Spring 2013 | Public lectures and events | Audio and pdf: Recent Episodes
London School of Economics and Political Science
Contributor(s): Dr Ben S Bernanke, Olivier Blanchard, Professor Lawrence H. Summers, Axel A. Weber | Five years on, the global economy continues to come to terms with the impact of the financial crisis. This event examines the lessons that both economists and policymakers should learn in order to lessen the chance of future crises. Ben S. Bernanke was sworn in on February 1, 2006, as chairman and a member of the board of governors of the Federal Reserve System. Before his appointment as chairman, Dr. Bernanke was chairman of the President's Council of Economic Advisers, from June 2005 to January 2006. Olivier Blanchard is economic counsellor and director, Research Department at the International Monetary Fund. After obtaining his Ph.D in economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1977, he taught at Harvard University, returning to MIT in 1982, where he has been since where he holds the post of Class of 1941 Professor of Economics. Lawrence H. Summers is President Emeritus of Harvard University. During the past two decades he has served in a series of senior policy positions, including vice president of development economics and chief economist of the World Bank, undersecretary of the Treasury for International Affairs, director of the National Economic Council for the Obama administration from 2009 to 2011, and secretary of the treasury of the United States, from 1999 to 2001. He is currently the Charles W. Eliot University Professor at Harvard University. Axel A. Weber is visiting professor of economics at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, former president of the Deutsche Bundesbank and current chairman of the board of UBS. Professor Sir Mervyn King is governor of the Bank of England. Before joining the Bank he was professor of economics at the LSE, and a founder of the Financial Markets Group.
Contributor(s): Dr Steffen Hertog, Professor Giacomo Luciani, Dr Marc Valeri, Dr Khalid AlMezaini | Although most Arab countries remain authoritarian, many have undergone a restructuring of state-society relations. Lower and middle class interest groups have lost ground, while big business has benefited in terms of its integration into policy-making and the opening-up of economic sectors that used to be state-dominated. Arab businesses have also started taking on aspects of public service provision in health, media and education that used to be the domain of the state, while also becoming increasingly active in philanthropy. This launch for Business Politics in the Middle East (Hurst, 2013), a volume by LSE's Dr Steffen Hertog and edited by Professor Giacomo Luciani and Dr Marc Valeri, will cover the political role of regional capitalists during and after the Arab uprisings, prospects for the emergence of a more independent bourgeoisie, economic reform and new social contracts. Dr Steffen Hertog is Senior Lecture in Comparative Politics in LSE’s Department of Government. Hertog has been researching the comparative political economy of the Gulf and Middle East for more than a decade, working with a number of local and international institutions. Professor Giacomo Luciani is Scientific Director of the Master in International Energy of the Paris School of International Affairs at Sciences-Po and a Princeton University Global Scholar attached to the Woodrow Wilson School and the Department of Near Eastern Studies. He is also a visiting professor at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva and co-director of the Executive Master in Oil and Gas Leadership. Dr Marc Valeri is Lecturer in Political Economy of the Middle East at the University of Exeter. After a Master's Degree in Comparative Politics, with speciality on Arab and Muslim worlds, he received a PhD in 2005 from Sciences Po Paris. His work dealt with nation-building and political legitimacy in the Sultanate of Oman since 1970. Dr Khalid Almezaini is an Assistant Professor at Qatar University and was previously a research fellow in the Kuwait Programme at LSE. He has taught International Relations at Cambridge, Edinburgh and Exeter universities. His research focuses on International Relations of the Middle East and the Gulf in particular.
Contributor(s): Evgeny Morozov | Evgeny Morozov will be presenting his latest book To Save Everything, Click Here, which argues that the proliferation of sensors, big data, and social networks have given policymakers the irresistible temptation to solve problems that, perhaps, should not be solved at all - or only solved via democratic debate, not nifty technological fixes. Evgeny Morozov is the author of The Net Delusion: The Dark Side of Internet Freedom (which was the winner of the 2012 Goldsmith Book Prize) and a contributing editor for The New Republic. Previously, he was a visiting scholar at Stanford University, a Scwhartz fellow at the New America Foundation, a Yahoo fellow at the Institute for the Study of Diplomacy at Georgetown (where he also taught), and a fellow at the Open Society Foundations (where he also served on the board of the Information Program). Prior to moving to the US, Morozov worked as Director of New Media at Transitions Online, a media development NGO based in Prague. His monthly column on technology comes out in Slate, Corriere della Sera, El Pais, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung and several other newspapers. He's also written for The New York Times, The Economist, The Wall Street Journal, The Financial Times, Times Literary Supplement, London Review of Books and other publications.
Contributor(s): Hilary Lawson, Dr Parashkev Nachev, Dr Jaime Whyte | We have seen a gradual erosion of belief in objective truth, but in a world without truth how are we to understand lies? This second event in the series debates the nature of lies and their importance. Are lies necessarily morally wrong, and what is the relationship between lies, power and individual identity? This lecture is the second of a three-part series entitled Error, Lies and Adventure, the first talk 'Beyond Truth: Error and Adventure' will take place on 4 March. Hilary Lawson is director of the Institute of Art and Ideas and the author of Closure. Parashkev Nachev is senior clinical research associate at the Institute of Neurology, UCL, and honorary clinical lecturer at Imperial College London. Jamie Whyte is a former Times columnist and Cambridge philosopher. Joanna Kavenna is an Orange Award-winning novelist. She has written for the London Review of Books and the Observer.
Contributor(s): Professor Andrew Abbott | This lecture argues that since excess and overabundance are central phenomena of modern life, we should refound social theory on the concept of "too much of" rather than "too little of." I trace the origin of the scarcity theories that dominate our reasoning, and sketch the outlines of a social theory based on excess. Andrew Abbott is the Gustavus F and Ann M Swift Distinguished Service Professor of Sociology, Chicago University. Abbott's major research interests lie in the sociology of occupations, professions, and work, the sociology of culture and knowledge, and social theory. Abbott also has longstanding interests in methods, heuristics, and the philosophy and practice of sociology.
Contributor(s): Dr Linda Yueh | What drives China's impressive growth and will it continue? Parsing the evidence leads to some surprising conclusions and also points to needed reforms to sustain development in the coming decades. Linda Yueh is director of the China Growth Centre and fellow in economics at St Edmund Hall, University of Oxford. She is also adjunct professor of economics at the London Business School. Linda's new book is entitled China's Growth: The Making of an Economic Superpower.
Contributor(s): Professor Ulrich Beck, Daniel Cohn-Bendit, Professor Mary Kaldor | The basic rules of European democracy are being subverted or turned into their opposite, bypassing parliaments, governments and EU institutions. Multilateralism is turning into unilateralism, equality into hegemony, sovereignty into the dependency and recognition into disrespect for the dignity of other nations. Even France, which long dominated European integration, must submit to Berlin’s strictures now that it must fear for its international credit rating. In this event, Ulrich Beck, Daniel Cohn-Bendit and Mary Kaldor discuss the current political crisis and how to reinvent democracy in Europe. Ulrich Beck is professor of Sociology at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, Germany. His recent books include Cosmopolitan Europe (with Edgar Grande) (Polity Press 2007), World at Risk (Polity Press 2009), A God of One’s Own (Polity Press 2010), Twenty Observations on a World in Turmoil (Polity Press 2012), Distant Love (together with Elisabeth Beck-Gernsheim) (Polity Press 2013) and German Europe (Polity Press 2013). Daniel Cohn-Bendit is a German politician, active also in France. He is currently co-president of the group European Greens–European Free Alliance in the European Parliament and co-chair of the Spinelli Group, a European parliament intergroup aiming at relaunching the federalist project in Europe. His latest book is For Europe (2012; with Guy Verhofstadt). Mary Kaldor is professor of Global Governance in the Department of International Development at LSE, where she directs the Human Security and Civil Society Research Unit. She has just completed a report on The Bubbling Up of Subterranean Politics in Europe based on research undertaken by seven field teams across Europe.
Contributor(s): Professor Anne Phillips | In this inaugural lecture, to celebrate her appointment as the Graham Wallas Professor of Political Science, Anne Phillips addresses the status of the human in politics. Is what Hannah Arendt called 'the abstract nakedness of being human' sufficient to establish principles of solidarity or equality? And can we talk of what, as humans, we have in common without thereby dismissing as irrelevancies our gender, sexuality, or 'race'? Anne Phillips is Graham Wallas Professor of Political Science in the Department of Government. She is also currently Director of the LSE Gender Institute. She joined the LSE in 1999 as Professor of Gender Theory, and was Director of the Gender Institute until September 2004. She subsequently moved to a joint appointment between the Gender Institute and Department of Government. She is a leading figure in feminist political theory, and writes on issues of bodies and property, democracy and representation, equality, multiculturalism, and difference. Much of her work can be read as challenging the narrowness of contemporary liberal theory. In 1992, she was co-winner of the American Political Science Association's Victoria Schuck Award for Best Book on Women and Politics published in 1991 (awarded for Engendering Democracy). She was awarded an honorary Doctorate from the University of Aalborg in 1999; was appointed Adjunct Professor in the Political Science Programme of the Research School of Social Sciences, Australian National University, 2002-6; and was elected a Fellow of the British Academy in 2003. In 2008, she received a Special Recognition Award from the Political Studies Association, UK, for her contribution to Political Studies. In 2012, she was awarded the title Graham Wallas Professor of Political Science. Simon Hix is Professor of European and Comparative Politics and Head of the Government Department at LSE.
Contributor(s): Dr Daniel Gros, Professor Charles Goodhart, Professor Michael Haliassos | Dr Daniel Gros is director of Centre for European Policy Studies, Brussels. Professor Charles Goodhart, Emeritus Professor of Banking & Finance; director of Financial Regulation Research Programme, LSE. Professor Michael Haliassos is chair for Macroeconomics and Finance, Goethe University Frankfurt; director, Center for Financial Studies, Frankfurt.
Contributor(s): Professor Ian Goldin | The growing gap between global problems and solutions reflects a crisis in global governance. Professor Ian Goldin will present ideas from his latest book, Divided Nations: Why Global Governance is Failing and What can be done about it? Ian will focus on the financial crisis, the internet, pandemics, migration and climate change to highlight the need for urgent global action and provide proposals as to what is to be done. Professor Ian Goldin is director of the Oxford Martin School at the University of Oxford. He was previously vice president and director of policy for the World Bank after serving as advisor to President Mandela and chief executive of the Development Bank of Southern Africa. He has been knighted by the French government and author of 16 books, including Globalization for Development, Exceptional People (On Migration), and his most recent Divided Nations. Born in South Africa, Goldin has a BA (Hons) and a BSc from the University of Cape Town, an MSc from the London School of Economics and Political Science, and a Doctorate from the University of Oxford.
Contributor(s): Professor Craig Calhoun | In this lecture LSE Director Professor Craig Calhoun, considers the threats, internal and external to global capitalism.
Contributor(s): Professor Cécile Laborde, Professor Tariq Modood, Professor Anne Phillips | Under the combined criticisms of feminism, secularism and nationalism, multiculturalism is repeatedly being pronounced dead. Has it really reached the end of the road and what are the alternatives? Cécile Laborde is professor of political theory at University College London. Tariq Modood is the founding director of the Centre for the Study of Ethnicity and Citizenship at the University of Bristol. Anne Phillips is director of the Gender Institute and professor of political and gender theory in the LSE Gender Institute.
Contributor(s): Dr Isatou Touray | This talk discusses the efforts made by grassroots Gambian activists and community campaigns, as well as external forces, in building resistance to female genital mutilation in one of the few countries in the world where the practice remains not legally prohibited. Isatou Touray is founder and Executive Director of the Gambia Committee on Traditional Practices Affecting the Health of Women and Children (GAMCOTRAP), an organisation which has campaigned for women’s and girls’ rights since the 1980s, and which has been a leader in the struggle to eliminate Female Genital Mutilation (FGM). In addition to a prolific list of publications, Dr Touray has engaged extensively with other rights organisations in The Gambia and beyond. This has included membership of the Gender Action Team for the Ratification of the African Protocol on Women’s Rights, and the Technical Advisory Body for the Policy for the Advancement of Gambian Women, and acting as Secretary General for the Inter-African Committee on Traditional Practices. In recognition of her achievements, sacrifices and service to others, in 2008 Dr Touray was awarded the US Ambassadorial Prize for ‘International Woman of Courage’ and was voted ‘Gambian of the Year’, an honour bestowed previously on only two female nationals. This event is supported by the LSE Annual Fund.
Contributor(s): Professor Ali Ansari | Launching his latest book, The Politics of Nationalism in Modern Iran, Professor Ali Ansari will explore the idea of nationalism in the creation of modern Iran, considering the broader developments in national ideologies that took place following the emergence of the European Enlightenment and showing how these ideas were adopted by a non-European state. Ali Ansari is Professor in Modern History with reference to the Middle East at University of St Andrews, where he is also the founding director of the Institute for Iranian Studies.
