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The International Criminal Court (ICC) has issued arrest warrants for Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, his former defence minister, Yoav Gallant, and Hamas leader, Mohammed Deif. The court claims both sides have committed crimes against humanity and war crimes from the day Hamas attacked Israel on October 7 onwards.

Although a warrant was issued for Deif, Israel has said he was killed in an air strike in July. But Hamas has neither confirmed nor denied this claim. If they were ever to be judged at the ICC, a conviction is conceivable.

The charges of the court against Netanyahu are severe. The three-judge panel unanimously said that he and Gallant are “co-perpetrators for committing the war crime of starvation as a method of warfare, and the crimes against humanity of murder, persecution, and other inhumane acts”.

The judges also “found reasonable grounds to believe that they bear criminal responsibility” … “for the war crime of intentionally directing an attack against the civilian population”. The charges are also backed by the work of the International Court of Justice, which has found that it is “plausible” that Israel has committed acts in Gaza that violate the Genocide Convention.

If arrested, Netanyahu would go through a trial, and he could then be acquitted, or convicted. In the latter case, Netanyahu would join the ranks of leaders considered perpetrators of crimes against humanity, such as Charles Taylor of Liberia, Hissène Habré of Chad, Saddam Hussein of Iraq, Augusto Pinochet of Chile, Slobodan Milosevic of Serbia, Radovan Karadžić of Serbia, Idi Amin of Uganda, Pol Pot of Cambodia, Joseph Stalin of the former Soviet Union, Mao Zedong of China, and Adolf Hitler of Germany.

The ICC has issued arrest warrants.

Next steps

The arrest warrants rely on ICC member states carrying them out. And this is by no means a foregone conclusion. Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, has been wanted by the court since 2023 for his role in directing attacks at civilians in Ukraine and illegal deportation of Ukrainian children.

But Putin was not arrested on a recent visit to Mongolia, a state that is party to the ICC, after the Mongolian authorities had assured him he would be safe. That said, he was unable to travel to South Africa when leaders from the Brics economic bloc of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa met in Johannesburg in 2023.

This was due to the experience in South Africa of former Sudanese president, Omar Al-Bashir. Bashir, for whom the ICC granted arrest warrants in 2009 and 2010 for allegedly directing a campaign of mass killing, rape and pillage against civilians in Darfur, travelled to South Africa in 2015 to attend an African Union summit. But he had to leave abruptly for fear of arrest.

South Africa’s Supreme Court of Appeal ruled in 2016 that the government’s failure to arrest him was unlawful. And the ICC ruled against South Africa on its “shameful failure” to arrest Bashir the following year. He was also able to travel freely to other ICC member states, including Chad, Kenya and Jordan.

Bashir was overthrown in a military coup in 2019 and placed under arrest. He is now persona non grata in Sudan where he was convicted of corruption, sentenced to two years in prison, and is being investigated for his role in the coup that brought him to power.

Not arresting criminals inflicts damage on the ICC, which already has a weak record of prosecutions. For example, after former president of Ivory Coast, Laurent Gbagb, was charged then acquitted. But it also takes away a major opportunity to achieve justice for victims of serious crimes.

Dramatic political implications

The likelihood of Netanyahu, who has become the first ever leader of a western country to be charged by the ICC, appearing at the Hague is low. But the political implications of the arrest warrants for Netanyahu are, at any rate, dramatic.

Netanyahu knew the ICC would be able to hold him to account for his political decisions, and this is exactly why he disapproved of Palestine joining the ICC in 2015.

In practice, Netanyahu might lose even more legitimacy in his own country than he has done already with some groups. Civil society groups in Israel are following the work of the ICC very closely.

B’Tselem, a Jerusalem-based non-profit organisation that documents human rights violations in the occupied Palestinian territories, has said that the ICC intervention and ICJ rulings “are a chance for us, Israelis, to realise that … upholding a regime of supremacy, violence and oppression necessarily involves crimes and severe violation of human rights”.

Netanyahu will also be limited in his travels, and viewed as a pariah in many of the 124 states that are party to the ICC. This is a view that would be shared by most leaders of European states, including Germany. In May, a spokesperson for the German government hinted that Germany would arrest Netanyahu should warrants be issued.

The EU is, for the moment, unlikely to be able to use its global human rights’ sanctions regime against Netanyahu, which allows targeted measures against foreign nationals who are deemed responsible for gross violations of human rights. This is because unanimity across the bloc is necessary, and some states such as Austria, Czechia, Hungary and Germany could be reluctant to agree to this. Even the French foreign ministry spokesperson said: “It’s a point that is legally complex.” But the EU is a strong supporter of the ICC, so there will be pressure in governments of all EU states to act against Netanyahu.

The political implications of this decision are not isolated to Netanyahu. Pro-Palestinian protest activity has taken place at over 500 US colleges since October 7. And the UK has now joined most EU states in supporting Netanyahu’s arrest.

The US is now very much isolated among western countries in its lack of support for international law. The ICC, on the other hand, is becoming increasingly visible in its quest for international justice for victims. Läs mer…

It may sound strange, but future Nobel Prizes, and other scientific achievement awards, one day might well be given out to intelligent machines. It could come down just to technicalities and legalities.

Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel established the prestigious prizes in his will, written in 1895, a year before his death. He created a fund whose interests would be distributed annually “to those who, during the preceding year, have conferred the greatest benefit to humankind”.

Nobel explained how to divide those interests in equal parts, to be given, “one part to the person who made the most important discovery or invention in the field of physics… the most important chemical discovery… the most important discovery within the domain of physiology or medicine”.

He also created prizes for the person responsible for the most outstanding work of literature and to the person who did most to advance fellowship among nations, oppose war and promote peace (the peace prize).

What should we draw from the use of the term “person” in Alfred Nobel’s will? The Nobel peace prize can be awarded to institutions and associations, so could it include other non-human entities, such as an AI system?

Whether an AI is entitled to legal personhood is one important question in all this. Another is whether intelligent machines can make scientific contributions worthy of one of Nobel’s prestigious prizes.

Grand challenge

I do not consider either condition to be impossible and I am not alone. A group of scientists at the UK’s Alan Turing Institute has already set this as a grand challenge for AI. They have said: “We invite the community to join us in… developing AI systems capable of making Nobel quality scientific discoveries.” According to the challenge, these advances by an AI would be made “highly autonomously at a level comparable, and possibly superior, to the best human scientists by 2050”.

Such a milestone may be closer than we think. But it will depend on what we are prepared to consider as worthy scientific contributions. These can range from standard data analysis to generating whole new scientific explanations for observed phenomena. There is a whole spectrum in between these two conditions, which is already being explored.

