I have a new article out in the Journal of Contemporary History: journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/... It examines Soviet humanitarianism by focusing on Soviet Red Cross hospitals in Tehran, Addis Ababa, and Phnom Penh. 📷 Soviet Red Cross hospital in Addis Ababa, ICRC Audiovisual Archives

This is so problematic. Creating big-money grants (7m EUR!) is such a travesty. Instead of funding 1 researcher, why not fund 25 with smaller grants? It would create more ideas, secure more careers, and create so much more innovative knowledge. www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-euro...

Of all the arguments that Mahmood is making for her wretched immigration "reforms", this is one of the most self-serving and disngenuous. It's also wrong. By attacking the principle of settlement, she is quite literally attacking people like her. Shame on her.

My British Academy project is on the road this week as some of the project team present a panel at #nacbs2025 in snowy Montreal! If you fancy an early-morning wake-up call, come along to hear us talk about identity politics, multiculturalism, prisons, and political mobilisation...

I wrote something with the wonderful @mcslaven.bsky.social about how the immigration debate in the UK has becoming so mind-bogglingly radicalised. foreignpolicy.com/2025/11/05/b...

It seems unreal after so many years in preparation, but my Hobsbawm book is almost there! It now has a front cover and a place on the publisher's website. Publication is due in August. www.hup.harvard.edu/books/978067...

We don't bite and we publish good stuff. Nuff said.

Job Opportunity! Teaching Fellow in Twentieth Century Black British History University of Leeds - Faculty of Arts, Humanities & Cultures - School of History www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DPF977/t...

Just returned from this wonderful workshop we organised as a project team. Such a pleasure to hear amazing young & established researchers speaking about their research. Hooray for academic collaboration! For more info on our @britishacademy.bsky.social-funded project: hca.ed.ac.uk/history/rese...

Another really stimulating interview about the book :) www.nonfiction.fr/article-1244...

This is now out in the world - get your copy now! 🙂

I guess France is doing OK if someone has agreed to interview me... 😄 www.lexpress.fr/idees-et-deb...

Vous voulez comprendre les racines profondes de la crise politique actuelle en France? Quoi de mieux que mon petit livre qui va paraître le 23 octobre et qui traite notamment de la désintégration du paysage politique français! A commander en librairie ou sur Amazon: www.amazon.fr/paradoxe-fra...

I'm not sure what to say about French politics anymore. First as tragedy, then as farce, then as some Czech surrealist movie, then as Sébastien Lecornu..?

🦋 With Bluesky's membership growing, here's a reminder that we've put together not one but TWO starter packs of people, journals and institutions working and publishing in our field. Follow one contemporary European historian, get 149 free! go.bsky.app/SU3jCJb

Dear Immigrant. When you’ve finished your night shift at A&E, please spend a couple of hours picking litter in the park or we’ll kick you out. Yours, the Labour Party

I really did love this article I edited! (To see more editorial recommendations, check out the Contemporary European History editorial digest here: tinyurl.com/38p3yxky)

Honestly, there has been enough of UK governments playing political games with immigrants' status. That's what paved the way to the Windrush Scandal. For a Labour government, having pledged to learn the lessons of Windrush, to be doing the same is really bad www.thenewworld.co.uk/james-ball-t...

Our collaborative book couldn't be more topical in the light of the recent announcement about digital ID cards. Mike's work on the UK is particularly relevant in thinking about why the UK doesn't have ID cards and what could happen if it tries to implement them.

Sarkozy will actually go to jail? Bloody hell, things are *happening* in French politics. Never a dull moment! PS. It's OK, I can't follow Sarko's dozens of corruption scandals either.

Sébastien Lecornu? What a yawnfest. Somehow this end-of-reign Macron regime is managing to be totally unexpected and totally boring all at once.

If you want to reduce small boat crossings, find ways to support the arrival of family members of refugees in the UK so they won't cross irregularly (like existed for family already in the EU pre-Brexit, via the Dublin system). Instead the government is doing something that will worsen the problem

There's no other way to say it: Macron boxed himself entirely into a corner by calling snap elections in 2024. Sure, there are structural conditions at work, but the responsibility here to a remarkable degree lies with him alone. www.lemonde.fr/politique/ar...