Contributor(s): James Dawson, Kate Kingsley, Meg Rosoff | This event celebrates the culmination of the LSE/First Story creative writing competition for key stages 3, 4 and 5 and will include a prize-giving presentation, as well as a reception following the event. Trying new things can be daunting, but also inspiring. In our creative writing trying a new genre or subject, or exploring what new technology has to offer can be liberating. But is it sometimes best to stick to the classics? Find out what has inspired our panel of authors, and join in the discussion. James Dawson, author of dark teen thrillers Hollow Pike and Cruel Summer, grew up in West Yorkshire, writing imaginary episodes of Doctor Who. He later turned his talent to journalism, interviewing luminaries such as Steps and Atomic Kitten before writing a weekly serial in a Brighton newspaper. Until recently, James worked as a teacher, specialising in PSHCE and behaviour. He is most proud of his work surrounding bullying and family diversity. He now writes full time in London and is published by Indigo/Orion. Kate Kingsley is the author of Young, Loaded & Fabulous, a scandalous YA series about mean teens at British boarding school. After growing up between London and New York City, Kate started her writing career at GQ magazine. She has been published in places like The Sunday Times Magazine and the New York Times. This is her first year working with the wonderfully talented First Story students, an experience she is absolutely loving. She currently lives in East London, where she's writing her sixth book. Meg Rosoff was born in Boston, educated at Harvard and St Martin’s College of Art, and worked in New York City for ten years before moving to London permanently in 1989. She worked in publishing, politics, PR and advertising until 2004, when she wrote How I Live Now, which won the Guardian Children’s fiction prize (UK), Michael L Printz prize (US), the Die Zeit children’s book of the year (Germany) and was shortlisted for the Orange first novel award. Her second novel, Just in Case, won the 2007 Carnegie Medal. Meg’s other books include What I Was, The Bride's Farewell and There Is No Dog. This event is linked to LSE's 5th Space for Thought Literary Festival|, taking place from Tuesday 25 February - Saturday 2 March 2013, with the theme 'Branching Out'.
Contributor(s): Michael Ward | LSE London's 2013 Lent term seminar series begins on the 14th of January. Speakers from within and beyond academia will focus on many of the implications of the current economic and political environment for London, covering relevant issues such as the road pricing, UK trends in higher education, census data and localism. Presenters include academics and practitioners from relevant fields. Each seminar is chaired by one of the members of LSE London, while speaker’s presentations, available podcasts and any other related documents are posted here regularly after each session.
Contributor(s): Professor David Ferris | This lecture will argue that painting, rather than retreat from the transformation of the visual image announced by photography, has now become photography’s most important interpreter. David Ferris is professor of humanities and comparative literature at the University of Colorado, Boulder.
Contributor(s): Professor Paul Preston, Dr Daniel Beer, Professor Helen Graham, Professor Dan Stone | A discussion of the atrocities against civilians in the Spanish Civil War, the political consequences in Spain today and the parallels with Nazi and Soviet experiences. Paul Preston is Director of the LSE’s Cañada Blanch Centre and author of numerous books on Spain of which the latest is The Spanish Holocaust. Daniel Beer is Senior Lecturer in Modern European History at Royal Holloway and the author of Renovating Russia: the Human Sciences and the Fate of Liberal Modernity (Cornell, 2008). Helen Graham is Professor of History at Royal Holloway. Her most recent book is The War and its Shadow. Spain’s Civil War in Europe’s Long Twentieth Century (2012). In 2010 she was Visiting Chair in Spanish Culture and Civilisation at the King Juan Carlos Centre, New York University. Dan Stone is Professor of Modern History at Royal Holloway, University of London. His books include Histories of the Holocaust (OUP, 2010); The Oxford Handbook of Postwar European History (OUP, 2012) and The Holocaust, Fascism and Memory (Palgrave, 2013). The Cañada Blanch Centre for Contemporary Spanish Studies is located within the European Institute at the London School of Economics and Political Science and is the focus of a flourishing interest in contemporary Spain in Britain. LSE Works is a series of public lectures, that will showcase some of the latest research by LSE's Research Centres. In each session, LSE academics will present key research findings, demonstrating where appropriate the implications of their studies for public policy. A list of all the LSE Works lectures can be viewed online.
Contributor(s): Professor Peter Hall | This presentation explores the origins and consequences of the contemporary crisis of the Euro from the perspective of a varieties-of-capitalism approach to the political economy. It associates the inadequacies of the governing institutions adopted for the Euro with a set of mythologies that was blind to the presence of distinctive varieties of capitalism in Europe and locates some of the roots of the crisis in the problems associated with combining joining varieties of capitalism in a single currency. The problems encountered by the Euro lie less in the ‘asymmetrical shocks’ anticipated in 1992 and more in the ‘institutional asymmetries’ across political economies. The problems the EU has had in resolving the crisis are also linked to divergent diagnoses of the problem rooted in distinctive philosophies of governance associated again with varieties of capitalism in Europe. Peter A. Hall is Krupp Foundation Professor of European Studies, a faculty associate of the Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies, and co-director of the Program on Successful Societies for the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research. Hall is co-editor of Successful Societies: How Institutions and Culture Affect Health (with M. Lamont), Changing France: The Politics that Markets Make (with B. Palier, P. Culpepper), Varieties of Capitalism: The Institutional Foundations of Comparative Advantage (with D. Soskice), The Political Power of Economic Ideas: Keynesianism across Nations, Developments in French Politics I and II (with A. Guyomarch, J. Hayward and H. Machin), European Labor in the 1980s and the author of Governing the Economy: The Politics of State Intervention in Britain and France as well as over seventy articles on European politics, public policy-making, and comparative political economy.
Contributor(s): Professor Kishore Mahbubani | 88% of the world’s population lives outside the West and is rising to Western living standards, and sharing Western aspirations. But while the world changes, our way of managing it has not and it must evolve. In this lecture, leading policy thinker Kishore Mahbubani outlines new policies and approaches that will be necessary to govern in an increasingly interconnected and complex environment. This event marks the publication of his new book The Great Convergence: Asia, the West, and the Logic of One World. Kishore Mahbubani is the Dean and Professor in the Practice of Public Policy at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore. From 1971-2004 he served in the Singapore Foreign Ministry, where he was Permanent Secretary from 1993-1998, served twice as Singapore’s Ambassador to the UN, and in 2001 and 2002 served as President of the UN Security Council. Professor Mahbubani is the author of Can Asians Think?, Beyond the Age of Innocence: Rebuilding Trust Between America and the World, and The New Asian Hemisphere: the Irresistible Shift of Global Power to the East. Foreign Policy and Prospect magazines have listed him as one of the top 100 public intellectuals in the world, and in 2009 The Financial Times included him on their list of Top 50 individuals who would shape the debate on the future of capitalism. In 2010 and 2011 he was selected as one of Foreign Policy’s Top Global Thinkers.
Contributor(s): Alexis Tsipras | Alexis Tsipras is President of Syriza-USF (Official Opposition Party, Greece). Professor Kevin Featherstone is director of the Hellenic Observatory at LSE.
Contributor(s): Professor John Breuilly, Dr Faisal Devji, Dr Mark Hewitson | This discussion will mark the launch of The Oxford Handbook of the History of Nationalism edited by Professor John Breuilly. The Oxford Handbook of the History of Nationalism comprises thirty six essays by an international team of leading scholars, providing a global coverage of the history of nationalism in its different aspects—ideas, sentiments, and politics. Every chapter takes the form of an interpretative essay which, by a combination of thematic focus, comparison, and regional perspective, enables the reader to understand nationalism as a distinct and global historical subject. The book covers the emergence of nationalist ideas, sentiments, and cultural movements before the formation of a world of nationstates, as well as nationalist politics before and after the era of the nation-state, with chapters covering Europe, the Middle East, North-East Asia, South Asia, South-East Asia, Sub- Saharan Africa, and the Americas. Essays on everyday national sentiment and race ideas in fascism are accompanied by chapters on nationalist movements opposed to existing nation-states, nationalism and international relations, and the role of external intervention into nationalist disputes within states. In addition, the book looks at the major challenges to nationalism: international socialism, religion, pan-nationalism, and globalization, before a final section considering how historians have approached the subject of nationalism. John Breuilly is professor of nationalism and ethnicity at LSE. Dr Faisal Devji is reader in Indian History, St. Antony's College, University of Oxford. Dr Mark Hewitson is senior lecturer in German History and Politics in the Department of German at University College London.
Contributor(s): Kate Bell, Duncan Bowie, Howard Reed, Zoe Williams | Seventy years ago the Beveridge Report announced the pursuit of a new settlement, one that would dramatically change the structure of Britain for the better. With this in mind, a new project from Class looks at what Beveridge's analysis of society can teach us about the Giant Evils of today and how can we use this to chart an alternative course for a welfare state - orSocial State - fit for a new settlement in 2015. This event at the London School of Economics will bring together the experts working on Class's Social State project in a panel discussion on the themes and policy suggestions proposed in this series of work. Kate Bell is child poverty coordinator of the Child Poverty Action Group. Duncan Bowie is senior lecturer in Spacial Planning at the University of Westminster. Howard Reed is director of the economic research consultancy Landman Economics. Zoe Williams is a columnist at The Guardian.
Contributor(s): Dr Duvvuri Subbarao | This lecture is in honour of Dr Indraprastha Gordhanbhai (IG) Patel who was the ninth director of LSE from 1984 to 1990. Over the five years through 2003-08 leading up to the global financial crisis, India clocked an average annual growth of 8.7 per cent on the back of wide ranging structural and policy reforms and growing integration with the global economy. By the year 2008, India was the fourth largest economy in the world in purchasing power parity terms. For a nation that once believed that the ‘Hindu rate of growth’ was its destiny, this remarkable growth performance became a trigger for setting off aspirations for double-digit growth. Those aspirations have moderated significantly with growth moderating below trend in the post-crisis period owing to the impact of the global downturn as also a host of domestic policy and operational bottlenecks. The post-crisis period has also been characterized by a large fiscal deficit, historically high current account deficit and inflation persisting above the comfort level. Macroeconomic management during this period has had to contend with balancing between stimulating growth and reining in inflation, dealing with the short-term pressures in external sector without compromising long-term sustainability and returning to a path of fiscal responsibility. Dr Subbarao, governor of the Reserve Bank of India will reflect on these challenges from the Reserve Bank perspective and illustrate the dilemmas encountered in making policy choices. Dr Duvvuri Subbarao assumed office as the twenty-second governor of the Reserve Bank of India on 5 September 2008. Prior to this appointment, Dr Subbarao served as finance secretary to the Government of India from April 2007 to September 2008 and as secretary to the Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Council from March 2005 to March 2007, and was a lead economist in the World Bank (1999 - 2004). Dr Subbarao came into the Reserve Bank just a week before the global financial crisis erupted in full in mid-September 2008. He led the Reserve Bank’s effort to mitigate the impact of the crisis on India and was actively engaged in the G-20 effort to coordinate an international response to the crisis.
Contributor(s): Professor Jeffrey D Sachs | The world has agreed to adopt Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to guide global development after 2015. Professor Jeffrey Sachs will discuss the choice of SDGs and a policy and normative framework to achieve them. Jeffrey D. Sachs is a world-renowned professor of economics, leader in sustainable development, senior UN advisor, bestselling author, and syndicated columnist whose monthly newspaper columns appear in more than 80 countries. He has twice been named among Time magazine's 100 most influential world leaders. He was called by the New York Times, "probably the most important economist in the world," and by Time magazine "the world's best known economist." A recent survey by The Economist magazine ranked Professor Sachs as among the world's three most influential living economists of the past decade. Professor Sachs serves as the director of The Earth Institute, Quetelet Professor of Sustainable Development, and professor of health policy and management at Columbia University. He is special advisor to United Nations secretary-general Ban Ki-moon on the Millennium Development Goals, having held the same position under former UN secretary-general Kofi Annan. He is co-founder and chief strategist of Millennium Promise Alliance, and is director of the Millennium Villages Project. He has authored three New York Times bestsellers in the past seven years: The End of Poverty (2005), Common Wealth: Economics for a Crowded Planet (2008), and The Price of Civilization (2011).
Contributor(s): Professor A. John Simmons | Modern states claim a wide variety of rights of control over particular geographical territories. These claims, however, are regularly disputed, often leading to violence. This fact makes practically pressing the questions, to be explored in these lectures, of how and to what extent such territorial claims by states can be justified. A. John Simmons (Ph.D., Cornell) is Commonwealth Professor of Philosophy, and professor of Law; editor, Philosophy and Public Affairs; Editorial Board member, Social Theory and Practice. He specialises in political philosophy, ethics, history of moral and political theory, and philosophy of law. This is the second in a series of two lectures by Professor Simmons, the first, States and their Territories: Boundaries of Authority, takes place on Monday 11 March.
Contributor(s): Professor Anne Applebaum | The nations of the region we called “Eastern Europe” were once closely linked, so much so that West Europeans had trouble distinguishing them. But since 1989 they have made different choices and taken different paths. Are there lessons which can be learned from the East European experience of reform? Professor Anne Applebaum is the Philippe Roman Chair in History and International Affairs for the 2012-2013 academic year.
Contributor(s): Hugh Segal | Senator Hugh Segal, Canada's Special Envoy to the Commonwealth, will speak about Commonwealth reform and the role it can play in helping its members strengthen Human Rights, Democracy and the Rule of Law. Senator Hugh Segal was appointed Canada's Special Envoy to the Commonwealth in 2011. This followed upon his service as a member of the Commonwealth Eminent Persons Group (2010-2011) which produced 106 recommendations for Commonwealth renewal for the 21st century. Senator Segal is a former Chair of the Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs and he now chairs the Anti-Terrorism Committee of the Senate. He is a former president of the Institute for Research on Public Policy, chief of staff to a Prime Minister of Canada and Associate Cabinet Secretary in Ontario.
Contributor(s): Professor Roland Dannreuther | When there are shifts in distribution of power in international politics, energy security emerges as a salient concern. Professor Dannreuther will consider the implications of two shifts: first, the flow of energy from east to west (oil and gas) and the increasing links between Asia and energy-producing regions; and secondly, the flow from consumers of energy to producers of energy with the rise of resource nationalism. Professor Dannreuther joined the University of Westminster in September 2009 as head of the Department of Politics and International Relations and Professor of International Relations. He is also an International Fellow at the Department of International Relations, Tbilisi State University, Georgia.