In a few weeks, the computer scientists Demis Hassabis and John Jumper of Google DeepMind will be presented with their Nobel medals (they won this year in the chemistry category). The prize was awarded for the development of AI that can predict the structures of proteins from the order, or sequences, of their molecular building blocks, called amino acids.

This had been a notoriously difficult problem in biology, with a history going back to at least the 1970s. But, in 2020, Hassabis and Jumper unveiled an AI system called AlphaFold2, which has enabled researchers to predict the structures of virtually all the 200 million proteins that have so far been identified.

The success of AlphaFold2 is no isolated case; there are analogous situations in other sciences.

In 2023, researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) used AI to discover a novel class of compounds that can kill drug-resistant bacteria. Then, in 2024, major archaeological discoveries – in South America and in the Arabian Peninsula – were made using machine intelligence.

Also this year, a study at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) tested the impact of AI in materials science research. It concluded that “AI-assisted researchers discover 44% more materials, resulting in a 39% increase in patent filings and a 17% rise in downstream product innovation”. The study found that these new materials possess relatively novel chemical structures and lead to more radical inventions.

There is even recent evidence that drug candidates discovered by AI may be of better quality than those discovered by traditional means.

Should we consider these as “scientific contributions”? AI generally makes such discoveries through a process of systematic screening of different possibilities. It’s a highly structured process that’s just the kind of thing we would assume machines are good at. But humans come up with scientific breakthroughs through the kind of innate creativity that a machine can’t emulate, right?

Well, without trying to diminish the roles of great scientists, systematic screening – this time carried out by humans – was involved in the discovery of artemisinin as an important antimalarial treatment, and the discovery of prontosil – a crucial antibiotic. These also led to Nobel prizes. So we should remember that tasks such as screening can make important contributions to science and are not something carried out only by machines.

So, can we imagine a machine going one step further, generating scientific hypotheses with a high degree of autonomy? Hypotheses are preliminary explanations for natural phenomena that can be tested by means of experiments. A hypothesis is a key stage in the scientific method, a kind of educated guess pending evidence from real testing. Furthermore, could the AI then go on to test its hypothesis and present the results to us in our own language?

It may surprise you to know that his has been attempted already, within the domain of computer science research. In August, an international research group demonstrated an AI system that was able to carry out a scientific investigation, and even write a scientific paper describing the results.

It seems very likely that AI will one day take an active part in scientific investigations. But will it be able to compete for Nobel prizes, perhaps as junior partners to humans? That remains to be seen.

Even if a machine could one day win one of the science prizes, the literature prize should remain safely in the hands of humans. Or will it too be opened up to artificial intelligence? A recent scientific study compared human reactions to poetry generated by machines and poetry produced by humans. Its main finding was that people cannot distinguish between them, and “AI-generated poems were rated more favourably in qualities such as rhythm and beauty”.

If there is a limit to what AI can achieve in what had been exclusively human fields of endeavour, we’re currently struggling to find it. Läs mer…

In an ever-more uncertain world, one thing you can say with a degree of confidence is that, right now in global affairs, all roads lead to Donald Trump. Trump’s re-election to the US presidency – while widely anticipated (especially by the bookmakers) – has kicked off something of a chain reaction.

Whether it’s his track record in his first term in office from 2017 to 2021, comments he made on the campaign trail, comments he has made since the election, his cabinet picks or comments his cabinet picks have made, the prospect of Trump assuming arguably the most powerful office in world politics in just a few weeks time is making its own weather around the globe.

In Ukraine, where the war has just passed its 1,000th day and Russia continued to advance slowly but steadily, the prospect that next year will see a ceasefire brokered by the Trump administration, followed by negotiations at which Vladimir Putin would hold many of the cards, looks to be the new reality.

The idea, cherished by Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, that Ukraine’s defenders would be able to force Russian troops back beyond the borders as established at the end of the cold war in 1991 – a notion in which he was wholeheartedly supported by his western allies – now appears to be a non-starter. All indications point to a frozen conflict, with each side holding the territory it now occupies (although one can imagine Ukraine will have more of a problem holding on to the 600 or so square kilometres of Russian soil it presently controls in the Kursk region).

Now, more than ever, it’s vital to be informed about the important issues affecting global stability. Sign up to receive our weekly World Affairs briefing from the UK newsletter. Every Thursday we’ll you expert analysis of the big stories making international headlines.

But, of course, there was already a frozen conflict in eastern Ukraine after Russia’s incursions in 2014. And – as Stefan Wolff, an international security expert from the University of Birmingham, points out – the Minsk accords on Ukraine of September 2014 and February 2015, which were supposed to maintain some degree, at least, of security and stop the fighting in the region turned out not to be worth the paper they were written on.

There’s very little chance that Trump will allow US troops to be sent to Ukraine as peacekeepers or combatants. So, Wolff surmises, it’ll be down to Europe to step up. The Polish prime minister, Donald Tusk, said as much before the US election and Margus Tsahkna, Estonia’s foreign minister, has explicitly said this week that Europe must be prepared to underpin a peace deal.

Europe must ensure it is intimately involved in any peace negotiations, Wolff concludes: “In negotiations involving Trump, Putin and Zelensky alone, Ukraine would be the weakest link and European interests would probably be completely ignored… After 1,000 days of the most devastating military confrontation on European soil since the second world war, it is time to accept that nothing about Europe should be without Europe.”

Read more:
Ukraine: after 1,000 days of war, Europe must prepare for a Trump-brokered peace deal by asserting its own interests

As you might expect, Trump’s victory has also been focusing the mind of the man who is currently sitting behind the Resolute desk. And on day 998 of the conflict, Joe Biden, gave Zelensky the go-ahead to use US-supplied long-range Atacms (army tactical missile system) against targets inside Russia, something the Ukrainian president has been begging for over pretty much the duration of the war.

Ukraine immediately took Biden at his word, launching eight missiles at targets in Bryansk, a Russian region bordering Ukraine. The following day the UK government formally signed off on Ukraine using its Storm Shadow long-range missiles in the same way, and Ukraine used them to attack targets in the Kursk region.

Many commentators believe that one of the epitaphs for Biden’s handling of the war in Ukraine will be too little, too late. This week he also gave permission for Ukraine to deploy anti-personnel mines (APLs) in Ukraine, of the sort that are shunned by 164 countries that are signatories to the Ottawa convention banning such ordnance. Which, of course, means he might have another epitaph as the US leader willing to use weapons almost universally condemned as a horrific scourge “already contaminating more than 70 countries”.

It’s worth noting, though, that neither the US nor Russia is a signatory to the convention. Ukraine is – but that hasn’t prevented it becoming one of the most mine-contaminated countries in the world.

The reason that Ukraine is so keen to get their hands on these APLs, writes David Galbreath of the University of Bath, an expert in military technology, is that it needs to find a way to stall Russian infantry as they continue to advance.