Even after all these years, holding a real book you've written never, ever gets old. Especially if it's your first book in French. Feeling très emu... PS. The book is coming out in a few weeks - order from Amazon or anywhere else you get your Francophone books! www.amazon.fr/paradoxe-fra...

I wrote something for the @thetls.bsky.social about the most famous wind in France - the mistral - and an excellent little book that tries to tell a "windswept" history of modern France. www.the-tls.com/world/travel...

We're very proud of this - and we hope it'll help people find out more about the really cool things we publish!

Just in time for the new paperback edition of the book!

I had the privilege of leaning heavily on Dónal to produce this piece - it's brilliant, go read it!

Excerpt from an article Eric Hobsbawm wrote in 'New Society' upon his return from a stint as visiting professor at Birzeit University in the West Bank in 1983. Some of the anecdotes he recounted in the piece came directly from his rough field notes.

Nora was one of the great French intellectual impresarios of the postwar period and truly representative of his generation - in all its imagination and dogmatism. www.lemonde.fr/disparitions...

Excellent, chilling reporting @lemonde.fr on neutralisation of criticism in Israel, focusing on universities. So much to unpack about complicity, power, silence. Struck also by comparisons with eg. Algerian War, Vietnam War, where campuses became hubs of resistance. www.lemonde.fr/internationa...

The longevity of France's nuclear testing in the South Pacific remains one of the Fifth Republic's great scandals. I'm glad the research is showing what we all knew about the cover-ups and the misinformation. www.theguardian.com/world/2025/m...

Yes, please send us your ideas! We're always looking for blogs and we think we're a nice bunch :)

Fancy learning more about the really cool book I co-authored on Western European states, irregular migration, and the politics of ignorance? Then tune in online to a panel discussion on the book in Birmingham on Thursday, 13:00-14:30 UK time. Sign up below! www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/states-of-...

Lol to the fictitious pay figures. But also: the final salary scheme of the USS pension was closed to new entrants in 2011 and closed altogether in 2016.

If you're in Cambridge on Tuesday, come and argue with me about whether Hobsbawm had a theory of capitalism or not!

Can't wait to take this great collaborative book back on the road again!

Bored with the Trumpfest and fancy a primer on what's going on in France? This is the best I could do in 30ish minutes when prompted by the excellent Gavin Esler...

Time to reup this classic video of Marine Le Pen denouncing political corruption and embezzlement in 2004. The hypocrisy is strong with this one, Master Yoda! www.ina.fr/ina-eclaire-...

Some observations about the Marine Le Pen verdict: 1) WOW. They really went for it: prison term (w/electronic tag) and 5 years of ineligibility. That's almost exactly what the prosecutors asked for, so she's seriously guilty. 2) Will this halt the progress of the far-right in France? No. But... 1/

Yes! Bring it on! Can't wait to see how this plays out! (And, oh my god, she is so guilty...) www.lemonde.fr/politique/li...

Yes, yes! Finally some French off-the-wall craziness to distract me from what's happening on the other side of the Atlantic! Anyone fancy chatting about islamo-gaullisme..?

ABC Australia topped and tailed the lecture I gave in Sydney on the history of the French state for their "Big Ideas" show. The recording quality is really good, which makes me sound much smarter than I am. A lovely memory of a lovely trip. www.abc.net.au/listen/progr...

The leadership and staff at the NIH institute who processed 100 grants in an afternoon are heroes. www.theatlantic.com/health/archi...

My article 'Between Moscow and Geneva: The Soviet Red Cross and the International Red Cross Movement' is out in the Journal of Global History. It explores the mutually beneficial relationship between the Soviet Red Cross & the League of Red Cross Societies during the Cold War tinyurl.com/yck3xzsc

The death of Jean-Marie Le Pen was a big deal for a lot of French people, even if they hated him. I wrote this piece to explain why - and to look at how this most unsavoury of characters embodied all the aspects of French politics that no-one wants to see. jacobin.com/2025/02/jean...

The death of Jean-Marie Le Pen was a big deal for a lot of French people, even if they hated him. I wrote this piece to explain why - and to look at how this most unsavoury of characters embodied all the aspects of French politics that no-one wants to see. jacobin.com/2025/02/jean...

"Examples".

Hard to describe my sheer excitement at the news that my first book in French will appear in the autumn! It's a revised translation of my introduction to contemporary French history for Polity, which came out in 2020. Tell your French friends! Link: www.markushaller.com/d/Chabal-dos...