Contributor(s): Stuart Basten, Carlos Cavalle, Wolfgang Lutz, Catherine Hakim, John Parker, Eric Kaufmann | This panel explores the impact of declining fertility in western countries and East Asia - especially the social effects which have largely been ignored. The panel will also launch the publication of a new book, Whither the Child: Causes and Consequences of Low Fertility (Paradigm Publishers 2013). Stuart Basten is ESRC Fellow in Demography and Social Policy at Oxford University. Carlos Cavalle is the Director, Social Trends Institute. Wolfgang Lutz is Professor, International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA). Catherine Hakim is Professor, Centre for Policy Studies. John Parker is the Globalisation Editor, Economist Magazine. Eric Kaufmann is Professor, Birkbeck, University of London.
Contributor(s): Professor Etienne Balibar | Etienne Balibar is Anniversary Chair in Modern European Philosophy at Kingston University and emeritus professor of moral and political philosophy at the University of Paris 10 Nanterre.
Contributor(s): Professor Clare Hemmings | This paper charts the significance of Emma Goldman's revolutionary thought for a contemporary analysis of sexuality, gender and revolt. Throughout her life (1869-1940) and work Goldman centred sexuality as both key to how capitalism functions (particularly for women) and as a privileged site for political transformation. Connecting sexuality to labour, Goldman's analyses of reproduction, prostitution, homosexuality and free love provide a helpful challenge to contemporary feminist investments in materialist and cultural analyses as opposed, and open up the possibility of an alternative feminist history with sexual materialism at its heart. But in claiming Goldman's thinking for a post-Marxist queer and feminist politics, what do we need to ignore in her thought? What does serious consideration of the sexual (but not gendered) essentialism that grounds Goldman's thought do to a contemporary vision of feminist transformation? Drawing on primary materials and a creative re-reading of archival fragments, I suggest that Goldman's sexual politics allows for a reinvigorated feminist method (as well as politics) with a real connection to others at its heart. Clare Hemmings is Professor of Feminist Theory and has been working at LSE for 13 years. Her primary areas of research interest are feminist theory and sexuality studies, and her main publications in these spheres are Bisexual Spaces (Routledge 2002) and Why Stories Matter (2011), for which she won the 2012 Feminist and Women's Studies Association Book Prize.
Contributor(s): Professor A. John Simmons | Modern states claim a wide variety of rights of control over particular geographical territories. These claims, however, are regularly disputed, often leading to violence. This fact makes practically pressing the questions, to be explored in these lectures, of how and to what extent such territorial claims by states can be justified. A. John Simmons (Ph.D., Cornell) is Commonwealth Professor of Philosophy, and professor of Law; editor, Philosophy and Public Affairs; Editorial Board member, Social Theory and Practice. He specialises in political philosophy, ethics, history of moral and political theory, and philosophy of law.
Contributor(s): Dr Jon Danielsson, Professor Charles Goodhart, Matt King | The first public event of the ESRC Systemic Risk Centre at LSE will debate whether the post crisis reforms of financial regulations will be effective in protecting us from financial excesses, or may perversely destabilise the financial system. The panel of experts will debate the topic and take questions from the audience. Jon Danielsson is the director of the Systemic Risk Centre at LSE. His research interests include financial stability, systemic risk, extreme market movements, market liquidity and financial crisis. He has published his research extensively in both academic journals and the mainstream media, and has presented his work at a number of universities and institutions. Charles Goodhart is emeritus professor of Banking and Finance with the Financial Markets Group at LSE, having previously, 1987-2005, been its deputy director. Until his retirement in 2002, he had been the Norman Sosnow Professor of Banking and Finance at LSE since 1985. Before then, he had worked at the Bank of England for seventeen years as a monetary adviser, becoming a chief adviser in 1980. In 1997 he was appointed one of the outside independent members of the Bank of England's new Monetary Policy Committee until May 2000. Earlier he had taught at Cambridge and LSE. Besides numerous articles, he has written a couple of books on monetary history; a graduate monetary textbook, Money, Information and Uncertainty (2nd Ed. 1989); two collections of papers on monetary policy, Monetary Theory and Practice (1984) and The Central Bank and The Financial System (1995); and a number of books and articles on Financial Stability, on which subject he was adviser to the Governor of the Bank of England, 2002-2004, and numerous other studies relating to financial markets and to monetary policy and history. His latest books include The Basel Committee on Banking Supervision: A History of the Early Years, 1974-1997, (2011), and The Regulatory Response to the Financial Crisis, (2009). Matt King is managing director and global head of Credit Products Strategy at Citi. His team is responsible for forming views and advising clients on the full spectrum of credit, across high grade, high yield, leveraged loan, structured, emerging and municipal bond markets. While the majority of clients are investors, he also deals frequently with issuers and regulators on everything from market direction to valuation to risk management. Matt King is a frequent speaker at industry conferences and has published extensively on credit markets over the past two decades. Some of his most widely referenced pieces include Are the brokers broken? (published two weeks before Lehman’s bankruptcy), Buy the bubbles, sell the bath, and How much debt is too much debt? Prior to joining Citi in 2003, Mr King was head of European Credit Strategy at JPMorgan. He is British, and a graduate of Emmanuel College, Cambridge, where he read Social & Political Sciences.
Contributor(s): Chris Brown | LSE London's 2013 Lent term seminar series begins on the 14th of January. Speakers from within and beyond academia will focus on many of the implications of the current economic and political environment for London, covering relevant issues such as the road pricing, UK trends in higher education, census data and localism. Presenters include academics and practitioners from relevant fields.
Contributor(s): Enda Kenny | Enda Kenny is Taoiseach (Prime Minister) of Ireland, a position he has held since March 2011. He has been the Leader of Fine Gael since June 2002 and has represented the people of Mayo as a Fine Gael member of Dáil Éireann since 1975. He served as Minister for Tourism and Trade from 1994 - 1997. He was also Vice-President of the European People’s Party from 2006-2012.
Contributor(s): Louise de Sousa, Elda Moreno, Pragna Patel | The Istanbul Convention is the Council of Europe Convention on preventing and Combating Violence against Women and Domestic Violence. It is the first legally binding instrument in Europe and in terms of scope the most advanced treaty in the world creating a comprehensive legal framework to prevent violence, to protect victims and to end the impunity of perpetrators. It defines and criminalises various forms of violence against women (including forced marriage, female genital mutilation, stalking, physical and psychological violence and sexual violence). It also foresees the establishment of an international group of independent experts to monitor its implementation at national level. Louise de Sousa is Head of Human Rights and Democracy Department at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. Elda Moreno is Head of Gender Equality and Human Dignity Department and Directorate General of Human Rights and Rule of Law at the Council of Europe. Pragna Patel is the founding member of Southall Black Sisters.
Contributor(s): Dr Ama de Graft Aikins, Dr Gora Mboup, Professor Vanessa Watson | Notwithstanding improvements, urban health in Africa remains a particular challenge, with 70 per cent of urban dwellers living in informal settlements, facing multiple disease burdens. How might we move towards healthy African cities? Ama de Graft Aikins is a visiting fellow at LSE Health and senior lecturer at the Regional Institute for Population Studies, University of Ghana. Gora Mboup is a senior demographic and health expert and the chief of the Global Urban Observatory of UN-HABITAT. Vanessa Watson is professor and deputy dean of the Faculty of Engineering and the Built Environment at the University of Cape Town.
Contributor(s): Professor Dr Ahmet Davutoglu | Professor Dr Ahmet Davutoglu is Minister of Foreign Affairs of the 60th Government of the Republic of Turkey, a position he has held since 2009. He was born on February 26th, 1959 in Konya and completed his secondary education at the Istanbul High School. In 1983 he graduated from the Bosphorus University with a double major in Political Science and Economics at the Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences. He completed his MA in the Department of Public Administration and received his PhD from the Department of Political Science and International Relations, Bosporus University. In 1990 he became an Assistant Professor at the International Islamic University of Malaysia where he established and chaired the Political Science Department until 1993. In 1993, he became an Associate Professor. Between 1995 and 1999 he has worked at Marmara University, teaching at the Institute for Middle Eastern Studies, the Institute for Insurance and Banking, at the Doctoral Program on Local Administrations and Political Science Department. Between 1998 and 2002 he was a visiting lecturer at the Military Academy and the War Academy. Following the November 2002 elections he was appointed as Chief Adviser to the Prime Minister and Ambassador at large by the 58th Government of the Republic of Turkey. He continued to serve in the 59th and 60th Governments. He worked at Beykent University in Istanbul as a professor from 1995 to 2004, serving as Head of the Department of International Relations, Member of University Senate and Member of Board of Management while teaching as a visiting scholar at the Marmara University. Professor Davutoglu published several books and articles on foreign policy in Turkish and English. His books and articles have also been translated into several languages including Japanese, Portuguese, Russian, Arabic, Persian and Albanian. Professor Sevket Pamuk is LSE Chair in Contemporary Turkish Studies.
Contributor(s): Mark Hoban | Presented by British Government @ LSE and LSE Civil Service and Public Policy Alumni Group.
Contributor(s): Dr Gareth Jones, Juan Sebastian Lama, Gloria Morrison, Dr Austin Zeiderman | This panel event is a student-led initiative, full title 'Urban Controversies: how controversies shape our cities,' with speakers Dr Gareth Jones (Reader, LSE Urban Geography), Juan Sebastian Lama (architect, PUC Chile and MSc City Design student), Gloria Morrison (Campaigning Coordinator, JENGbA) and Dr Austin Zeiderman (LSE Cities Research Fellow), talking about natural and man-made disasters and their aftermath in Columbia, Chile and London.
Contributor(s): Paul Collier | How to Harness Natural Resource Wealth for Accelerated Development.
Contributor(s): Baroness Williams | Shirley Williams is a former Labour cabinet minister and one of the Gang Of Four who left Labour to start the Social Democrats.
Contributor(s): Pablo Fernandez, Carlos Lopez, Miguel Klingenberg | The recent expropriation of Repsol by the Argentine government raises important legal, diplomatic and policy issues that put into question the current system of international investment protection. This seminar invites to debate on this issues from the investor's perspective. Pablo Fernández is Professor of Finance at the IESE Business School, Madrid. Carlos López Jall is the Director of International Organizations and European Affairs of Repsol S.A. Miguel Klingenberg is the Deputy Secretary General of Repsol S.A. Jan Kleinheisterkamp is Senior Lecturer of Law at LSE.
Contributor(s): Alain Juppé | At this time of mistrust towards the European Union, Alain Juppé reiterates his strong beliefs and his faith in Europe's future. A plea by a French statesman who has always been committed to the European enterprise. Alain Juppé was President of the political party Union for a Popular Movement from 2002 to 2004. He served as the Minister of Foreign Affairs from 2011 to 2012. He also served as Prime Minister of France from 1995 to 1997 under President Jacques Chirac and the Minister of Defence and Veterans Affairs from 2010 to 2011. He had previously served as Minister of Foreign Affairs from 1993 to 1995, and as Minister of the Budget and Spokesman for the Government from 1986 to 1988.
Contributor(s): Hilary Lawson | Philosophers have pursued truth, and many have placed truth at the centre of their account of meaning. But might this be a mistake? Could error be at the heart of language, and adventure, rather than truth, be the matter in hand? In the first of three events on the theme, Hilary Lawson argues for a radical reappraisal of the importance of error. This lecture is the first of a three-part series entitled Error, Lies and Adventure, the second talk 'The Power of Lies' will take place on 21 March. Hilary Lawson is director of the Institute of Art and Ideas, a non-realist philosopher and the author of Closure.
Contributor(s): Dr Hazem Kandil | Cambridge University's Dr Hazem Kandil will help explain why Egypt's popular uprising has so far failed to overthrow the regime through exploring the positions of the main players in the revolt: the military, security, and the various political factions. Kandil's latest book, Soldiers, Spies and Statesmen: Egypt's Road to Revolt, (Verso, 2012) analyses Egypt’s transformation from military regime to police state, on the road to revolution. Hazem Kandil is the Cambridge University Lecturer in Political Sociology and Fellow of St Catharine’s College. His work examines military-security institutions and revolutionary movements. He has published on revolution, warfare, the sociology of intellectuals, and Islamism in various academic journals and periodicals. Kandil has taught political science at the American University of Cairo and social theory at UCLA before settling at the Sociology Department at Cambridge University.
Contributor(s): Baljit Bains | LSE London's 2013 Lent term seminar series begins on the 14th of January. Speakers from within and beyond academia will focus on many of the implications of the current economic and political environment for London, covering relevant issues such as the road pricing, UK trends in higher education, census data and localism. Presenters include academics and practitioners from relevant fields.