Galbreath describes how the success of Ukrainian drones at targeting Russian armoured vehicles had forced the Russians to change tactics and advance on foot. Ukraine had been finding their anti-tank weapons ineffective for forcing enemy infantry into their lines of fire, hence the need for anti-personnel mines, no matter how dirty a weapon they might be.

Read more:
US decision to supply Kyiv with hated anti-personnel mines is both controversial and a depressing sign of the way the war is going

On Putin’s side of the ledger, meanwhile, the main issue is that Russia’s advantage in the field has always depended on the asymmetric advantage provided by the imbalance in troops numbers. Put simply, the Russian military has always been able to call on more bodies to throw into battle than Ukraine.

But there are suggestions that Putin’s reservoir of manpower might be shallower than he’d like. His decision to deploy North Korean troops in the Kursk region, the emptying of prisons to send convicts to the frontline and, more recently, the recruitment and training of troops from the occupied parts of Ukraine all hint that filling Russia’s quota of 20,000 new troops each month has not been plain sailing.

Russia is now pressing along much of the frontline in eastern Ukraine and is making daily advances.
Institute for the Study of War

Natasha Lindsteadt, an expert in authoritarian regimes from the University of Essex, gives us an in-depth look at how Russia fills its ranks. She surmises that, just quietly, Putin might be as keen as Donald Trump to bring this conflict to a speedy conclusion: as long as it favours his side, of course. Because Putin is quickly running out of people he can send to the front lines.

Read more:
Russia needs a peace deal soon as it is running out of soldiers

The view from Israel

Back in Washington, Trump’s senior foreign policy choices are coming in for a degree of bemused scrutiny. Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, will be considerably buoyed by the news that Trump wants former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee as his ambassador to Israel.

Huckabee, whose CV also acknowledges his stint as a talk-show host, an evangelical Baptist minister and contender for the Republican presidential nomination in 2008 and 2016 (when Huckabee called the president-elect a “car wreck”), is known for his outspoken views on Palestine. Namely that it doesn’t exist.

Huckabee is on the record for saying, after witnessing the inauguration of n illegal settlement on the West Bank, that: “There is no such thing as a West Bank. It’s Judea and Samaria [the territory’s biblical name]. There’s no such thing as a settlement. They’re communities, they’re neighbourhoods, they’re cities. There’s no such thing as an occupation.”

Clive Jones, a professor of regional security at Durham University with a particular interest in the Middle East, believes that Trump could take the brakes off Israel’s campaign in Gaza, the West Bank, Lebanon and even against Iran.

While Joe Biden has maintained steadfast support for Israel and the government of its prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, he has privately urged caution. He recently attempted to put a deadline on Israel ensuring more food and humanitarian supplies get into Gaza where people are starving.

But, as Jones notes here, Trump’s pick for secretary of state, Marco Rubio, while mainly known as a China hawk, is on the record as being against a ceasefire in Gaza. He told journalists recently that: “I want them [Israel] to destroy every element of Hamas they can get their hands on. These people are vicious animals who did horrifying crimes.”

With elements of Netanyhu’s government urging the annexation of the West Bank and signs that they might also have designs on northern Gaza and a US administration that looks set to back Israel to the hilt, things are looking bleak for the Palestinian people, concludes Jones.

Read more:
Gaza: outlook for Palestinians bleak under a Trump presidency that looks set to go ’all the way’ with Netanyahu

There has been a major personnel change in Netanyahu’s cabinet, too. Earlier this month he unceremoniously dumped his defence minister, Yoav Gallant. If Biden attempted to be a brake on Netanyahu from the White House, perhaps Gallant was the nearest thing to someone attempting to moderate the behaviour of the prime minister from within his own government.

Gallant has long called for a ceasefire and a hostage deal. He also wanted universal conscription and an end to the exemption of ultra-Orthodox men from military service. And, perhaps, most significantly, his was a strong voice calling for an immediate state inquiry into the causes of the October 7 Hamas-led attacks – something his critics say he is desperate to avoid.

John Strawson, of the University of East London, who writes regularly about Israeli politics here, believes that Netanyahu might act against other powerful military voices in the weeks to come. He believes that the Israeli prime minister is “to reshape Israel in his own political image. That means not only diminishing the role of the judiciary, but also undermining the influence of the IDF and the security establishment.”

In what appears a sinister corollary to Gallant’s dismissal and the appointment of Huckabee as US ambassador to Israel, Netanyahu has nominated a far-right firebrand, Yechiel Leiter, as the new Israeli ambassador to Washington. Leichter, who came up via the now outlawed Kahanist movement in the US, is known to favour annexation of the West Bank.

He’ll soon be back in America sharing his vision with the Trump administration.

Read more:
Israel: Yoav Gallant’s sacking could have devastating consequences both for Palestinians and Israelis

World affairs briefing, from the UK
is available as a weekly email newsletter. Click here to get our updates directly in your inbox. Läs mer…

The International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants on Nov. 21, 2024, for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, his former defense minister and one leading Hamas official. Those named in the action are accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity relating to the Oct. 7, 2023, attack by the Palestinian militant group and the subsequent ongoing siege and bombing of Gaza by the Israel Defense Forces.

In May 2024, ICC Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan sought arrest warrants for three senior Hamas leaders, accusing them of extermination, murder, taking hostages and committing rape and other acts of sexual violence. Two of those Hamas leaders, Yahya Sinwar and Ismail Haniyeh, have since been killed by Israeli forces. It has been reported that a third leader, Mohammed Deif, had also been killed by Israeli forces in August. But the ICC Pre-Trial Chamber still issued an arrest warrant for Deif, explaining that his death has not been confirmed.

Allegations against Netanyahu and former defense minister Yoav Gallant include starving Palestinians in Gaza, “intentionally directing attacks against a civilian population,” as well as persecution and “willful killing.”

The ICC, an independent tribunal based in The Hague, Netherlands, prosecutes genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes – the latter being a legal term that includes attacking civilians and committing other wartime violations, such as blocking humanitarian aid.

The arrest warrants, which the Israeli government in a statement rejected “with disgust,” mean, in theory, that those accused could face arrest should they travel to one of the ICC’s 124 member states. Israel is not a member state of the court, but the “State of Palestine” has been a party to the Rome Statute, which set up the court, since 2015.

As a scholar of human rights and international courts, I think it is important to emphasize that the arrest warrants do not mean that those accused will necessarily face arrest or trial.

The ICC, in line with other contemporary international criminal tribunals, lack any enforcement powers of their own. That means in the Israel-Hamas situation, the ICC may never be able to arrest suspects or bring them to trial.

These international courts therefore have a mixed record of holding senior political and military leaders accountable for their crimes. It’s only if and when political leaders fall from power that there is any chance that their governments will arrest and hand them over to international courts for prosecution.

