is it protected?

27:46 How is the company organised?

28:38 Concerns over how Enough was pitching itself to Universities

29:48 How revolutionary is Enough really?

32:16 The shocking belligerence of Enough

33:20 What does solidarity mean to Lucy?

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the first episode of our new mini-series exploring the financial interests of political parties in England and Wales. 

Nigel Farage’s Reform UK has banked almost £5m from wealthy donors since 2023, including those with links to fossil fuels, the financial services industry and tax havens. It has also received significant financial investment from the general public in the form of party memberships. 

There seems to be a tension between the party’s desire to be seen as a grassroots, ‘by the people, for the people’ movement and its efforts to court the very billionaires its supporters believe they are rallying against. 

openDemocracy’s investigations reporter, Ethan Shone, examines this contradiction, discusses what Reform’s future might look like and asks whether the UK media is right to dedicate so much time to the party. 

Read Ethan’s investigation: https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/dark-money-investigations/reform-uk-funders-nigel-farage-5-million-donations-fossil-fuels-tax-havens/

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https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/newsletters/

In Solidarity is openDemocracy’s podcast about people, power, and politics.Support the show by visiting https://opendemocracy.net/donate

https://insolidaritypodcast.substack.com/

Credits:

Presented by James Battershill

Edited and produced by James Battershill, Ayodeji Rotinwa & Carla Abreu

Theme song ‘Odyssey’ performed by Edward Abela

00:00 Introduction

02:44 How was this data sourced?

04:25 What's the cut-off for reporting?

05:20 How does Reform's income compare to Labour and The Conservatives?

08:47 Off-shore benefactors for political parties

11:22 The people of note who back Reform

13:22 Backers shifting from Conservatives to Reform

14:34 George Cottrell - an unofficial aide?

17:49 The phantom punishments

19:22 What's Reform's future looking like?

23:48 Should we even be talking about Reform?

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On 17 June 2025 UK Parliament voted to decriminalise abortion in England and Wales, reversing a Victorian-era law. The amendment will prevent women from being prosecuted for ending a pregnancy after 24 weeks or without approval from two doctors.

We spoke to our senior investigative reporter Sian Norris, author of Bodies Under Siege: How the Far-Right Attack on Reproductive Rights Went Global. 

Get Bodies Under Siege by Sian Norris: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/8711/9781839764738

Read Sian’s full piece on this vote: https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/mps-vote-decriminalise-abortion-important-increasing-prosecutions-global-backlash-us/

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https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/newsletters/

In Solidarity is openDemocracy’s podcast about people, power, and politics.Support the show by visiting openDemocracy.net/donate.

Credits:

Presented by James Battershill

Edited and produced by James Battershill, Ayodeji Rotinwa & Carla Abreu

Theme song ‘Odyssey’ performed by Edward Abela

00:00 Introduction

00:55 A huge achievement for women's reproductive rights

01:55 'Isn't abortion already legal in the UK?'

07:19 The 24 week question

09:44 Telemedicine

13:24 What does this mean on a global level?

14:51 What happens next?

17:22 On to the next fight!

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Earlier this year, openDemocracy explored how successive governments had cracked down on protest rights. Now, with Just Stop Oil activists facing lengthy sentences for "conspiring" to commit protest offences, the impact of these laws is being felt more than ever. We sat down with human rights lawyer Katy Watts to discuss the sentencing, and how she and the NGO Liberty won a legal challenge against the government's new protest laws. 

https://www.libertyhumanrights.org.uk/

—

https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/newsletters/

In Solidarity is openDemocracy’s podcast about people, power, and politics.Support the show by visiting openDemocracy.net/donate.

Credits:

Presented by Sian Norris

Edited and produced by James Battershill, Ayodeji Rotinwa & Carla Abreu

Theme song ‘Odyssey’ performed by Edward Abela

00:00 Introduction

01:16 Long sentences for protestors

03:21 Protestors new-found reluctance

05:41 Broadening definitions of what is criminal

08:30 A framework for authoritarians

09:50 What inspired the clamp down on protest?

12:10 Holding the government to account in court

16:04 Labour defending Conservative policies

18:28 What happens to those arrested unlawfully?

