THE LAST DECADE HAS BEEN DEFINED BY THE BEST – AND THE WORST – OF HUMAN NATURE. OVER THE NEXT 14 PAGES, OUR PICTURE EDITORS SHARE THE IMAGES THAT THEY BELIEVE BEST CAPTURE AN UNFORGETTABLE ERA
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WORDS RUSSELL LEADBETTER PHOTOGRAPHS AP/PA/GETTY/KIRSTY ANDERSON/JAMIE SIMPSON
WHAT will be your abiding memory of the last decade? Images of the migrant crisis? Donald Trump becoming US President? Britain seceding from the European Union? The civil war in Syria? Scotland’s failed bid for independence? Boris Johnson, the Conservatives’ joker in the pack, becoming Prime Minister?
Or was it foodbanks and widening inequality, or Greta Thunberg, the startling power of the tech giants, Russian influence in Western elections, the Arab Spring, the disaster at Grenfell Tower, the killing of Osama bin Laden, the rightwing populists ascending to power, the #MeToo movement, Catalonia’s drive for independence, the rise and fall of Isis, or the endless courage of Malala Yousafzai?
Or was it the terror assaults – on Paris, Nice, London, Manchester, Berlin, Brussels, and in Norway? Or the gun massacres in America –
Sandy Hook elementary school, the Las Vegas music festival?
Then again, it could have been Edward Snowden, the quiet, bespectacled whistleblower who disclosed the top-secret mass surveillance programmes run by America’s National Security Agency and its global partner agencies.
One thing is for sure: it was a turbulent decade, filled with protest and rage and division. The
Arab Spring, which flared into life in 2011, ended with several autocratic regimes in the region being toppled.
In Syria, the regime of Bashar al-Assad has carried out innumerable atrocities against its own people, including the use of chlorine as a chemical weapon. The civil war in Syria has now lasted longer than the two world wars combined.
The culture wars in America and elsewhere have become increasingly bitter and divisive. And if you thought the 2016 presidential campaign was ugly, it will have nothing on the one in 2020, fuelled in part by the Democrats’ bid to impeach the President.
It was a decade in which we came to see social media as a threat to liberal democracy; when, confronted with the sight of melting icecaps and raging forest fires, we came to appreciate the urgency of the need to do something meaningful about climate change.
On the more positive side? We had Game of Thrones, the two royal weddings and the birth of several princes and princesses, the London and the Rio Olympics, three World Cups, the Glasgow Commonwealth Games, and the successes of Andy Murray. We learned new terms and concepts – ‘selfies’, ‘twerking’, gender fluidity, non-binary, #MeToo, data-mining, Instagram influencers, streaming wars, binge-watching, emojis, post-truth, youthquake, ‘fake news’, photobomb and more. So much more.
The photographs in the pages that follow reflect a small part of the decade.
A Kurdish refugee mother and her son from the Isis-besieged Syrian town of Kobani beside their tent in a camp in the town of Suruc on the Turkish-Syrian border, in October 2014
Above: Hong Kong has been rocked by increasingly confrontational pro-democracy, anti-government protests for the last six months. Police fired tear-gas at demonstrators on Christmas Day.
Below right: Greta Thunberg, a 16-year-old Swedish environmentalist activist, did much to remind world leaders of the urgency behind the need to tackle climate change before it is too late.
Below left: Members of the media were struck by a Molotov cocktail thrown at a Hong Kong demo in October.
Left: Japan supporters made headlines when they collected rubbish after their national team’s World Cup game against Belgium at the World Cup in Russia in 2018. The trophy was won by France, who defeated Croatia 4-2 in the final in Moscow.
Right: An understandably emotional Brazil fan reacts after watching his team - the hosts and one of the tournament favourites – being hammered 7-1 by Germany at the 2014 World Cup. The victors went on to lift the trophy, beating Argentina 1-0.
Above: A devastating earthquake in Haiti in January 2010 killed an estimated 250,000 people and left more than a million people homeless.