Palestinians walk amid the rubble of destroyed buildings in Nuseirat, Gaza, on April 29, 2024.
AFP via Getty Images

The challenge for international courts

Take the example of Russian President Vladimir Putin, who, since March 2023, has defied an ICC arrest warrant for allegedly committing war crimes during the Ukraine war. As long as Putin remains in power, there is practically no prospect of his arrest.

International criminal tribunals such as the ICC have a twofold problem. First, these tribunals do not have an actual international police force to carry out arrests.

Second, governments implicated in their leaders’ alleged crimes often try to obstruct international tribunals by not turning over suspects and by seeking to attack the tribunals as biased.

The enforcement problem, as my scholarship has shown, can allow the leaders of a powerful country such as Israel or an entity like Hamas to evade arrest warrants from international courts – as long as the suspects remain within their country or territory.

Because Israel is not an ICC member state, it never agreed to abide by court rulings or arrest warrants and does not otherwise accept the court’s jurisdiction. The U.S. and other countries, including Qatar, which in recent years has hosted a number of senior Hamas members, are also not ICC members and do not face a legal obligation to make arrests.

As such, Netanyahu and Gallant could still travel to meet with U.S. leaders in Washington, D.C., without fear of arrest. But they will now likely avoid travel to European Union countries, all of which are part of the ICC and would be obliged to arrest Netanyahu.

All of this may also contribute to Israel’s further international isolation and pressure over its wartime conduct.

Issuing arrest warrants for the Hamas leaders also threatens to stigmatize Hamas internationally.

The U.S., which at times has strongly opposed the ICC but has also supported the court on an ad hoc basis, as has happened in the ICC’s Ukraine situation, has previously warned that issuing arrest warrants for Israeli leaders could compromise a potential cease-fire agreement between Israel and Hamas.

Milosevic’s fall from power

Not all arrest warrants fail.

The trial of Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic in the mid-2000s illustrates how international tribunals might be able to prosecute alleged war criminals once they fall from power.

In 1993, as the war in Bosnia was still being fought, the United Nations Security Council set up a special court, called the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, to address crimes committed during the regional wars.

This court indicted Serbian nationalist leader Slobodan Milosevic for war crimes and crimes against humanity in 1999 during the ongoing Kosovo war. Milosevic’s alleged crimes in Kosovo included a massive ethnic-cleansing campaign waged against Kosovar Albanians, the largest ethnic group there. Milosevic later faced additional charges for alleged crimes in Bosnia and Croatia.

But Milosevic was still in power when the indictment was issued, and his government shielded him from arrest. Milosevic lost a presidential election in late September 2000 and, after widespread protests, stepped down.

The U.S. promised the new democratic government in place in Serbia substantial economic assistance to speed its postwar recovery. This helped prompt the Serbian government to arrest Milosevic and then transfer him to the the international tribunal in June 2001.

Relatives and supporters of hostages held by Palestinian militants in Gaza chant during a demonstration calling for their release on April 27, 2024.
Jack Guez/AFP via Getty Images

A potential playbook for Israeli leaders

Milosevic’s trial was launched in February 2002, but he died in prison in 2006, shortly before the end of his trial.

His trial still shows that under specific circumstances, international courts can overcome their lack of enforcement powers and bring high-level suspects to trial. International political pressure and incentives often serve an essential role in this process.

As long as any political and military leaders facing potential arrest remain in power, it is likely that no amount of political pressure or promises will persuade Israel, Qatar or other countries to cooperate with an international court and turn over any leaders, if they are indicted.

And history also shows that even if Hamas leaders are overthrown or Israeli leaders lose elections, there’s no guarantee that potential suspects will ever stand trial at the ICC.

There is broad public opposition to the ICC in Israel.

Despite the fact that Khas, the ICC’s chief prosecutor, has also sought to prosecute Hamas leaders for the atrocities of Oct. 7, Israeli politicians have reacted to the court’s arrest warrants with outrage.

Moreover, at least in the short term, it is highly unlikely that the U.S., which announced that it “fundamentally rejects” the ICC’s actions against Netanyahu and Gallant, will apply the type of pressure against its close ally, Israel, that it successfully applied on Serbia for Milosevic’s arrest after his fall from power.

This story was updated from an article originally published on June 22, 2022. Läs mer…

Science fiction has long been a window into possible futures, often anticipating technological advancements and societal shifts with surprising accuracy.

While AI is now widely recognized for its practical uses — like natural language processing and pattern recognition — science fiction often brings more captivating and thought-provoking perspectives.

Movies and shows have depicted AI and robots both as harmonious and menacing, imagining futures where technology seamlessly integrates into daily routines. These stories spark important conversations about how AI might shape our world.

In a recent study with Carmela Cucuzzella, dean of the Faculty of Environmental Design at Université de Montréal, and Negarsadat Rahimi, a doctoral researcher examining the impact of façade design on sustainability and livability in the city, we explored how AI can be harnessed to raise environmental awareness and foster meaningful community dialogues.

AI for environmental education and action

Public spaces like streets, squares, transportation hubs and vehicles create ideal environments for fostering community interaction, raising awareness and promoting environmental action. One effective way to raise awareness and educate people in public spaces is through eco-art, which has a powerful emotional impact and can inspire individuals to adopt more eco-friendly behaviors.

Our study examined the potential real-world applications of AI and other futuristic technologies as represented in science fiction series like Black Mirror, Westworld and Altered Carbon.

Trailer for Season 1 of Westworld.

Sci-fi technologies seen on TV

We conducted a survey asking people how likely it is they would want to see various sci-fi technologies from these series become a reality. The survey included 30 participants from North America and Europe, recruited through social media platforms such as LinkedIn, Instagram and X.

The top two preferred technologies were smart screens and mirrors (grouped together as one category) and smart assistants with voice activation; self-driving cars and flying vehicles were among technologies which followed. This indicates a preference for safer, low-impact innovations.

In contrast, the least favoured technologies were simulated reality, AI-driven behavioural prediction, social media rating systems for human interaction and AI humanoids. These choices reveal a reluctance towards AI’s deeper involvement in social interactions often depicted in shows’ dystopic visions.

We also interviewed Ozgur Ozkan, CEO of Keymate.AI, who noted that popular culture influences tech innovation by driving public demand and investor interest, crucial for major developments. On AI’s environmental impact, he argued that while AI could be used to reduce waste, its energy demands and the push for cost reduction could undermine true sustainability — a problem also flagged by computing and energy researchers.

Environmental public communication

We developed two contrasting future scenarios related to how governments can communicate with people about the environment and sustainability. The first, scenario, “Participatory Communication in the Public Realm,” envisions safer technologies with a focus on individual control and strict regulations. AI would be used to enhance public spaces like parks and libraries to encourage community collaboration on environmental education. Data privacy is safeguarded by strong regulations, balancing technological progress with social welfare.