Contributor(s): Miranda Glover, Charles Leadbeater, Sam Riviere | Some people have been struck by the aphoristic potential of Twitter. Others see developments in new media as bringing the era of the literature to an end. This panel will explore the way new media impacts on traditional literary and philosophical forms of writing and reading. One question is about the threat of new media to classical literacy: fragmentation and overload in new media leading to the withering away of traditional literary, philosophical and poetic forms. Another question is about the chance that new media offers for new forms of cultural literacy: where everyone can become a reader and a writer. Miranda Glover is group account director for FMI Group, she specialises in brand positioning, strategic digital comms, film and social media marketing, heading up accounts including LG Mobile, Global and EHQ. She’s previously worked for international agencies with Motorola, Sony PlayStation, Lastminute.com, Unilever and others. She has published three novels with Random House, Meanwhile Street (2009) Soulmates (2007) and Masterpiece (2005), which was shortlisted for the Pendleton May first novel award and translated into seven languages. Charles Leadbeater is a leading authority on innovation and creativity, and author of We:think: the power of mass creativity, which charts the rise of mass, participative approaches to innovation from science and open source software, to computer games and political campaigning. Sam Riviere's poems have appeared in various publications and competitions since 2005. He co-edits the anthology series Stop Sharpening Your Knives and his debut collection 81 Austerities is published by Faber & Faber. He is currently working towards a PhD at the University of East Anglia. He was a recipient of a 2009 Eric Gregory Award. Simon Glendinning is director of the Forum for European Philosophy. This event forms part of LSE's 5th Space for Thought Literary Festival|, taking place from Tuesday 26 February - Saturday 2 March 2013, with the theme 'Branching Out'.
Contributor(s): Dr Clémentine Deliss, Elke Krasny, Maria Lind, Justin McGuirk | In recent years arts practice has shifted towards new modes of collaborative production while digital platforms continually offer new ways to distribute and engage with the arts. As performing and visual arts organisations are transforming relationships with audiences, more varied roles have emerged for curators beyond exhibition making and collections management. Curating has evolved to embrace audience-generated content. Many curators see their role more and more as a cultural producer. The panel will examine an evolving definition of contemporary curation within their practices, and their relationships to the cities and people around them. Is an architect who arranges and designs spaces or the city a curator? Is a curator an architect of sorts producing spaces of exchange? What about the work a writer or researcher does in 'curating' arguments and ideas? Finally, how does the increasing importance of the everyday, of the street, and of shifting political geographies of art practice mark curation today? Clémentine Deliss is director of Weltkulturen Museum, Frankfurt am Main since April 2010. She studied contemporary art in Vienna, and social anthropology in Vienna, London, and Paris. She holds a PhD (1988) from the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London on 1920s French museum anthropology and dissident surrealism. Elke Krasny is a cultural theorist, curator, urbanist and author, based in Vienna. She researches on the interrelations of architecture, urban space, issues of cultural identity and representation, engaged art practices, gender and world fairs, museums and exhibitions as cultural formations. She teaches Art and Public Space, Museum Pedagogy, Visual Didactics, Didactics of Architecture and Space and Cultural Education at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, "Garden as Community" at the Technical University of Vienna, Cultural Studies at the FH Joanneum Graz and is a visiting professor at the University of Bremen "Urban Transformation and its Narratives" 2006. Maria Lind is a curator and critic. She is director of Tensta Konsthall, a centre for contemporary art in Stockholm, Sweden. Between 2001 and 2004 she was director of the Munich Kunstverein. Previous to that she was curator at Moderna Museet in Stockholm (from 1997-2001) and in 1998 was co-curator of Manifesta 2 Europe’s nomadic biennale of contemporary art. Justin McGuirk is a writer, critic and curator. He is the director of Strelka Press, the publishing arm of the Strelka Institute in Moscow, and the design consultant to Domus. He has been the design columnist for The Guardian and the editor of Icon magazine. In 2012 he was awarded the Golden Lion at the Venice Biennale of Architecture for an exhibition he curated with Urban Think Tank. He is currently working on a book about activist architecture and social housing in Latin America. Theatrum Mundi / The Global Street is a new urban forum based in London at LSE Cities. It seeks to understand what brings life to a city, particularly in its public places and asks how these might be better designed. Theatrum Mundi, focused on urban culture, brings architects and town planners together with performing and visual artists to reimagine the public spaces of twenty-first century cities – streets, squares, parks, and places for culture. We begin with theoretical conversations and move towards real projects, celebrating those which embody new thinking about public space. This event forms part of LSE's 5th Space for Thought Literary Festival|, taking place from Tuesday 26 February - Saturday 2 March 2013, with the theme 'Branching Out'.
Contributor(s): Ben Galley, Claire Squires, Damon Zucca | New technologies have the potential to revolutionise how publishing works. And the benefits for authors of faster and more accessible opportunities are obvious. But the death of books has long been predicted but has not yet come to pass. This session will look at the prospects for the future of academic and traditional publishing in the digital age. The session will examine the current state of play in digital publishing, how readers’ views are being heard and how the publishing world may change over the next decade. Ben Galley is an author and indie publisher. He will look at will look at what technology offers for both writing and publishing. Claire Squires is director of the Stirling Centre for International Publishing and Communication at the University of Stirling. She researches the history of the book and publishing in the 20th and 21st centuries and is director for Publications and Awards for the Society for the History of Authorship, Reading and Publishing. Damon Zucca is publisher of Scholarly and Online Reference at Oxford University Press, where he oversees the planning and development of a range of print and digital publishing initiatives, including Oxford Biblical Studies, Oxford Bibliographies, and Oxford Handbooks Online. He has been working in scholarly book publishing for fifteen years as an editor at Garland Publishing, Routledge, and Peter Lang before coming to OUP. Jonathan Derbyshire is culture editor of the New Statesman. His literary journalism has also appeared in a number of newspapers and magazines, including the Financial Times, the Guardian, Literary Review, Prospect and the Times Literary Supplement. This event forms part of LSE's 5th Space for Thought Literary Festival, taking place from Tuesday 26 February - Saturday 2 March 2013, with the theme 'Branching Out'.
Contributor(s): Claude Fischler, Matthew Fort, Katie Miller, Carl Warner | Food is something of an obsession in contemporary culture, with 'celebrity' chefs topping the bestseller lists and pop-up restaurants and foodie blogs the height of cool. But are we thinking about food in the right way? Food shortages are predicted to be the next major world crisis, and obesity and eating disorders increasingly test our health services. Do campaigns to encourage sustainable healthy eating make any difference? This panel will explore international attitudes to food. Claude Fischler is director of Research at CNRS, the national research agency of France, and heads the Interdisciplinary Institute for Contemporary Anthropology, a research and graduate studies unit of Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales in Paris. His main area of research is a comparative, social science perspective on food and nutrition, their role and determinants in societies and cultures. His work covers the structure and function of cuisines, taste and preferences, body image and their evolution and change over time and space. He has published numerous articles on these issues, as well as books including L'Homnivore, Du Vin and Manger. His latest book Les Alimentations particulières on special dietary requirements and the issues they involve will be published in 2013. Matthew Fort was Food and Drink editor of the Guardian from 1989- 2006. He has written for a wide variety of British, American and French publications. In 1992 he won the title of Glenfiddich Food Writer of the Year and, in 1993, Glenfiddich Restaurant Writer of the Year, as well as The Restaurateurs’ Association Food Writer of the Year. He was Glenfiddich Cookery Writer of the Year in 2005. He has written three books on food, the third of which, Eating Up Italy, was the Guild of Food Writers Book of the Year in 2005, and his fifth, Sweet Honey, Bitter Lemons, a food portrait of Sicily, won the Premio Sicilia Madre Mediterranea in 2009. Recent television series include Greatest Dishes in the World (Sky; 2005); The Forager’s Field Guide (ITV; 2005). He co-presented Market Kitchen (UKTVFood) with Tom Parker Bowles until 2010. Currently he’s a judge on The Great British Menu (BBC2; 2006, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011,2012, 2013). Katie Miller is Sustainable Seafood Coalition advisor at ClientEarth. Prior to joining ClientEarth, Katie coordinated events for environmental NGO Green Alliance and worked on both fisheries and coral reefs in marine and freshwater conservation programmes at the Zoological Society of London. Carl Warner is a professional still life photographer with a studio in London, and has worked in the advertising industry for more than 20 years. Over the past ten years he has been developing a body of work making landscapes out of food. This work has been featured in magazines and newspapers all over the world, as well as advertising campaigns and commissions from some of the biggest brand names in the food industry. His book Carl Warner's Food Landscapes is published by Abrams Image. James Thornton is an environmental lawyer, social entrepreneur, and the founding CEO of ClientEarth. James founded ClientEarth - Europe’s first public interest environmental law organisation - in 2007. Now operating globally, it uses advocacy, litigation and research to address the greatest challenges of our time - including biodiversity loss, climate change, and toxic chemicals. The New Statesman has named him as one of 10 people who could change the world. This event forms part of LSE's 5th Space for Thought Literary Festival, taking place from Tuesday 26 February - Saturday 2 March 2013, with the theme 'Branching Out'.
Contributor(s): Paul Farley, Tristan Gooley, Sara Maitland | Paul Farley has received widespread acclaim for his poetry, including the Whitbread Prize, the Somerset Maugham Award, the E.M. Forster Award and the Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year. From 2000-02 he was poet-in-residence at the Wordsworth Trust in Grasmere, and as a broadcaster he has made many programmes with the BBC on art, landscape and literature, including Auden: Six Unexpected Days, The Larkin Tapes and Children of the Whitsun Weddings. Edgelands, a non-fiction book (co-written with Michael Symmons Roberts), was serialised as a Radio 4 Book of the Week in 2011. His latest collection, The Dark Film, is a Poetry Book Society Choice. Tristan Gooley is a writer, navigator and explorer. He has worked in travel most of his life, led expeditions on five continents and pioneered a renaissance in the very rare art of natural navigation. Tristan is the only living person to have both flown solo and sailed single-handed across the Atlantic. He is a fellow of the Royal Geographical Society and the Royal Institute of Navigation and Vice Chairman of the UK's largest independent travel company, Trailfinders. His books include The Natural Explorer and The Natural Navigator. His website is www.naturalnavigator.com. Sara Maitland is the author of numerous works of fiction, including the Somerset Maugham Award-winning Daughters of Jerusalem, and several non-fiction books about religion. The Book of Silence was shortlisted for four prizes: The Orwell, the Saltire, The Scottish Arts Council book award and the Bristol Festival of Ideas Book prize, and has sold more than 30,000 copies. Born in 1950, she studied at Oxford University and currently tutors on the MA in creative writing for Lancaster University. Her latest book is Gossip from the Forests. Tim Cresswell is pofessor of human geography at Royal Holloway. This event forms part of LSE's 5th Space for Thought Literary Festival, taking place from Tuesday 26 February - Saturday 2 March 2013, with the theme 'Branching Out'.
Contributor(s): Carola Luther, Michael McGregor, Dr Llewelyn Morgan | How well can political ideas and sentiments be expressed and illuminated in poetry? Are oblique references more successful than the overt? Is the formulation of political ideas in poetry intrinsically more difficult than other ideas? Does a poet’s expression of politics necessarily compromise her status as a poet, or are our views of these matters culturally specific, related to assumptions about and ideals of the poet that cannot be applied at all historical times. In this panel discussion speakers will read short passages of poetry to illustrate their points. Carola Luther is a former poet in residence at The Wordsworth Trust, now living in Yorkshire. She is the author of Arguing with Malarchy and Walking the Animals (Carcanet Press) and Herd (Wordsworth Trust). Carola will examine the topic from the perspective of contemporary poetry. Michael McGregor is The Robert Woof Director of The Wordsworth Trust – an organisation that not only curates the world’s most important collection of Wordsworth manuscripts, but also supports contemporary poetry through readings, workshops and a poetry residence. Michael’s remarks will centre on the treatment of political issues such as the French Revolution by Wordsworth and other Romantics. Llewelyn Morgan is lecturer in classical literature and language and tutorial fellow in classics at Brasenose College, Oxford, and author of Musa Pedestris: Metre and Meaning in Roman Verse, Oxford University Press. Llewelyn will focus on the Latin poets, Virgil and Horace, who wrote under the indirect patronage of the first Roman emperor. Richard Bronk is a visiting fellow at the European Institute, LSE, and author of The Romantic Economist (Cambridge University Press). This event forms part of LSE's 5th Space for Thought Literary Festival, taking place from Tuesday 26 February - Saturday 2 March 2013, with the theme 'Branching Out'.
Contributor(s): Pat Barker | Moving from the Slade School of Art to Queen Mary's Hospital, where surgery and art intersect in the rebuilding of the shattered faces of the wounded, Pat Barker’s latest novel Toby's Room is a riveting drama of identity, damage, intimacy and loss. This event will explore art’s responsibility to war, and the links between art, literature, science and history. Pat Barker was born in Thornaby-on-Tees in 1943. She was educated at LSE and has been a teacher of history and politics. Her books include Union Street (1982), winner of the 1983 Fawcett Prize, which has been filmed as Stanley and Iris; Blow Your House Down (1984); Liza's England (1986), formerly The Century's Daughter, The Man Who Wasn't There (1989); the highly acclaimed Regeneration trilogy, comprising Regeneration,The Eye in The Door, winner of the 1993 Guardian Fiction Prize, and The Ghost Road, winner of the 1995 Booker Prize for Fiction and Another World. Her last novel was Life Class. Suzannah Biernoff is lecturer in modern and contemporary visual culture, Department of History of Art and Screen Media at Birkbeck College. This event forms part of LSE's 5th Space for Thought Literary Festival, taking place from Tuesday 26 February - Saturday 2 March 2013, with the theme 'Branching Out'.
Contributor(s): Gabriella Ambrosio, Vered Cohen–Barzilay, Marina Nemat | Literature has a unique capacity to touch the hearts and minds and engage readers in a way that is distinctly different from political or academic texts. Can it play a role in exposing human rights violations? Should literature be ‘engaged’, and should authors take political or social stand? Gabriella Ambrosio’s first novel, Before we Say Goodbye, was inspired by the true story of a suicide bombing and is widely used as an educational tool. Vered Cohen–Barzilay is founder of Novel Rights, which encourages the literary community to take action. Marina Nemat’s memoir, Prisoner of Tehran, tells of growing up in Iran, being imprisoned for speaking out against the Iranian government and escaping a death sentence. Susan Marks joined the LSE in 2010 as Professor of International Law. This event forms part of LSE's 5th Space for Thought Literary Festival, taking place from Tuesday 26 February - Saturday 2 March 2013, with the theme 'Branching Out'.