19:35 Neutering protests

21:12 These protest laws target everyone

24:56 Concerns about Labour's approach to protest

27:37 What does solidarity mean to you?

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Boomers ruined everything, Millennials are work-shy and Gen Z can’t comprehend anything that isn’t a TikTok dance. Generational language defines the way we think about broad cohorts of society, but is this way of viewing the world dividing us further at a time when solidarity has never been more important?

Tom Nicholas, a writer, filmmaker and YouTuber, joins us to discuss his latest film Boomers: The Rise of Gerontocracy, generational language and whether Gen X, Millennials and Gen Z are really that different to each other or are just one generation shaped by the financial crisis.

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Watch Boomers: The Rise of Gerontocracy - https://go.nebula.tv/boomers

Subscribe to Tom Nicholas on YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@Tom_Nicholas

Get the openDemocracy newsletter - https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/newsletters/

In Solidarity is openDemocracy’s podcast about people, power, and politics.Support the show by visiting openDemocracy.net/donate.

Credits:

Presented by Aman Sethi

Edited and produced by James Battershill, Ayodeji Rotinwa & Carla Abreu

Theme song ‘Odyssey’ performed by Edward Abela

00:00 Introduction

03:00 Is generational discourse useful?

08:20 Shrinking generations

11:07 The long shadow of the financial crisis

13:47 How is generational language shaping politics?

15:47 What makes boomers different from other generations?

18:01 Is it time to redefine generations?

20:56 The Covid generation

22:55 Intergenerational solidarity

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week on In Solidarity, we're in discussion with openDemocracy's senior investigative reporter and feminist activist, Sian Norris. Sian joins us on the podcast to reveal how recent laws are quietly dismantling the right to protest in the UK.

Drawing on six months of in-depth reporting, Sian breaks down the true impact of the Public Order Act 2023 and the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022. These laws allow protests to be stopped before they even begin, based on little more than suspicion.

What does this mean for democracy, and who is being targeted? From activists to everyday citizens, no one is exempt. This is a must-listen for anyone concerned about the increasingly authoritarian political climate in the UK -- and around the world.

https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/conservative-labour-protest-ban-climate-gaza-just-stop-oil-extinction-rebellion-black-lives-matter/

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In Solidarity is openDemocracy’s podcast about people, power, and politics.Support the show by visiting openDemocracy.net/donate.

Credits:

Presented by Carla Abreu

Edited and produced by James Battershill, Ayodeji Rotinwa & Carla Abreu

Theme song ‘Odyssey’ performed by Edward Abela

00:00 Introduction

01:51 Why investigate protest?

04:56 What are the PCSC and POA?

10:28 What's a 'serious disruption'?

11:53 Who do these rules target?

16:49 We're all 'arrestables' now

19:42 Are all protests targeted equally?

22:52 Targeting BLM and XR

25:56 How does the party of free speech justify suppressing protest?

29:25 The carol service crackdown

32:28 Why don't Labour 'undo' this?

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

As a young woman in 1980s Iran, Nasrin Parvaz was arrested, imprisoned and tortured by the Iranian regime. In this moving interview, she shares her experience of torture and incarceration, reflects on the successive women's revolutions in Iran, questions the West's ideas of regime change, and offers a powerful call for global sisterhood.

http://www.nasrinparvaz.org/web/tag/https-www-victorinapress-com-product-one-womans-struggle-in-iran-a-prison-memoir/

Get our independent journalism delivered direct to your inbox, join the openDemocracy Newsletter today.

In Solidarity is openDemocracy’s podcast about people, power, and politics. It’s hosted by openDemocracy Senior Investigations reporter Sian Norris, author of Bodies Under Siege. Support the show by visiting openDemocracy.net/donate.

Presented by Sian Norris

Edited and produced by James Battershill, Ayodeji Rotinwa & Carla Abreu

Theme song ‘Odyssey’ performed by Edward Abela

—

Get our independent journalism delivered direct to your inbox, join the openDemocracy Newsletter today.

opendemocracy.net/newsletters

In Solidarity is openDemocracy’s podcast about people, power, and politics. It’s hosted by openDemocracy editor-in-chief Aman Sethi, an award-winning journalist and author of A Free Man. Support the show by visiting openDemocracy.net/donate.