Below left: In July 2016, a French-Algerian jihadist drove a 19-tonne truck along the crowded Promenade des Anglais in Nice, killing 86 people.
Below right: Fidel Castro, the communist revolutionary who governed Cuba from 1959 to 2008. Cuban state television announced that he had died on the night of November 25, 2016. The cause of death was not disclosed.
Below: Tears are shed for one of the victims of the Easter Sunday church bombings in Sri Lanka last April, in which 269 people were killed.
Above right: Former South African president Nelson Mandela, seen here in Glasgow in 1993, died in 2013.
Above left: The assassination in Pakistan of Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, mastermind behind the 9/11 attacks, led to celebrations across America when President Obama announced the news in May 2011.
Above centre: The Libyan dictator, Col Muammar Gaddafi, was killed in October that same year, during the Arab Spring tumult.
Below middle: The ‘Beast from the East’ brought Scotland to a snowbound standstill in February and March 2018.
Above left: Rangers stunned the world of football when they went into administration in 2012, and were demoted to Scottish senior football’s lowest tier.
Below right: Ruth Davidson, the then leader of the Scottish Conservatives, is flanked by her partner, Jen Wilson, after giving birth to a baby boy, Finn Paul.
Above: The world-famous Mackintosh building at Glasgow School of Art suffered two catastrophic fires, in 2014 and 2018.
Left: One of the most harrowing images of the decade: Grenfell Tower ablaze in June 2017. Seventy-two people died.
Below right: Twenty-two people, including 14-year-old Eilidh MacLeod from Barra, died in a suicide bombing at the end of a concert at the Manchester Arena in May 2017 by US singer Ariana Grande. Here, flowers are laid in the city’s St Ann’s Square.
Right: Floods brought widespread problems to northern England in November 2019, including Rotherham where the River Don burst its banks.
Below: The royal family had several ups and downs; the happier moments included the wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle in
May 2018 (left); the wedding, at Westminster Abbey in April 2011 (centre); and (right) the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee celebrations in 2012.
Right: Fireworks at the London Olympics in 2012.
Left: The #MeToo movement and the Time’s Up campaign gave millions of people worldwide a new consciousness regarding sexual assaults on women.
Here, Orla Dean, aged five, holds a placard during a Time’s Up rally in London in 2108.
Above: Delight and relief are etched on Andy Murray face as he holds the Wimbledon’s men’s singles trophy in 2013 after a straight-sets victory over Novak Djokovic. The Scot’s triumph ended Britain’s 77-year wait for a men’s champion.
Below right: David Gray celebrates his 92nd minute winner in Hibernian’s dramatic 3-2 victory over Rangers in the 2016 Scottish Cup final. It had been 114 years since the Edinburgh side had last won the trophy.
Below left: Mo Farah surges to victory at the men’s 5000m final at the London 2012 Olympics.
Left: Emeli Sandé’s 2012 debut album, Our Version of Events, was one of the decade’s biggest UK albums and its biggest-selling female debut. The singer, who grew up in Alford, Aberdeenshire, is a distinctive and hugely popular voice; her latest album, Real Life (2019), was widely praised
Right: Marie Kondo beeame famous as a de-cluttering expert. “Our goal is to help more people live a life that sparks joy”, says her website.
Above: Artist of the year and artist of the decade at the American Music Awards, Taylor Swift, 30, is the world’s biggest solo star, renowned for the quality of her songs and her outspoken stances against gender inequality.
Left: Malala Yousafzai survived being shot in the head by the Taliban to become joint winner of the 2014 Nobel Peace Prize.
Below: Barack Obama has been sorely missed since leaving the White House almost four years ago. He and his wife Michelle have signed production deals with Netflix.
The hit comedy, Still Game, entertained thousands of fans with three runs of live shows at the SSE Hydro.
Below: the Hydro opened in 2013 and has hosted many of the world’s biggest acts.