Contributor(s): Dr Vayu Naidu, Michael Wood | After a performance by the highly acclaimed story teller Vayu Naidu of a story from the Ramayana, this discussion will explore the oral tradition of storytelling, and fiction. Vayu Naidu is a story teller. She is founder and artistic director of the Vau Naidu company, which promotes storytelling as theatre, with a signature style combining text, music and dance. She has brought research and performance of oral traditions into British Academy, creating new works with composers and orchestras and for theatre and radio drama. Her debut novel is Sita's Ascent. Michael Wood is a British historian and filmmaker. He has made over 100 documentary films including In the Footsteps of Alexander the Great and The Story of India, which have been seen in most countries of the world; the latest was The Great British Story on BBC 2 this summer. Among his many books he is the author of The Story of India (BBC) and a contributor to Chidambaram the Home of Nataraja (Marg Mumbai); his South Indian Journey (Penguin) was praised by Rough Guides as ‘one of the most enlightening books ever written about South India’. He is a fellow of the Royal Historical Society and a governor of the RSC. Mukulika Banerjee is a reader in Social Anthropology at LSE. This event forms part of LSE's 5th Space for Thought Literary Festivals, taking place from Tuesday 26 February - Saturday 2 March 2013, with the theme 'Branching Out'.
Contributor(s): Katy Darby | Bored of the same old viewpoint or genre? Want to inject new life into your prose? Katy Darby talks about experimenting and playing around with different approaches to writing fiction. We'll explore the genesis and development of ideas (and come up with some new ones of our own) - and discuss ways of telling a story which can refresh a dusty narrative and teach an old plot new tricks. Katy Darby is author of The Unpierced Heart, director of short story event Liars' League and writing tutor at City University. This is the second of three workshops, preceded by Fast Fiction: creative writing and changing technology at 10am, and followed by Based on a True Story at 12noon. This event forms part of LSE's 5th Space for Thought Literary Festival, taking place from Tuesday 26 February - Saturday 2 March 2013, with the theme 'Branching Out'.
Contributor(s): Jonathan Gibbs | It’s a truism that technology is changing the way we live our lives – but should this fact change just what we write about, or should it change the way we write too? In this workshop we will look at – and try out – various ways that writers have tried to keep pace with the new dynamics of the digital age, including flash fiction and Twitter fiction, as well as seeing what happens when we try to incorporate these new ways of understanding the world, and dealing with the information overload, into more tradition prose styles and forms. Bring a pad and paper, and a Twitter-enabled communication device (phone or laptop) ready to tweet – set up an account if you don’t have one. Jonathan Gibbs is currently finishing a PhD in Creative and Critical Writing at the University of East Anglia, where he was awarded a Malcolm Bradbury memorial bursary, and graduate teacher of the Year. His story, Tiny Camels is published by www.shortfirepress.com and his novel Randall, or The Painted Grape is currently on submission. This is the first of three workshops, followed by Trying New Positions: how to spice up your text life at 11am, and Based on a True Story at 12noon. This event forms part of LSE's 5th Space for Thought Literary Festival, taking place from Tuesday 26 February - Saturday 2 March 2013, with the theme 'Branching Out'.
Contributor(s): Hugh Tomlinson QC, Karon Monaghan QC, Jamie Burton, Martin Howe QC, Richard Honey, Tim Frost, Will Hutton, Andrew Lilico, Ruth Porter, Magdalena Sepulveda, Polly Toynbee | Organisers: Professor Conor Gearty, Professor of Human Rights Law, LSE; Professor Aoife Nolan, Professor of International Human Rights Law, The University of Nottingham. Introduction: Conor Gearty (LSE Department of Law) and Aoife Nolan (Just Fair). Judge: Hugh Tomlinson QC (Matrix Chambers). Prosecution: led by Karon Monaghan QC (Matrix Chambers) with Jamie Burton (Doughty Street). Defence: led by Martin Howe QC (8 New Square) with Richard Honey (Francis Taylor Building). Expert Witnesses: Tim Frost (Cairn Capital Group), Will Hutton (Oxford University), Andrew Lilico (Europe Economics), Ruth Porter (Institute of Economic Affairs), Magdalena Sepúlveda(UN Special Rapporteur on Extreme Poverty and Human Rights) and Polly Toynbee (The Guardian). Does UK government policy on economic austerity breach international human rights law? In an innovative legal proceedings, the charges will be brought, and 'Austerity' defended, by a team of legal experts, backed by distinguished human rights and other specialist witnesses from the UK and around the world. Overseen by a leading barrister acting as judge, the trial will end with a verdict delivered by a jury of children and young people, as well as the audience. The jury is made up of members of Amplify (the Children's Commissioner for England's Advisory Group of children and young people) and members of the LSE Widening Participation Programme. For full speaker biographies, the prosecution indictment and the defence statement for the event, please click on Event posting. For additional information on the event, please click on the Just Fair - Austerity on Trial link in Related Links below.
Contributor(s): Professor Russell Goulbourne, Dr Tim Hochstrasser, Dr Paul Keenan | This discussion will explore the work and influence of the French Enlightenment philosopher, art critic and writer Denis Diderot, a key figure for the Festival in the 300th anniversary of the year of his birth. Probably best known for co-founding and editing the Encyclopedie, our panel of experts will discuss this and other less well-known areas of his life, including his association with Catherine the Great and his writings about Pacific discoveries. Russell Goulbourne is professor of early modern French literature at the University of Leeds and his books include a translation of Diderot’s The Nun. Tim Hochstrasser is senior lecturer in International History at LSE. Dr Hochstrasser's research focuses on the two-way relationship between intellectual life and political action in the history of early modern Europe, and above all on the use made of contemporary historical and philosophical writing to legitimate and defend changing concepts of sovereignty and political structure. Paul Keenan is lecturer in international history at LSE. Dr Keenan's research deals with Russia during the eighteenth century and, in particular, the role of St Petersburg in the relationship between Russia and other contemporary European states. Paul Stock is lecturer in early modern international history at LSE. This event forms part of LSE's 5th Space for Thought Literary Festival, taking place from Tuesday 26 February - Saturday 2 March 2013, with the theme 'Branching Out'.
Contributor(s): Jenny Uglow | Jenny Uglow celebrates National Women’s History Month and its theme ‘women inspiring innovation through imagination’ with this talk about Sarah Losh, who built an extraordinary church in a village near Carlisle in the 1840s. As a woman innovator she broke all conventions in designing, supervising the building, and even carving the alabaster - sixty years before women architects were accepted into RIBA. She has been called ‘a Charlotte Bronte of wood and stone’, defying the gothic vogue, and creating a Romantic language of symbols, from the pinecone and lotus to fossils from local mines, incorporating new ideas from geology and science, and celebrating the buried past and resurrection of the earth. Jenny Uglow’s books include Elizabeth Gaskell: A Habit of Stories, The Lunar Men: The Friends who Made the Future and, most recently, The Pinecone. Hermione Lee is well known as a writer, reviewer and broadcaster. Her books include biographies of Virginia Woolf and Edith Wharton. This event is organised in association with the Royal Society of Literature. Forthcoming RSL speakers include: Emma Donoghue, Jung Chang, Hermione Lee, Richard Mabey, Alice Oswald and Robin Robertson. Please visit www.rslit.org to book or for more information. Membership of the Royal Society of Literature is open to all. This event forms part of LSE's 5th Space for Thought Literary Festival, taking place from Tuesday 26 February - Saturday 2 March 2013, with the theme 'Branching Out'.
Contributor(s): Professor David Abulafia | One great sea, a multitude of cultures and an embarrassment of riches: David Abulafia shares his intellectual odyssey from Alicante to Alexandria, from Salerno to Smyrna. David Abulafia is professor of Mediterranean History at Cambridge University and author of The Great Sea: a human history of the Mediterranean. Helen Moore is fellow and tutor at Corpus Christi College, Oxford and University lecturer in the Faculty of English. This event forms part of LSE's 5th Space for Thought Literary Festival, taking place from Tuesday 26 February - Saturday 2 March 2013, with the theme 'Branching Out'.
Contributor(s): Professor John Gray | John Gray draws on an extraordinary array of memoirs, poems, fiction and philosophy to make us re-imagine our place in the world. Writers as varied as Ballard, Borges, Freud and Conrad are mesmerised by forms of human extremity - experiences on the outer edge of the possible, or which tip into fantasy and myth. What happens to us when we starve, when we fight, when we are imprisoned? And how do our imaginations leap into worlds way beyond our real experience? In this lecture, John Gray will explore the conundrum of our existence - an existence which we decorate with countless myths and ideas, where we twist and turn to avoid acknowledging that we too are animals, separated from the others perhaps only by our self-conceit. In the Babel we have created for ourselves, it is the silence of animals that both reproaches and bewitches us. John Gray is emeritus professor of European thought at LSE, and author of Straw Dogs, The Immortalization Commission and The Silence of Animals: On Progress and Other Modern Myths. This event forms part of LSE's 5th Space for Thought Literary Festival, taking place from Tuesday 26 February - Saturday 2 March 2013, with the theme 'Branching Out'.
Contributor(s): Professor Jerry Brotton, Mike Parker | Throughout history maps have been fundamental in shaping our view of the world and our place in it. Our panel will discuss how maps both influence and reflect contemporary events and how, by reading them, we can better understand the worlds that produced them. Jerry Brotton is professor of renaissance studies at Queen Mary University of London, and a leading expert in the history of maps and Renaissance cartography. His last book, The Sale of the Late King's Goods: Charles I and his Art Collection (2006), was short-listed for the Samuel Johnson Prize as well as the Hessell-Tiltman History Prize. In 2010, he was the presenter of the BBC4 series Maps: Power, Plunder and Possession. His latest book is A History of the World in Twelve Maps. Mike Parker is the author of the best-selling Map Addict and writer and presenter of BBC Radio 4’s On the Map. He is currently working on a book, The Story of Britain in Road Maps, to be published in autumn 2013. This event forms part of LSE's 5th Space for Thought Literary Festival, taking place from Tuesday 26 February - Saturday 2 March 2013, with the theme 'Branching Out'.
Contributor(s): Leandro Carrera, Professor Patrick Dunleavy, Joe Grice, Edwin Lau, Barry Quirk | For many decades there has been little effective analysis and guidance on how to improve the organizational productivity of government bodies consistently over time. Yet unless this can be achieved, the relative price of public services is doomed to rise ineluctably (the 'Baumol disease' problem). Leandro Carrera and Patrick Dunleavy's new book Growing the Productivity of Government Services (published by Edward Elgar) provides the first in-depth empirical treatment of the organizational productivity of unique national government agencies, focusing on UK taxation, social security and regulatory agencies. In addition, they also show how productivity analysis for decentralized services can include salient and managerially useful variables, looking at how IT and management modernization help shape the productivity of NHS hospitals. The first rule of productivity growth in public services is to focus hard on consistently measuring and improving productivity performance. The second rule is to embrace IT modernization carried out in tandem with genuinely effective and well-considered business process reorganization. This lecture will discuss ideas for the improvement of public sector productivity from a local, national and international government perspective. Leandro Carrera is a senior researcher at the Pensions Policy Institute. Patrick Dunleavy is professor of political science and public policy at LSE. Joe Grice is chief economist at the Office for National Statistics. Edwin Lau is head of the Reform of the Public Sector Division in the OECD Public Governance and Territorial Development Directorate. Barry Quirk is chief executive at the London Borough of Lewisham. Diane Coyle OBE is a freelance economist, and is a member of the UK Competition Commission and Vice Chairman of the BBC Trust. Previously she was an advisor to the UK Treasury and the Economics Editor of the Independent. LSE Public Policy Group (PPG) is an independent consultancy and research organisation. PPG provides thorough analysis and recommendations for a variety of clients; providing an interface between academia, the private, public and 'third' sector. LSE Works is a series of public lectures, that will showcase some of the latest research by LSE's Research Centres. In each session, LSE academics will present key research findings, demonstrating where appropriate the implications of their studies for public policy. A list of all the LSE Works lectures can be viewed online.
Contributor(s): Ken Livingstone | Ken Livingstone has for almost 40 years been a controversial but highly effective politician who has dominated London politics. He championed low fares for public transport, fought the abolition of the GLC, defeated Labour to become mayor of London in 2000, re-joined Labour and then presided over eight years of pro-development, market-led policy in the capital. He has brought a distinctive point of view to many issues, always dividing opinion. He has continued his life in politics, having been elected to Labour’s NEC and maintaining a commentary on public policy. Ken Livingstone is author of You Can’t Say That: Memoirs, published by Faber. This event forms part of LSE's 5th Space for Thought Literary Festival, taking place from Tuesday 26 February - Saturday 2 March 2013, with the theme 'Branching Out'.
Contributor(s): Professor Miriam Bernard, Dr Kip Jones, Dr Gareth Morris | Academic communication is changing. New emphasis on impact and public engagement, combined with new technologies that allow high quality and easy to use production methods are increasing the possible range of outputs from academic research. This session will hear from three researchers that have used alternative forms for their research dissemination. We will ask what strengths these forms had in comparison to traditional books and articles, their value to research users and their credibility with funders and academic assessors. Miriam Bernard is professor at Keele and looks at representation of aging in drama through a partnership with the New Vic Theatre. Kip Jones is a reader in performative social sciences at Bournemouth University, and film-maker. Gareth Morris of Salford University has used graphic novels to disseminate research findings on homelessness. Amy Mollett is managing editor of LSE Review of Books, a blog providing daily academic book reviews from the social sciences. This event forms part of LSE's 5th Space for Thought Literary Festival, taking place from Tuesday 26 February - Saturday 2 March 2013, with the theme 'Branching Out'.