Credits:

Presented by Aman Sethi

Edited and produced by James Battershill, Ayodeji Rotinwa & Carla Abreu

Theme song ‘Odyssey’ performed by Edward Abela

00:00 Introduction

01:19 Being a female prisoner in Iran during the 80s

04:33 Stolen Trauma

05:59 A friend still imprisoned

09:11 Those who paved the way

12:32 The resistance lives on

16:35 What's next for Iran's women?

18:16 Global Sisterhood

20:40 Hubris of the west

23:27 Torture's global supporters

25:57 Hopes for the future of Iran

28:00 What does solidarity mean to you?

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

For many years, politicians have sold the public a simple story: The answer to undocumented immigration is a strong, fortified border. This story has a seductive, common-sense reasoning — but it is also wrong. 

Decades of research has shown that people determined to move, find a way to move. 

And when States respond with border controls, people turn to smugglers to circumvent these controls; and on and on this cycle goes with increasingly militarised borders on the one hand, and increasingly desperate people on the other. 

But politicians don’t want to engage with this research, when it is much more politically palatable to spend billions buying shiny technology from private corporations to prop the myth of strong borders. 

Our guests today have published research that shows the UK government has spent over 3.5 billion pounds in public money to support a sprawling, almost entirely privatised, apparatus to stop desperately vulnerable people from using small boats to cross the English channel and apply for asylum in the United Kingdom.

Listen in to learn more

This research was part of the collaborative Channel Crossings project who are Dr Arshad Isakjee, Dr Thom Davies and Dr Tesfalem Yemane, Dr Lucy Mayblin and Dr Joe Turner. 

We would like to thank Corporate Watch and Tipping Point UK in supporting this work. 

Here is a link to the initial report: https://channelcrossings.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/border-security-contracts-briefing.-april-2025.docx-1-1.pdf

To find out more about the border security economy see here https://corporatewatch.org/category/companies/ and here https://www.tni.org/en/publication/financing-border-wars

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Get our independent journalism delivered direct to your inbox, join the openDemocracy Newsletter today. 

In Solidarity is openDemocracy’s podcast about people, power, and politics. It’s hosted by openDemocracy editor-in-chief Aman Sethi, an award-winning journalist and author of A Free Man. Support the show by visiting openDemocracy.net/donate.

Credits:

Presented by Aman Sethi

Edited and produced by James Battershill, Ayodeji Rotinwa & Carla Abreu

Theme song ‘Odyssey’ performed by Edward Abela

00:00 Introduction

03:30 The manufactured border crisis

06:30 How to understand borders

11:20 The economic migrant 'myth'

15:09 The Borders industrial complex

18:08 Technological underpinnings

22:20 Investigating surveillance contracts

25:09 Companies profiting from war and refugees

28:25 We're all complicit

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Community organisers around the world have long argued that to change a country, canvas a community. But is that really true? 

In this episode, we catch up with someone who literally wrote the book on the subject. Our guest George Goehl started organising in a soup kitchen in Southern Indiana 30 years ago in the Clinton era and continues to do so in the time of Trump. 

Listen in to understand how to fight effectively for change and why immigration is such a divisive issue. 

The Fundamentals Of Organizing - George Goehl 

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Get our independent journalism delivered direct to your inbox, join the openDemocracy Newsletter today. 

In Solidarity is openDemocracy’s podcast about people, power, and politics. It’s hosted by openDemocracy editor-in-chief Aman Sethi, an award-winning journalist and author of A Free Man. Support the show by visiting openDemocracy.net/donate.

Credits:

Presented by Aman Sethi

Edited and produced by James Battershill & Ayodeji Rotinwa

Theme song ‘Odyssey’ performed by Edward Abela

00:00 Introduction

01:18 How to George get into community organising

05:37 The state of rural America

08:12 Can community organising go national?

11:45 Recharging for the fight ahead

12:45 The public opinion of migration

16:30 AD - The World Unspun podcast

17:55 Progressive meekness

21:31 Meaning making

23:37 How progressive are Democrats really?

25:54 Political vs Community organising

28:55 Tangible change

34:01 Tales from the doorsteps

36:55 What does solidarity mean to you?

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.