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In the second scenario, “AI-Operated Social Structure,” our society permits less regulated technologies, prioritizing surveillance. Minimal regulation would allow advanced AI to offer personalized services in urban areas, focusing on individual data harvesting to be leveraged for corporate profit. AI algorithms gather personal data from citizens, identify patterns and customize the environmental content to suit individuals’ needs and learning styles. However, privacy concerns arise due to the lack of data protection.

Policy choices will guide how individuals’ data can be leveraged for corporate profit.
(Shutterstock)

These scenarios are both plausible. The key question is: how can we design safe and inclusive public spaces to foster discussions on environmental issues and sustainability? Public spaces should be welcoming to diverse communities and promote a sense of belonging.

Technologies like virtual reality and augmented reality offer opportunities to create new digital spaces for interaction and collaboration, though they also pose challenges in maintaining meaningful human connections.

Environmental impact

AI technologies have the potential to support sustainable practices. But the substantial energy demands of advanced AI systems must be carefully managed to prevent undermining their environmental benefits.

Generative AI requires massive amounts of energy to even train the models, not to mention using them. Policy researchers suggest AI will intensify greenhouse gas emissions, consume increasing amounts of energy and demand bigger amounts of natural resources. Yet AI also offers opportunities for optimizing energy use. For example, AI can be used to track behavioural patterns to adjust energy use in buildings.

AI can be used to adjust energy use in buildings.
(Shutterstock)

We should do our best to use AI efficiently and for good causes. Stakeholders such as designers, architects, engineers, policymakers and educators should create sustainable solutions for its applications and use the technology in meaningful ways.

Energy-efficient AI?

New technologies are being developed to support energy-efficient use of AI. For example, a recent breakthrough from Massachusetts Institute of Technology introduces new “nanoscale” transistors that solve energy limitations of traditional silicon-based devices like smartphones. These transistors work efficiently at much lower voltages.

Implementing thoughtful policies and developing innovative energy-efficient and environmentally sustainable solutions matters for steering AI towards sustainable and ethical uses. Additionally, emphasizing the artistic and design elements of public space experiences can enhance their value and accessibility for everyone. Läs mer…

There is a clear ethical and legal principle that adults have a right to make decisions about their health. This is sometimes called the principle of patient autonomy. That is, of course, why doctors need patients’ consent before providing the treatment they recommend.

But we only really notice the ethical significance of this principle when patients make choices that go against medical advice and that doctors think are unwise or even dangerous. If we respect autonomy, those choices, too, must be respected.

There is an important proviso: if the adult has or appears to have a physical or mental disorder that seriously impairs their ability to make decisions (their “capacity” to use the language used by English law), it may not be right to do as the adult wishes. In such cases, there are important legal processes to potentially make decisions for the adult patient.

But what if a patient simply does not believe the information that a doctor is telling them? Could that affect the patient’s capacity to make decisions? A recent court case focused on this question.

In 2023, 19-year-old Sudiksha Thirumalesh became the focus of a legal dispute regarding her capacity to make decisions.

Thirumalesh suffered from a rare mitochondrial disorder and spent over a year in hospital in the UK in an intensive care unit. She depended on a breathing machine, artificial nutrition and kidney dialysis for her survival. The doctors caring for Thirumalesh judged that her disease had progressed, and she was dying.

They proposed transitioning her to a palliative treatment plan. Thirumalesh, along with her family, opposed the recommendation. While she accepted that her chances of recovery were “no more than 50%”, she did not believe the situation was as grave as the doctors were making it out to be. She wished to explore the possibility of experimental treatment overseas.

The key issue brought before the Court of Protection in September 2023 (and then the Court of Appeal earlier this year) was whether Thirumalesh’s capacity to make decisions about her care was compromised by her refusal to believe her doctors.

In a controversial ruling, Justice Roberts held that Sudiksha Thirumalesh lacked decision-making capacity because she could not appropriately weigh or use the information provided by her medical team.

Ethical issues

Imagine that someone is trying to find their way to a distant destination in a strange city. To navigate, they have a map, they have received some directions and they draw on information they see around them (such as street signs).

Of course, the person might get lost or take a long time to get there. But in some cases, the person might be literally incapable of finding their way. For example, they might be unable to read the map, comprehend the directions or read the street signs.

Or they might have such severe memory problems that they can’t remember where they are going, or whether they were told to turn left or right at the traffic lights. In those cases, we might think that it is important that someone else takes over the driving.

But what if they don’t believe in what the map is telling them, or the directions?

As we outline in a recent paper, there are several reasons to be sceptical about belief as a basis for judging a patient to lack capacity.

First, a patient’s values (the things to which they attach importance) can affect what they believe and even who they are able to believe. Factors like hope can play an influential role in shaping beliefs. But values are not the sort of thing that justify overruling a patient’s choices.

Indeed, respecting autonomy fundamentally requires allowing patients to develop beliefs and make choices in line with their values. If someone values the challenge of finding their way without a map, that wouldn’t give us a reason to navigate for them.

Second, it is important to distinguish between situations where someone is (a) capable of believing X but chooses not to do so and (b) where they are (literally) incapable of believing X.

The latter would arguably ground a judgment of incapacity. That might apply in the case of a person who is suffering from delusions of persecution and thinks that the map is fake and the people offering directions are all imposters. But chosen beliefs (or disbelief) are different.

A vaccine sceptic, for example, may disbelieve the information offered by all health professionals, but that does not make them incapable of deciding to have (or, more likely, refuse) a vaccine.

Based on the available evidence and expert testimony, Thirumalesh showed some understanding of the information provided to her and an appreciation of its significance.

Her stated desire to “die trying to live” appeared to indicate a recognition that at some point in the future, she may succumb to her condition. Her beliefs were motivated by her desire to survive and, therefore, an expression of her autonomy, not a threat to it.

Finally, to impose the beliefs of doctors on patients undermines the importance of partnership with patients and families, taking into consideration their values and preferences.

The family of Sudiksha Thirumalesh stand with another family outside the Supreme Court in London, while judges considered lifting the naming restrictions for the doctors involved in care of two deceased children.
PA Images / Alamy Stock Photo

The appeal

Tragically, Sudiksha Thirumalesh died in September 2023 following a cardiac arrest, after an appeal was filed by her family (but before any stopping of the medical treatments keeping her alive).

Although the results of the appeal could not benefit Thirumalesh, the Court of Appeal agreed to hear it because of the wider significance of the issues raised. In a landmark ruling in July 2024, the Court of Appeal reversed the previous decision, affirming that while Thirumalesh’s beliefs entailed a mistaken understanding of the clinical reality, they were not grounds for finding her to lack capacity.