Contributor(s): Greg Artus, Richard Bronk, Aifric Campbell, Professor Roger Kneebone | Is truth a casualty in the stories we tell about science? Is there a conflict between narrative truth and historical truth? Can fiction illuminate scientific themes? What are the challenges of presenting scientific topics in the media? How do scientists tell stories to raise capital? Greg Artus lectures in politics, philosophy and business ethics at Imperial College. His research interests include the nature of human action and perception, and the work of Wittgenstein and Heidegger. Richard Bronk is Visiting Fellow in LSE's European Institute. Richard is a writer and part-time academic, with particular expertise in the history of ideas, philosophy of economics, comparative corporate governance and European political economy. His books include The Romantic Economist - Imagination in Economics (Cambridge University Press, 2009). Aifric Campbell is a writer and former investment banker at Morgan Stanley. Her latest novel On the Floor was long listed for the 2012 Orange Prize. She teaches at Imperial College. Roger Kneebone is professor of surgical education at Imperial College. He is a clinician and educationalist who leads a multidisciplinary research group at Imperial College. Roger has an international profile as an academic and innovator and is a 2011 National Teaching Fellow. In 2013 Roger will take up a prestigious Wellcome Trust Engagement Fellowship. Nick Russell was a college science lecturer, freelance journalist, and vocational science curriculum developer before organizing and teaching postgraduate science communication programmes at Birkbeck College and Imperial College. He was head of Department of Humanities at Imperial College before he retired and is now emeritus reader in Science Communication at Imperial College. This event forms part of LSE's 5th Space for Thought Literary Festival, taking place from Tuesday 26 February - Saturday 2 March 2013, with the theme 'Branching Out'.
Contributor(s): Tan Sri Dato' Azman bin Hj. Mokhtar, Dr Frank Vogel | Organised in conjunction with the Harvard Islamic Finance Project, a distinguished authority shall speak on Islamic finance in the Western world. Tan Sri Dato' Azman bin Hj. Mokhtar is managing director of Khazanah Nasional. Frank Vogel is the founder and former director of Harvard Law School’s Islamic Legal Studies Program.
Contributor(s): Professor Christopher Andrew, Professor Lord Hennessy, Alan Judd | Although the cliché of the novelist as a typically bohemian, solitary, garret-inhabiting individual persists, in reality today, as in the past, the majority of novelists writing lead double-lives, holding down at least a part-time and very often a full-time job as well. Trollope did a full-time job as a director of the General Post office while simultaneously turning out some of the major novels of the nineteenth century. Kafka worked in an insurance office. Author of the bestseller The Wind in the Willows, Kenneth Grahame worked at the Bank of England for thirty years.This panel will discuss the question of combining official work with the writing of fiction in the context of the Cold War and after. Professor Christopher Andrew is author of Defence of The Realm, the official history of MI5. Peter Hennessy is Attlee Professor of Contemporary British History at Queen Mary, University of London. He has written several books on contemporary British history including Never Again and Having It So Good. Distilling the Frenzy is his latest book. Alan Judd represents a case in point, having published nine novels, most recently Uncommon Enemy (2012), while simultaneously working in the army, in the Foreign Office and in other Whitehall departments. He has also written, while pursuing these day jobs, The Quest For C , the biography of Mansfield Cumming, founder of MI5. This event forms part of LSE's 5th Space for Thought Literary Festival, taking place from Tuesday 26 February - Saturday 2 March 2013, with the theme 'Branching Out'.
Contributor(s): Lisa Appignanesi, Professor Anne Applebaum, Dr Charles Fernyhough | Our ability to remember forms the basis of who we are, and is a psychological trick that has fascinated scientists and authors alike. But are our memories reliable, or are the stories we tell about our past just a fiction of the mind? This panel brings together psychology, history and literature in its exploration of memory. Lisa Appignanesi OBE is a prize-winning writer, novelist, broadcaster and cultural commentator. A visiting professor at King’s College London, she is former president of the campaigning writers association, English PEN, and chair of London’s Freud Museum. . Her latest books are All About Love: Anatomy of an Unruly Emotion, and Mad, Bad and Sad: A History of Women and the Mind Doctors. Anne Applebaum is Philippe Roman Chair in History and International Affairs at LSE IDEAS for 2012-13. Her books include Gulag: A History and Iron Curtain:The Crushing of Eastern Europe 1944-56. Dr Charles Fernyhough is a writer and psychologist. His previous book, The Baby in the Mirror, was critically acclaimed in the UK and has been translated into seven languages. Pieces of Light:The new science of memory was published in July 2012. He is a reader in Psychology at Durham University and has written for the Guardian, Financial Times and Sunday Telegraph. Sandra Jovchelovitch is professor in the Institute of Social Psychology, LSE. She is a social and cultural psychologist interested in the development and social context of knowledge, social representations, community and the social psychology of public spheres. Her current research focuses on how different socio-cultural contexts shape the development and transformation of knowledge, and in particular, on how different systems of knowing meet and relate in contemporary public spheres. This event forms part of LSE's 5th Space for Thought Literary Festival, taking place from Tuesday 26 February - Saturday 2 March 2013, with the theme 'Branching Out'.
Contributor(s): Molly Crabapple, Professor Mary Evans, Vicky Featherstone, Kate Mosse | In celebration of LSE’s acquisition of the Women’s Library, our distinguished panel will discuss the role of women in literature, the arts and academia today. This event will include readings from the Women's Library archives, and from works that have inspired our panel. Molly Crabapple is a New York artist. Her most recent projects are Week in Hell, in which she locked herself in a hotel room, covered the walls in paper, and filled 270 square feet of wall with art and Shell Game, a series of large-scale paintings about the revolutions of 2011 that will be shown together publicly in Spring 2013. Her work is in the permanent collection of the New York Historical Society, the Rubin Museum of Art, and the Groucho Club (London). She writes for CNN and Vice. Molly's published books include Discordia (with Laurie Penny; Random House UK, 2012), Devil in the Details (IDW, 2012), Saints and Sinners (IDW, 2012), Week in Hell (2012), Puppet Makers (DC Comics, 2011), and the forthcoming Straw House (First Second Books, 2014). Mary Evans is a LSE Centennial Professor and attached to the Gender Institute from 2010 to 2013. Prior to coming to the LSE as a visiting fellow she taught Women's Studies and Sociology at the University of Kent. Vicky Featherstonehas been artistic director of the National Theatre of Scotland since its foundation in 2006, touring work to venues large and small all around Scotland. One of her first commissions was the hit production Black Watch by Gregory Burke, directed by John Tiffany, which attracted international acclaim, winning multiple awards and touring all over the world. Prior to this Vicky Featherstone was artistic director of new writing company Paines Plough Theatre Company from 1997-2005. In April 2013 she will join the Royal Court Theatre as artistic director. Kate Mosse is the author of three non-fiction books, three plays and five novels, including the multi-million selling international No 1 bestseller, Labyrinth. The first of her Languedoc Trilogy, it was translated into 37 languages and published in 40 countries. The second in the series, Sepulchre, was also a # 1 bestseller. The third and final novel in the series, Citadel, was published in October 2012. She is the co-founder & honorary director of the Orange Prize for Fiction, now called the Women's Prize for Fiction. This event forms part of LSE's 5th Space for Thought Literary Festival, taking place from Tuesday 26 February - Saturday 2 March 2013, with the theme 'Branching Out'.
Contributor(s): David Edmonds, Nigel Warburton | In the 5th century BC Socrates brought philosophy to the marketplace. Can this ancient branch of learning be rejuvenated by the technology of the 21st century? Philosophy Bites Back is the second book from the team that brings you Philosophy Bites, the hugely successful podcast that has now had 16 million downloads. Philosophy Bites Back is a collection of conversations with leading scholars on major figures in the history of philosophy. David Edmonds is a senior research associate at Oxford’s Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics. Nigel Warburton is Senior Lecturer in Philosophy and author of A LIttle History of Philosophy.
Contributor(s): Lord Alderdice, Dr Deirdre MacManus | How much do we know about the psychology of those engaged in the violence of insurgency and counterinsurgency? What are the predispositions and motivations for violence, and what are the psychological consequences of their experiences? From 1987 to 1998 John Alderdice was the leader of Northern Ireland’s cross-community Alliance Party. He has previously served as the consultant–in-charge of the Centre for Psychotherapy, Belfast. Deirdre MacManus is a forensic psychiatrist and clinical lecturer at the Institute of Psychiatry, King’s College London.
Contributor(s): Professor Damian Chalmers | As part of the EU, can Britain disobey EU law and when would it be democratic to do so? If Britain left the Union how easy would it be to ignore EU law and when would it be democratic to do so? Damian Chalmers is professor of European Union law at LSE.
Contributor(s): Professor Andy Clark | We are entering an age of widespread human enhancement. This raises a fundamental question: where does the mind stop, and the rest of the world begin? Andy Clark is professor of logic and metaphysics at the University of Edinburgh.
Contributor(s): Andrew Simms | Is the sleeping architecture of a new economic approach already with us? Andrew Simms argues that while we might be dancing on the edge of systemic threats to the economy, society and environment, we have the tools and resources necessary to build a bridge across them. Andrew Simms is the author of several books including the bestselling Tescopoly. He is a Fellow of nef (the new economics foundation) where he was policy director for many years, trained at the London School of Economics and Political Science and was described by New Scientist magazine as, ‘a master at joined-up progressive thinking.’ He is also one of the UK’s leading campaigners who coined the term ‘Clone Towns,’ co-authored the groundbreaking Green New Deal, was one of the original organisers of the campaign to cancel poor country debt, and devised how to mark the day in the year when the world enters ‘ecological debt.’ This event marks the publication of his new book Cancel the Apocalypse: The New Path to Prosperity.
Contributor(s): Professor Alan Evans | LSE London's 2013 Lent term seminar series begins on the 14th of January. Speakers from within and beyond academia will focus on many of the implications of the current economic and political environment for London, covering relevant issues such as the road pricing, UK trends in higher education, census data and localism. Presenters include academics and practitioners from relevant fields.
Contributor(s): Professor Fawaz Gerges, Professor Charles Tripp | What drives large-scale, popular mobilizations in the Middle East and North Africa? And what are the challenges and prospects for democratic transformation and consolidation in the region? This lecture, ahead of the release of the LSE Middle East Centre’s new book, The New Middle East: Protest and Revolution in the Arab World (CUP, 2013), looks to explore these questions and more. Fawaz Gerges is director of the Middle East Centre at LSE. Charles Tripp is professor of politics at SOAS. Kristian Coates Ulrichsen is the co-director of the Kuwait Programme at LSE. The LSE Middle East Centre opened in October 2010. It builds on LSE's long engagement with the Middle East and provides a central hub for the wide range of research on the region carried out at LSE. LSE Works is a series of public lectures, that will showcase some of the latest research by LSE's Research Centres. In each session, LSE academics will present key research findings, demonstrating where appropriate the implications of their studies for public policy. A list of all the LSE Works lectures can be viewed online.
Contributor(s): Dr Phil Hutchinson, Professor Vasudevi Reddy, Dr Jonathan Webber | Shame is often depicted as playing a socially negative role. But might it also play an important positive role in our moral psychology, and for a flourishing political community? Is shame a source of self-knowledge, and a spur to transformative action, as Sartre and Beauvoir suggest? How important are other people to one’s feeling of shame? And how should we think about the developmental origins of shame? Phil Hutchinson is senior lecturer in philosophy at Manchester Metropolitan University. Vasudevi Reddy is professor of developmental and cultural psychology at the University of Portsmouth. Jonathan Webber is reader in philosophy at Cardiff University.
Contributor(s): Jim Hagemann Snabe | While the digital age has reached the individual through global social networks and redefined social interaction some years ago, the digital revolution for the business world has just started. Innovation in technology is opening up a whole new area of business opportunities that go beyond our established way of doing business. We can reach the individual consumer instantly anytime anywhere. We can get new business insights and analyze unlimited amounts of data in real time. We can solve problems that weren’t solvable before. And we can redefine value chains and integrate them in global business networks where everyone can participate – big or small – with unlimited possibilities to sell, buy and collaborate. The digital revolution in business is driven by three mega technology trends: in-memory computing for unlimited real-timeness, cloud-based social collaboration and business networks and individual access to mission critical insight for better decisions anytime anywhere from any mobile device. SAP is a leading global innovator that drives the convergence of these mega trends to create the next wave of innovation and growth for businesses. The world is changing rapidly: hyper-connected, shorter product cycles, more unpredictability, and even more limited resources. Businesses need to adjust and innovate much faster to meet future business challenges while constantly sensing and responding to customer demand. Technology, and in particular smart software solutions are game changing – not only for the IT industry but for the entire enterprise. As the global market leader in enterprise software SAP is at the forefront of these developments. An estimated 63% of all world transactions run through SAP. SAP has more than 230.000 customers and achieved total revenues of more than 16 billion Euros in 2012. Jim Hagemann Snabe is SAP co-CEO and will offer unique insights on how the digital revolution creates opportunities across many industries and how the power of innovative software solutions can bring productivity and innovation to a new level that we require to propel sustainable growth for our economies in Europe and across the globe.
Contributor(s): Dr Werner Telesko | A look at how Habsburg visions and constructions of identity were reflected in the arts in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, and how the history of the Habsburg Empire was “reconfigured” after 1918. Werner Telesko is corresponding member of the section for the humanities and the social sciences at the Austrian Academy of Sciences.
Contributor(s): Professor Simon Hix | A look at how the emerging structure of macro-economic governance in Europe has an impact on traditional modes of democratic politics, at both the national and European levels. Simon Hix is professor of European and comparative politics at LSE and fellow of the British Academy.
Contributor(s): Professor Lord Giddens | The risks we face, and the opportunities we have, in the 21st century are in many respects quite different from those experienced in earlier periods of history. How should we analyse and respond to such a world? What is a rational balance of optimism and pessimism? How can we plan for a future that seems to elude our grasp and in some ways is imponderable? Anthony Giddens is former Director of the LSE and a member of the House of Lords.
Contributor(s): Professor Conor Gearty, Dr Devika Hovell | Leading human rights lawyer Professor Conor Gearty speaks about his new book Liberty and Security with Dr Devika Hovell. Conor Gearty is professor of human rights law at LSE. Devika Hovell is a lecturer in public international law at LSE.
Contributor(s): Professor Stefano Bartolini | The EU crisis, and the new economic governance instruments invented to solve it, further complicates the problem of the source of EU legitimacy. This lecture will explore these problematic connections. Stefano Bartolini is director of the Robert Schumann Centre for Advanced Studies at the European University Institute.
Contributor(s): Professor Fawwaz Traboulsi | With few comprehensive histories of Lebanon, Professor Fawwaz Traboulsi's A History of Modern Lebanon, which weaves together more than five centuries of the country's social, political, cultural and economic history, has become a go-to reference for anyone who wants to understand the country. In this lecture, Traboulsi will share the problems he has faced in writing the history of Lebanon and how he has dealt and proposes to deal with these challenges. This event is free and open to all on first come first served basis. Please make sure to arrive early to book your seat. *Note: Professor Traboulsi will also give a smaller seminar on Wednesday 20 2013, in which he will discuss the Arab uprisings. This seminar is limited to 50 attendees and is already fully registred. Fawwaz Traboulsi is Associate Professor of Political Science and History at the Lebanese American University, and the American University of Beirut. He has been a visiting professor at New York University, the University of Michigan, Columbia University, and Cairo University, and a fellow at St. Antony’s College, Oxford, and the Wissenshaftskolleg, Berlin. His books, papers and articles focus on the history, politics, social movements, political philosophy, folklore, and art in the Arab World. Traboulsi’s translations include Edward Said’s memoir, Out of Place, as well as Said's Humanism and Democratic Critique. Traboulsi's most recent publication is A History of Modern Lebanon (in English and Arabic, 2007). Traboulsi, a long time journalist, is a columnist for As-Safir Daily and chief editor of Bidayat, a new quarterly magazine launched last year.
Contributor(s): Dr Eamonn Butler | The Nobel economist F A Hayek was the arch-rival of Keynes in the 1930s and 1940s. Some today say that he has the better explanation of boom-bust cycles and how to end them. His prescription is the exact opposite of Keynes – no big infrastructure spending, no keeping things afloat with quantitative easing and cheap credit, but leaner government, lower taxes, less regulation and more freedom for businesses and individuals alike. In this lecture, Hayek biographer Dr Eamonn Butler of the Adam Smith Institute explains Hayek's view that a prosperous economy and a creative society are better achieved by individual freedom than by state planning. This event marks his latest book Friedrich Hayek: The ideas and influence of the libertarian economist. Eamonn Butler is director of the Adam Smith Institute, rated one of the world's leading policy think-tanks. He has degrees in economics, philosophy and psychology, gaining a PhD from the University of St Andrews in 1978 and an honorary DLitt from Heriot-Watt University in 2012. During the 1970s he worked on pensions and welfare issues for the US House of Representatives, and taught philosophy in Hillsdale College, Michigan, before returning to the UK to help found the Adam Smith Institute. Eamonn is author of books on the pioneering economists Milton Friedman, F A Hayek, Ludwig von Mises and Adam Smith, and on the Austrian and Public Choice schools of economics. He is also co-author of Forty Centuries of Wage and Price Controls, and of a series of books on intelligence testing. Eamonn contributes to the leading UK print and broadcast media on current issues, and his recent popular books The Best Book on the Market, The Rotten State of Britain and The Alternative Manifesto have attracted considerable attention. Allister Heath is Editor of City A.M. Prior to taking over at City A.M. in March 2008, he was Editor of The Business magazine, a publication he joined as economics correspondent and leader-writer when it was a Sunday newspaper in 2002. During those years, he was also a regular contributor to The Scotsman and Scotland on Sunday. While at The Business, he also served a two year term as a Wincott visiting professor of financial journalism at the University of Buckingham. Heath was born and schooled in France. He moved to the UK to attend university, graduating with a BSc in economics from the London School of Economics and Political Science and an M.Phil in economics from Hertford College, Oxford University.
Contributor(s): Dr Julian Baggini, Hardeep Singh Kohli | Humour is not to be confused with comedy and jokes. Humour concerns something that belongs to and can more or less pervade everyday life and conversation, not something restricted to comedy sketches or stand-up routines. In this dialogue we will explore everyday humour, and its distinctive regional and cultural variations. Are there principles of British humour that transcend class, profession, religion and region? Are there ‘cultures of humour’ across the world? Julian Baggini is a philosopher, writer and broadcaster. Hardeep Singh Kohli is a raconteur, a cook, a writer and a broadcaster.
Contributor(s): Shani Orgad, Professor Saskia Sassen, Laurie Taylor | Marking the publication of Shani Orgad's latest book Media Representation and the Global Imagination (Polity), the panel will discuss how the way we imagine the world and its 'others' is nourished by the media, and how the media can offer different images and accounts from the ones we encounter. Dr Shani Orgad is a Senior Lecturer in Media and Communications at LSE. Saskia Sassen is Robert S. Lynd Professor of Sociology and Co-Chair Committee on Global Thought at Columbia University. Laurie Taylor presents Thinking Allowed on BBC Radio 4. He is a consultant, writes for newspapers and magazines, contributes to television programmes and is an accomplished public speaker. Charlie Beckett is Head of Department of Media and Communications and Director of Polis.
Contributor(s): Jo Attwool | LSE London's 2013 Lent term seminar series begins on the 14th of January. Speakers from within and beyond academia will focus on many of the implications of the current economic and political environment for London, covering relevant issues such as the road pricing, UK trends in higher education, census data and localism. Presenters include academics and practitioners from relevant fields.
Contributor(s): Navi Pillay | In recent years, the world has witnessed a number of incidents involving hate speech at times with wide-ranging and global repercussions. Many governments have put in place measures which not always are in consonance with international human rights law. This lecture recalls the relevant provisions of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Convention on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination and showcases the jurisprudence of the expert bodies monitoring their implementation. It also illustrates some recent activities undertaken by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. The appointment of Navanethem Pillay (Navi) as UN High Commissioner for Human Rights was approved by the General Assembly on 28 July 2008 and she assumed her functions on 1st September 2008. On 24 May 2012, the United Nations General Assembly extended her mandate for a further two years. Ms Pillay, a South African national, was the first woman to start a law practice in her home province of Natal in 1967. Over the next few years, she acted as a defense attorney for anti-apartheid activists, exposing torture, and helping establish key rights for prisoners on Robben Island. She also worked as a lecturer at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, and later was appointed Vice-President of the Council of the University of Durban Westville. In 1995, after the end of apartheid, Ms. Pillay was appointed as acting judge on the South African High Court, and in the same year was elected by the United Nations General Assembly to be a judge on the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, where she served a total of eight years, the last four (1999-2003) as President. She played a critical role in the ICTR's groundbreaking jurisprudence on rape as genocide, as well as on issues of freedom of speech and hate propaganda. In 2003, she was elected as a judge on the International Criminal Court in the Hague, where she remained until August 2008. In South Africa, as a member of the Women's National Coalition, she contributed to the inclusion of an equality clause in the country’s Constitution that prohibits discrimination on grounds of race, religion and sexual orientation. She co-founded Equality Now, an international women's rights organization, and has been involved with other organizations working on issues relating to children, detainees, victims of torture and of domestic violence, and a range of economic, social and cultural rights. Ms. Pillay received a BA and a LLB from Natal University South Africa. She also holds a Master of Law and a Doctorate of Juridical Science from Harvard University. She was born in 1941, and has two daughters.
Contributor(s): Nick Robinson | Live from Downing Street is the BBC’s political editor’s colourful and personal account of the relationship between the men and women who wield power and those whose job it is to tell the public what they are doing which he will speak about in this lecture at LSE. Nick's book focuses on the key milestones in the long and rocky relationship between politicians and broadcasters: the prime ministers who pioneered broadcasting live from Downing Street – Baldwin and Macmillan; those who fought back – Churchill, Wilson, Thatcher and Blair; and those who could never quite come to terms with it. It also charts the emergence of the charismatic inquisitors of radio and television from Richard Dimbleby and Robin Day to John Humphreys and Jeremy Paxman and concludes with Nick’s own considered view of the controversial issue of impartial reporting. Nick Robinson studied politics, philosophy and economics at Oxford before joining the BBC in 1986. After a decade working behind the cameras – as a producer on programmes ranging from Crimewatch to On the Record and Panorama – he became a reporter and presenter. He is the only person to have been political editor of both ITV News and now BBC News – a job he has held since August 2005. As well as appearing on TV and radio, he writes an award-winning blog.
Contributor(s): Jean-Paul Costa | A unique opportunity to put your questions to a former president of the European Court of Human Rights, via Twitter @LSELaw using #LSECosta. Jean-Paul Costa is the former president of the European Court of Human Rights.
Contributor(s): Professor Iver Neumann | One origin of the social sciences lies in opposition to the discipline of history. Rather than speculating about the course of history generally, the idea was to look at the variation in forms of social life. The social sciences are not alone in attempting this. Other approaches to such a study may be found in psychology and biology. Drawing on Durkheim and Mauss, Professor Iver Neumann will begin with a discussion of how these different but overlapping approaches stand today, when the psychologising approach of methodological individualism and the biologising thrust towards stressing the genetic make-up of the species are on the rise. Stressing how humans are a meaning-producing species, and so bound to be living in a condition of alterity, Professor Iver Neumann will make the case for privileging social causes in the study of social life. Professor Iver Neumann will go on to discuss the specificity of International Relations (IR) relative to other social sciences. IR’s sensibilities to alterity on all levels of political life means that it is an apt tradition from which to cope with the globalisation that defines the age. Crucially, however, for such analyses to be meaningful, they have to pay attention to the sundry social fields within which global politics now play out. The large-scale hybridization that goes with globalization means that we can no longer afford to analyse social and political life in terms of pre-social ideas about the state, war, diplomacy etc. The study of top-level decision making cannot neglect the everyday, and vice versa. This is why we should be meticulous in insisting on IR being first and foremost a social science. Iver Neumann is the Montague Burton Professor of International Relations, LSE.
Contributor(s): Professor Athar Hussain, Dr Debin Ma, Professor Arne Westad | The 18th Congress of the Chinese Communist Party held last November saw a wholesale replacement of the old with a new Party leadership. More than two-thirds of the old team has stepped down, and the change has yet to run its full course. March this year is going to witness the appointment of a new government leadership, including the President, the Prime Minister and the State Council. In time, the impact of this change at the top will ripple through to the lowest level of the government. The new generation of leaders has given rise to a mixture of renewed hope for overdue political and economic reforms and uncertainty about its stance towards domestic and foreign problems and issues. The panellists, Chinese population and the world outside are still coming to terms with the change that is taking place. The panel discussion aims to assess and answer at least some of the questions raised by the change. Professor Athar Hussain is director of the LSE Asia Research Centre. Dr Debin Ma is lecturer in Economic History, LSE. Professor Arne Westad is co-director of LSE IDEAS.
Contributor(s): Miroslav Lajcák | Miroslav Lajcák is Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign and European Affairs of the Slovak Republic, a position he has held since April 2012. Prior to this he held a series of senior diplomatic postings including managing director for Europe and Central Asia, European External Action Service (Dec 2010-April 2012); High Representative/European Union special representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina (July 2007-January 2009); and personal representative of European Union High Representative for Common Foreign and Security Policy to facilitate the referendum on the independence of Montenegro (2006). Miroslav Lajcák was educated at Moscow State Institute of International Relations, Faculty of International Relations; Comenius University Bratislava, Faculty of Law; and the College of International and Security Studies, George C. Marshall European Center for Security Studies, Garmisch – Partenkirchen.
Contributor(s): Professor Anne Applebaum | Containing elements of managed democracy and corporate capitalism – and reflecting the culture and values of the 1980s KGB – Putinism is now taught to Russian children and propagated in the media. It has an ostensible goal: along with protecting the power and wealth of Putin and his inner circle, it proposes to make Russia strong and feared again. Anne Applebaum is the Philippe Roman Chair in History and International Affairs for the 2012-13 academic year.
Contributor(s): Emily McTernan | Questions of responsibility play a central role within contemporary political debate. This lecture will revise the currently impoverished conception of responsibility within theories of justice. Emily McTernan is a fellow in the Department of Philosophy, Logic and Scientific Method at LSE.
Contributor(s): Enrique García | What are the new challenges and opportunities faced by Latin American countries and the New Global South in the 21st Century? Enrique García has been president and CEO of CAF (Development Bank of Latin America) since December 1991. Dr Chris Alden is a Reader in the Department of International Relations at LSE.