In retrospect, it appears clear that Thirumalesh’s doctors were right that she was reaching the end of the road in her illness. She did not believe this, but she retained the right to make choices about her medical treatment – at least for treatments that were available and appropriate.

This case demonstrates some of the difficulties, but also the important ethical principles in decision-making for seriously ill patients. When doctors assess “capacity” to make decisions, they ought to focus on the technical (cognitive) elements and not the evaluative elements. It is inherently risky to include someone’s beliefs and values in capacity determinations.

A doctor, like a guide, should offer directions. They should try to help patients make good decisions about their health, including correcting, where possible, any misconceptions or misunderstandings. Ultimately, though, they should allow travellers (patients) to ignore that advice and walk in what looks like the wrong direction. Läs mer…

After the conclusion of UN biodiversity conference Cop16, it was easy to feel disappointed. In Cali, Colombia, discussions fell short on how to monitor targets and progress remains slow. Despite agreements, Cop16 lacked urgency from governments and the UN on how to halt the crisis in the natural world.

Like many others, the UK government remains focused on net zero targets for greenhouse gas emissions. It can feel like biodiversity – the thing that makes our world a vibrant and beautiful place – has been left behind.

So it should come as good news that in my research I have heard stories from business owners who are taking it upon themselves to make a change. These are owners of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) who are going from business as usual to business with nature as an equal partner.

We all connect with nature in different ways, from the joy of hearing a robin singing to the annoyance of having a seagull steal your lunch. This is the same for business – there are negative and positive interactions.

My ongoing research is finding that business owners often take their environmental passions and turn them into company values. The business managers, creators and entrepreneurs I spoke to are putting nature at the centre of their actions and decisions. And the markets they operate in are changing as customers see past simply using nature as a brand image. I found that it’s no longer acceptable to only think about nature for advertisements. It should also be the focus of the product.

This consumer expectation has resulted in many small businesses evolving their supply chain, industry and services to reflect their nature-dependent branding – the very opposite of greenwashing.

What does it mean to trade on nature?

Take an outdoor clothing company. Its adverts would likely feature rugged footpaths, wild hillsides and beautiful sandy beaches.

A world without diverse flora and fauna would probably ruin the outdoor clothing market – very few people will want to explore a polluted forest. So biodiversity is an important aspect of the success of their product in both advertisement and use.

Or a more complex example might be a company that produces high-end kitchen units. Most of their product is sold locally, and the area is renowned for its landscape. This environment draws both potential customers and potential employees to live in the area – so threats to the landscape also present a long-term risk to the business.

Both of these examples show how businesses depend on biodiversity. Despite the shortcomings of Cop16, those businesses that are already taking action can offer valuable lessons to governments and to bigger corporations.

The key ideas emerging from this research include understanding that businesses depend on biodiversity; that now is the time to innovate and adapt; and that individual connections with nature can be the trigger to create change.

As an example of this third point, one interviewee from a business selling Cornish food hampers talked about how they had noticed the lack of bees. This prompted them to talk to their team about how they manage their land. And after consulting a wildlife volunteer, they turned half of their land over to meadow and created a pond. They are continuing to review the environmental impact of their hampers, reviewing the supply chain and are now creating a decarbonisation plan.

These owners are connecting with nature locally and bringing this to their brand values. For some owners this has meant difficult conversations with customers. Tourists usually would not appreciate a hornets’ nest in their holiday home, but at one venue staff took the time to share their passion for insects with the guests, who then understood that they could actually co-exist.

Once inspired, however, it can be difficult to know what to do next. Another interviewee said that they knew what they were doing wrong but found it difficult to know how to do better.

Owners have reported that getting information and changing direction can be the hardest part, especially as business impact on biodiversity can be vast.

Holidaymakers expect clean beaches and unpolluted seas.
Monkey Business Images/Shutterstock

One events venue worked hard to find information to change its waste management systems. The team knew that waste has a negative impact on nature and so started small with recycling. They have now developed a zero-waste project for the entire site. They researched packaging, talked to waste management companies and discovered that not all recyclable food packaging could be processed locally.

This led to a comprehensive review of the supply chain. They worked with local catering companies to change the food packaging used during events. It also meant changing customer behaviour so that waste was put in the right bin.

Making progress on their zero-waste goal has meant years of innovating and adapting. But the success has been achieved through bringing their suppliers, staff, external experts and technology along on the journey. It began with the value of nature and innovation, and developed into a whole-business approach.

This shows that one business’s decision to find out more can have far-reaching benefits as they collaborate with others to reduce their impact.

Many businesses’ image, brand and produce require a healthy planet. It is no longer enough to talk about a commitment to nature, it requires action or their business simply cannot expect to survive.

I have found that businesses taking action now are leading the charge when it comes to positive reputations with customers. The innovators are developing products that respond to their landscape, working with suppliers with similar mindsets and carving out loyal customer bases. Examples I’ve encountered include making big changes to premises, suppliers, livestock and ingredients.

Businesses can start by taking a moment to look at the nature around them, before examining the values demonstrated across their supply chain and in the workplace. Whether Cop16 results in future change is yet to be seen, but businesses are thriving by taking action for biodiversity now. Läs mer…

On March 2 2022, delegates to the UN environment assembly adopted an ambitious resolution to develop the text of a new treaty by the end of 2024 to end plastic pollution. With 24 days of formal negotiation between almost 200 countries completed, spread over meetings in Peru, France, Kenya and Canada, the fifth and final negotiation meeting is about to take place in Busan, South Korea. This is crunch time. Agreement must be found or the opportunity to take global action to tackle plastic pollution might be lost.

I have studied international action to tackle plastic pollution for the past decade. During this time, I have witnessed remarkable growth in plastic waste – an estimated 400 million tonnes is thrown away every year. Plastic pollution is now ubiquitous.

The issue of plastic pollution has moved up the public and political agenda in a way few could have predicted. Global action has always been the missing piece of the picture, as the plastics economy transcends national boundaries, and actions in one jurisdiction, while locally beneficial, tend not to address global pollution patterns.

To tackle plastic pollution, a shift in the entire plastics economy is needed. This should focus on reuse and refill schemes, which reduce the need for new plastic products and the substitution of plastics with other materials that are less polluting or harmful.

Refill schemes need to be scaled up to phase out single-use plastic.
Daisy Daisy/Shutterstock

With my team of policy researchers, I have attended the last three plastics treaty negotiation meetings as an observer to gauge progress towards a global treaty. For the most part, progress has been slow, largely because of delaying and blocking tactics by a few countries that depend on fossil fuel industries. Lobbying from the petrochemical industry frustrates progress further. Given the tight timescale to agree the treaty, I worry that no agreement will be reached.

Three priorities

Final negotiations must include three things.

An immediate priority is to agree on the rules governing how decisions are taken in the negotiations between member states, known as the “rules of procedure”. At present, decisions are taken by consensus, meaning all delegations must agree before a decision is reached.

Given the entrenched positions of some countries, consensus-based decision-making is unlikely to yield rapid agreement because the positions of some nations are so far apart. The rules of procedure needs to include a voting mechanism so that when there is decisive agreement between most nations a decisions can be taken and progress can be made, when consensus cannot be reached.

The second critical issue is finance. Plastic pollution is a challenge most acutely faced by low- and middle-income countries. The plastics treaty is only likely to be effective if there’s adequate funding for countries most affected by plastic pollution to take action.

As witnessed in the climate debate, finance is incredibly contentious and raises critical questions. That includes who will pay for the problems plastic pollution has already caused and the new measures to tackle plastic pollution, plus how supporting countries can best provide necessary technology and training.

The role of the private sector is also significant in the plastics economy, and discussions are underway about innovative options for private finance to support treaty implementation. For the treaty to be credible, agreement on the broad terms of a finance mechanism for treaty implementation is essential.

The treaty must also focus on actions most likely to reduce plastic pollution. There is clear evidence that reducing the production of primary plastic polymers reduces plastic pollution most efficiently and effectively.

Plastic is made at such a rate that it is impossible for waste management systems to keep up. So a treaty that focuses on waste management will not reduce plastic pollution significantly enough. Only putting the brake on plastic production will stop the inundation of plastic waste.

There are, of course, many other important elements to agree on during negotiations. Criteria must be set to identify problematic, unnecessary and avoidable plastics that companies should stop making. Problematic plastics have harmful effects on human health or the environment, so any chemicals of concern must be removed from plastic materials and products. Unnecessary plastics are those with a function that is deemed non-essential, while avoidable plastics have an essential function but could be replaced by a non-plastic alternative.

Subsidies on virgin plastics that make single-use products so financially attractive need to be stripped away. Any changes in the plastics economy that this treaty create need to benefit workers in the informal waste sector too.

This week is critical for the world’s relationship with plastics. People and planet depend on it.

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Former New Zealand prime minister John Key has three white rabbits painted on his helicopter, a nod to his “massively superstitious” habit of repeating “white rabbits” three times at the start of every month.

Tennis champion Rafael Nadal performs the same sequence of actions (shirt-tug, hair-tuck, face-wipe) before every serve. Taylor Swift paints “13” on her hand for good luck before a show, while Rihanna won’t allow anything yellow in her dressing room.

Perhaps you, too, are superstitious. Maybe you have a lucky number, avoid black cats, or shudder at the thought of opening an umbrella indoors.

Even if you don’t consider yourself superstitious, little things like saying “bless you” after a sneeze, knocking on wood or crossing your fingers are all examples of behaviours with superstitious origins.

We humans are particularly susceptible to superstitions. But why are we so quick to develop superstitious behaviours, and do we really believe they can bring good or bad luck?

In our new research, we set out to answer this question. We tested whether people could tell the difference between outcomes they caused and outcomes they didn’t cause, and this told us something about the cognitive roots of human superstition.

Learning about cause and effect

From as early as four months, infants learn their actions produce outcomes – kicking their legs shakes the crib, shaking a rattle makes an interesting noise, dropping a toy on the floor means mum or dad picks it up.

Lucky 13: Taylor Swift in concert.
Getty Images

As we grow older, we develop a more sophisticated understanding of cause-and-effect relationships, asking “why?” questions about the world around us.

This sensitivity to causes and effects sets the stage for important developmental milestones, like imaginative play, planning actions to achieve a goal, predicting others’ intentions, anticipating and regulating emotions, and cooperating with others.

The ability to learn about relationships between causes and effects is a defining feature of human cognition. But how does this square with our superstitious tendencies?

When cause and effect is an illusion

We learn about causes and effects from experience. When our behaviour is followed by an outcome, we learn about the relationship between our action and that outcome. The more often this action-outcome pairing occurs, the stronger the perceived link between them.

This is why we repeat behaviours that produce rewarding outcomes, and avoid repeating behaviours that produce punishing ones.

But what happens if an outcome follows our actions by coincidence? If I wear my lucky socks and my favourite sports team wins, this is probably just a coincidence (it’s unlikely my sock-wearing actually caused the win). But if this happens a few times, I may develop a superstition about my lucky socks.

This suggests superstitious behaviour arises because we aren’t particularly good at discerning when our actions cause an outcome, versus when our actions just coincide with (but do not cause) an outcome. This is a common explanation for superstition – but does it have any weight?

Testing our ability to detect causality

We can test what underpins superstitious behaviour by simply asking people “who caused that outcome?”. Getting it right would suggest we can discern action-outcome relationships (and therefore that there must be some other explanation for superstitious behaviour).

Our research did exactly that. We asked whether people could tell when their actions did or didn’t cause an outcome.

Cause and effect.
Getty Images

We recruited 371 undergraduate students from a large New Zealand university, who participated in one experimental session for a course credit. Participants played a game where a positive outcome (winning) or a negative outcome (losing) occurred either after their own action (clicking a button), or independently of their action.

Importantly, participants weren’t given any information beforehand about the type of outcome or whether it would depend on their behaviour. This meant they had to rely on what they actually experienced during the game, and we could test their ability to judge whether they had caused the outcome.

This also meant participants’ preexisting superstitions and other characteristics (such as age) didn’t affect our results. Their behaviour during the task was representative of human behaviour more generally.

Participants’ scores indicated they often got it right: in about 80% of trials, they knew when they’d caused the outcome, and when they hadn’t.

A built-in bias

The distinction between causing and not causing the outcomes was sometimes very subtle. This made it more difficult for participants to tell what had occurred.

When they weren’t sure, participants defaulted to saying “I caused it”, even if they actually hadn’t. They were biased to attribute outcomes to their own actions, particularly after winning outcomes.

This bias may be the key to explaining why we’re superstitious: something I did caused something to happen, even if I can’t be sure what it was. And it suggests knowing superstitions aren’t real may not actually stop us from behaving superstitiously.

On the surface, this may not make sense – why expend energy doing things we know don’t affect outcomes? But if we look deeper, this bias serves an important purpose, because it helps ensure we don’t miss any potential connections between our actions and their outcomes. In other words, it’s better to be safe than sorry.

Research shows that engaging in superstitious behaviour can also increase confidence in our abilities to achieve a goal, improve performance in different tasks, and alleviate anxiety by giving us a sense of control.

The tendency to attribute positive outcomes to our actions (as we found) can boost self-esteem and psychological wellbeing. So, perhaps we’d all benefit by indulging in a little superstitious behaviour. Touch wood. Läs mer…

Earlier this year, the Daily Beast published a story that contained highly derogatory allegations about the Duchess of Sussex, Meghan Markle, quoting anonymous sources.

The piece was apparently aimed at refuting an earlier story in US Weekly that praised Markle and her management style, and featured people quoted by name.

The Daily Beast piece, written by a British-born journalist, was another example in a well-established pattern of relentless negative media framing of Markle, particularly by the same U.K. tabloids that have been sued by her husband, Prince Harry, and often via the use of unnamed sources.

This framing is readily identifiable by conducting a simple Google News search on her name. Markle, in fact, recently described herself as being one of the most bullied people in the world — which was met with more online bullying.

Although tabloid gossip is a feature of any celebrity’s life, the longstanding and seemingly orchestrated media campaign against Markle, a private citizen who left the United Kingdom almost five years ago and hasn’t spoken publicly about the Royal Family in years, is exceptional.

There have even been allegations of British media outlets attempting to pay people to lie about her.

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle on their wedding day outside Windsor Castle in May 2018.
(AP Photo/Matt Dunham)

These efforts reveal important information about the intersection of media power, gender and race.

As a communications scholar, I wanted to examine how Markle has been represented in the media and what other academics have determined in their own research about the coverage of her. The goal is not to assess the media’s derogatory claims about her; rather, it’s to shed light on the concealed structural issues underlying everyday news.

A disruptor in Brexit-era Britain

Since the onset of her relationship with Prince Harry, Markle’s identity as a feminist, biracial, American media celebrity has been under heavy media scrutiny. Early on in their relationship, The Daily Mail ran a highly controversial piece with the headline: “Harry’s girl is (almost) straight outta Compton: Gang-scarred home of her mother revealed — so will he be dropping by for tea?”

This piece made no attempt to conceal its racism and was replete with negative stereotypes of Black urban poverty, depicting Markle as unfit for the privileged life of the monarchy.

Nonetheless, the couple’s wedding received generally favourable media coverage from a diverse array of outlets. This disparity prompted scholars to inquire into the symbolic meanings of the royal wedding.

In an essay that garnered significant media attention, historian Hannah Yelin and sociologist Laura Clancy argued that the monarchy co-opted Markle’s feminist rhetoric.

They wrote:

“A celebrity (post)feminist such as Markle is of great value to a British monarchy keen to set themselves apart from these other forms of patriarchy and to mask, or at least deflect attention from, their own intensely problematic relationship with issues of race, gender, class and religion.”

But when The Sunday Times published a story based upon Yelin and Clancy’s essay, it chose an eye-catching yet problematically inaccurate title: “Academics accuse Meghan Markle of dropping feminism like a hot potato.”

As this story was reproduced by other publications, Yelin and Clancy found themselves targeted with sustained online hostility. Their criticism of proliferating misogyny was co-opted into increasingly negative media coverage of Markle. This twist was a telling revelation of how attacks on Markle are closely associated with mounting public tension around feminism and visible feminists.

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle at an Invictus Games training camp, in Whistler, B.C., in February 2024.
THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darryl Dyck

Racial identity

Besides the gender perspective, racial identity is also central to media discourses surrounding Markle, whose marriage to Prince Harry was depicted by some media commentators as a marked progress in British race relations.

This widely held opinion, however, is disputed by many scholars. For example, Kehinde Andrews, the first Black Studies professor in the U.K. who led the establishment of the first Black Studies program in Europe at Birmingham City University, considers Markle’s inclusion into the royal family a “cosmetic change in representation.”

He adds that framing her entry into the family as a sign of progress is “the perfect example of a post-racial delusion that demonstrates how poorly the nation understands racism and the power of the desire to live in a fantasy of progress rather than address continuing issues.”

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s high-profile departure from the Royal Family in 2020 occurred in the broader context of Brexit, and it was naturally labelled as #Megxit in online discussions.

This play on words allowed racist ideologies to persist under the guise of humour. As media scholar Kendra Marston noted:

“Staged fantasies of Markle’s expulsion from the Royal Family and indeed from Britain — neatly encapsulated in the Twitter hashtag #Megxit — seek to preserve a fantasy of the British monarchy as an exclusive symbol of national heritage that is conservative, patriarchal, white and, importantly, legitimate.”

Meghan Markle walks among the members of the Royal Family at Queen Elizabeth’s funeral in September 2022.
( Jacob King/Pool via AP)

Market-oriented journalism

Media narratives about Markle should also be understood against the backdrop of British regulatory environments and market mechanisms.

First, journalists in the U.K. navigate a maze of statutes and legal precedents. As such, their focus can be drawn to what is legally possible, and there is more legal leeway for reporting on celebrities and members of the Royal Family than there is for reporting on private people.

Ethical considerations appear in professional codes of conduct. McNae’s Essential Law for Journalists, a tome elaborating what may get journalists into legal trouble, is the British journalist’s “Bible.”

Second — and unlike the U.K.’s statutorily regulated broadcast sector — oversight of the print sector primarily rests with the industry-established Independent Press Standards Organisation. The extent to which this self-regulatory arrangement curbs newspaper excesses is a matter of debate.

Prince Harry leaves court after giving evidence in London in June 2023 against a tabloid publisher he accuses of phone hacking and other unlawful snooping.
(AP Photo/Kin Cheung)

Market pressures weigh on British media ethics, but there is a difference in coverage between the more sober “quality” press like The Guardian and sensationalistic tabloids like The Daily Mail and The Sun, which lean towards hyper-competitive, market-oriented journalism.

Media scholar James Curran has noted that quality news historically attracts high-end advertisers seeking high-end “niche” audiences; tabloids have sought larger, mass audiences and the advertisers targeting them. Sensationalism and outrage deliver large readerships, as does gossip, which helps audiences feel “in the know” about exclusive, high-status groups.

Gossip does appear in the quality press, though tabloids excel at providing it.

In 2012, the U.K.’s Leveson inquiry into media ethics resulted in a series of recommendations on how to regulate British newspapers in the wake of phone-hacking scandals. Those recommendations have largely been ignored.

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said recently he would not revive the long-awaited second part of the inquiry, to the dismay of media regulation advocates and many parliamentarians.

Read more:
Brexit and migration: our new research highlights fact-free news coverage

Societal tensions

The media’s portrayal of Markle reveals the societal tensions underlying daily news, particularly concerning race and gender.

It also underscores the complexity of news ethics, especially in the U.K., which are exacerbated by the supposed self-regulation of some media outlets. Market pressures and the desire for clicks often result in sensationalist celebrity coverage that can often be factually problematic or, in Markle’s case, even incendiary at times.

Given the media’s impact on public perception and how it can incite online abuse of the type Markle is frequently subjected to, it seems the media should rethink how it reports on public figures and private citizens alike. Läs mer…