Contributor(s): Matthew Oakley | LSE London's 2013 Lent term seminar series begins on the 14th of January. Speakers from within and beyond academia will focus on many of the implications of the current economic and political environment for London, covering relevant issues such as the road pricing, UK trends in higher education, census data and localism. Presenters include academics and practitioners from relevant fields.
Contributor(s): Phyllis Bennis | While US policy towards Israel remains unchanged, the long-standing assumption that most Americans – even most Jewish Americans – agree with that policy no longer holds. In the media, in popular culture, in universities and particularly within the Jewish community, there are signs of major shifts. In conversation with MEC Director Professor Fawaz Gerges, writer, analyst and activist Phyllis Bennis discusses these changes with reflection on her own political evolution from Zionist youth leader to anti-war internationalist and Palestinian human rights activist. Phyllis Bennis directs the New Internationalism Project at IPS. She is also a fellow of the Transnational Institute in Amsterdam. She has been a writer, analyst, and activist on Middle East and UN issues for many years. In 2001 she helped found and remains on the steering committee of the U.S. Campaign to End Israeli Occupation.
Contributor(s): Professor Sarah Coakley, Professor John Cottingham, Professor John Worrall | The idea that nature displays an inherent purpose, and more generally the hand of a wise designer, may have suffered a blow from Darwinian science, but it seems not to have been a death-blow. Indeed, from both academic and popular wings of theist opinion there is still considerable interest in arguments from design. The classic arguments contended that the natural world is so complex and suited to our survival that we cannot but credit it to the work of a wise designer. In this event we will explore attempts to revive design arguments in a time after Darwin. Sarah Coakley is Norris-Hulse Professor of Divinity and fellow of Murray Edwards College at the University of Cambridge. John Cottingham is professor emeritus of philosophy at the University of Reading and an honorary fellow of St John’s College, Oxford. John Worrall is professor of philosophy of science at LSE. The Centre for Philosophy of Natural and Social Science and the Forum for European Philosophy gratefully acknowledge the support of the LSE Annual Fund.
Contributor(s): Professor Neil Walker | The EU’s early success owed much to the law’s understated role as the motor of integration, but a more emphatic legal approach to the recent European crisis has been less successful. What does this mean for the future of European law, and the EU itself? Neil Walker holds the Regius Chair of Public Law and the Law of Nature and Nations at the University of Edinburgh.
Contributor(s): Megan MacInnes, Fred Pearce, Dr Subir Sinha | The theft of land is a global phenomenon. This event will provide an overview of global land grabbing, an analysis of its nature, and discussion of its impact on human rights. Megan MacInnes is the head of the Land Campaign at Global Witness. Fred Pearce is environment consultant at the New Scientist and author of The Land Grabbers: the new fight over who owns the Earth. Subir Sinha is senior lecturer in institutions and development at SOAS.
Contributor(s): Professor Donatella Della Porta | While liberal democracy is losing trust and legitimacy, social movements of different types are calling for alternatives. This lecture will discuss the potential of participatory and deliberative models of democracy. Donatella Della Porta is professor of sociology at the European University Institute.
Contributor(s): Professor Dominic Lieven | Dominic Lieven asks whether new trends in German and English language scholarship together with the opening of the Russian archives require a fundamental re-thinking of Russia’s role in the outbreak of the First World War. Dominic Lieven is senior research fellow at Trinity College, Cambridge.
Contributor(s): Professor Valerie Bunce | Why do publics decide to challenge authoritarian rulers; why do they take different approaches to achieving these ends; and what explains the spread of such challenges across state boundaries? In this lecture, Professor Bunce will compare these three waves of popular challenges to authoritarian rulers providing insights into the MENA dynamic and important issues related to cross-national diffusion. Valerie Bunce is the Aaron Binenkorb Professor of International Studies and Professor of Government at Cornell University. Her research and teaching address comparative democratization, international democracy promotion (primarily by the U.S.); and inter-ethnic cooperation and conflict.
Contributor(s): Gerhard Weiss | LSE London's 2013 Lent term seminar series begins on the 14th of January. Speakers from within and beyond academia will focus on many of the implications of the current economic and political environment for London, covering relevant issues such as the road pricing, UK trends in higher education, census data and localism. Presenters include academics and practitioners from relevant fields.
Contributor(s): Professor Tim Besley, Professor Francesco Caselli, Sir Richard Lambert, Rachel Lomax, Professor Lord Stern and Professor John van Reenen | Having sifted through the evidence throughout 2012, the distinguished group of LSE Growth Commissioners launch the report of their findings on the design of a strategy to support UK growth. Tim Besley is LSE professor of economics and political science; co-chair of the commission. Francesco Caselli is professor of economics at LSE. Richard Lambert is chancellor, University of Warwick and former director general of the Confederation of British Industry. Rachel Lomax is non-executive director of HSBC, former deputy governor of the Bank of England and permanent secretary of three government departments. Nicholas Stern is IG Patel chair and director, LSE Asia Research Centre. John van Reenen is director of CEP and professor of economics; co-chair of the commission.
Contributor(s): Heriberto Araujo, Juan Pablo Cardenal | Frustrated by the facile, pro-business commentary of so much writing on China and the evasions of Beijing's official pronouncements, two China-based journalists made a drastic decision to see for themselves just how rapidly China is spreading its influence around the world. Many thousands of miles and twenty-five countries later, China's Silent Army is the result: an unprecedented attempt to meet the many Chinese who, through hard work, ingenuity and ruthless business practices are rapidly moving much of the world into Beijing's orbit - from Peruvian mines to Siberian forests, Sudanese dams to Burmese jade mines. The implications of what they are doing - politically, ecologically and economically - are profoundly disturbing and particularly topical in light of the Eurozone crisis and the diminishing economical presence of the West. A disturbing and revealing piece of investigative journalism into the unknown extent of China's global power. Heriberto Araújo arrived to Beijing in early 2007, initially working for the AFP agency as Spanish correspondent in Beijing, and then as a freelance reporter for both French and Spanish media. Juan Pablo Cardenal has been reporting from and about China and the Asia-Pacific region since 2003 - first as Shanghai correspondent for El Mundo, and later from Singapore and Beijing for El Economista. He is currently based in Hong Kong.
Contributor(s): Lord Malloch-Brown | Ryszard Kapuscinski exposed the follies of Africa’s rulers and officials while showing an intense emotional identification with the continent’s people. Would he see the current state of Africa as a further triumph of the elites or the redemptive emergence of a more just continent? Mark Malloch-Brown is a former UN deputy secretary-general and was head of the UN Development Programme. He is the author of The Unfinished Global Revolution.
Contributor(s): Professor Hanspeter Kriesi | Professor Kriesi will explore the reactions of Europe’s citizens to the Great Recession, and how the political and economic context is shaping the aftermath of the crisis. Hanspeter Kriesi holds the Stein Rokkan Chair of Comparative Politics at the European University Institute.
Contributor(s): Professor Craig Calhoun | Craig Calhoun took up his post as LSE Director on 1 September 2012, having left the United States where he was University Professor at New York University and director of the Institute for Public Knowledge and President of the Social Science Research Council. Professor Calhoun is a world-renowned social scientist whose work connects sociology to culture, communication, politics, philosophy and economics. Professor Calhoun is an American citizen but has deep connections with the United Kingdom. He took a D Phil in History and Sociology at Oxford University and a Master's in Social Anthropology at Manchester. He co-founded, with Richard Sennett, Professor of Sociology at LSE, the NYLON programme which brings together graduate students from New York and London for co-operative research programmes.
Contributor(s): Professor James Jasper | On those rare occasions when democracy has emerged in history, emotions have been used to define who is a full citizen. Can a new vision of emotions help us protect, repair, and extend democracy rather than curtailing it? James Jasper is professor of sociology at The Graduate Center, City University of New York.
Contributor(s): Dr Bonnie Ayodele, Professor Zhongying Pang | As Africa-China ties have grown tighter in the past few years, China’s engagement with the continent has evolved from being mostly economically focused to more sensitive socio-political fields. This talk provides in-depth discussion of African security issues in relation to China’s long-held non-interference policy. Bonnie Ayodele is lecturer in the Department of Political Science at the University of Ado Ekiti, Nigeria. Zhongying Pang is professor of international and global affairs at Renmin University of China.
Contributor(s): Otto Dov Kulka, Sir Ian Kershaw | In this event Otto Dov Kulka will discuss his new book Landscapes of the Metropolis of Death: Reflections on Memory and Imagination in conversation with historian Sir Ian Kershaw. Auschwitz is for Otto Dov Kulka a vast repository of images, memories, and reveries: “the Metropolis of Death” over which rules the immutable Law of Death. Amidst so much death Kulka finds moments of haunting, almost unbearable beauty (for beauty, too, says Kulka, is an inescapable law). But what does it mean to find beauty in Auschwitz? For him, “the blue of the sky in this land is many times stronger than any blue one can see anywhere else.” Kulka here breaks years of silence, bringing together the personal and historical in a devastating, at times poetic, account of the concentration camps. Returning to the sites of his childhood, Kulka struggles to overcome the obfuscations of memory, unpick the euphemistic language of the camp, and interpret history as he experienced it. These haunting memories – of his mother, who doesn’t look back as she marches towards her death, the sounds of ‘Ode to Joy’ being sung by a children’s choir opposite the crematoria, and the “black stains” along the roadside during the winter death march - instigate forbidden, unanswerable questions. As the author maps his interior world, in a way reminiscent of W. G. Sebald, readers gain a new sense of what it was to experience the Shoah from inside the camps— both at the time, and long afterward. A renowned historian of Nazi Germany and the Holocaust, Otto Dov Kulka is Rosenbloom Professor Emeritus in Jewish History at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He was born in Czechoslovakia in 1933. As a child, he was sent first to the ghetto of Theresienstadt and then to Auschwitz. As one of the few survivors he has spent much of his life studying Nazism and the Holocaust, but always as a discipline requiring the greatest coldness and objectivity, with his personal story set to one side. Ian Kershaw is the author of Hitler 1889-1936: Hubris; Hitler 1936-1945: Nemesis; Making Friends with Hitler; and Fateful Choices: Ten Decisions that Changed the World, 1940-4. Hitler 1936-1945: Nemesis received the Wolfson History Prize and the Bruno Kreisky Prize in Austria for Political Book of the Year, and was joint winner of the inaugural British Academy Book Prize. Until his retirement in 2008, Ian Kershaw was professor of modern history at the University of Sheffield. For services to history he was given the German award of the Federal Cross of Merit in 1994. He was knighted in 2002 and awarded the Norton Medlicott Medal by the Historical Association in 2004. He is a Fellow of the British Academy, and was the winner of the Leipzig Book Prize for European Understanding 2012.
Contributor(s): Dr Rabah Aissaoui | In colonial Algeria, the social, ethnic and religious dividing lines of colonial society remained marked in the interwar period, and the political tensions that traditionally characterised the colonial relationship became particularly acute in the context of the rise of Algerian nationalism during the 1930s. The emergence of Algerian nationalist activism during that period coincided with the celebrations marking the apogee of the French colonial empire. This presentation seeks to examine some key developments in the political mobilisation of Algerians prior to the Second World War and how the French colonial authorities and more specifically the French security services responded to the political situation in Algeria by implementing a number of changes to the intelligence gathering process, changes that were marked by internal conflicts and tensions. Dr Rabah Assaoui is Senior Lecturer in French at the University of Leicester.Dr Aissaoui’s research interests focus on immigration and racism in colonial and postcolonial France. He is particularly interested in the study of discourses on identity and exile, in the diasporic construction of nationalism and more specifically in expressions of ethnic, national and cultural belonging amongst Maghrebi migrants in France.
Contributor(s): Dr Joseph Hanlon, Dr Jeanette Manjengwa, Teresa Smart | A discussion with the authors of the new book, Zimbabwe Takes Back its Land which offers a nuanced assessment of land reform, countering the dominant media narratives of oppression and economic stagnation in Zimbabwe. Joseph Hanlon is a visiting senior fellow at the LSE and an honorary research fellow at the University of Manchester. Jeanette Manjengwa is deputy director of the Institute for Environmental Studies at the University of Zimbabwe, Harare. Teresa Smart is a visiting fellow at the Institute of Education, University of London.
Contributor(s): Alexander Jan | LSE London's 2013 Lent term seminar series begins on the 14th of January. Speakers from within and beyond academia will focus on many of the implications of the current economic and political environment for London, covering relevant issues such as the road pricing, UK trends in higher education, census data and localism. Presenters include academics and practitioners from relevant fields.
Contributor(s): Professor Eve Mitleton-Kelly, Professor Dr Paul Lukowicz, Nestor Alfonzo Santamaria | The scientists behind a crowd safety app, and the City of London Police who use the app in emergencies, will discuss the difference it can make to policy-makers and the emergency services. Eve Mitleton-Kelly is director of the Complexity Research Group at LSE and organised the trial of the app. Paul Lukowicz is scientific director at the Embedded Intelligence German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI). Nestor Alfonzo Santamaria is the lead in business resilience for the City of London Corporation where he is part of the Security & Contingency Planning Group. The LSE Complexity Group has been working for over 16 years, with organisations in the private and public sectors, and several companies in the aerospace industry, to address practical complex problems. In the process it has developed a theory of complex social systems and an integrated methodology using both qualitative and quantitative tools and methods. LSE Works is a series of public lectures, that will showcase some of the latest research by LSE's Research Centres. In each session, LSE academics will present key research findings, demonstrating where appropriate the implications of their studies for public policy. A list of all the LSE Works lectures can be viewed online.
Contributor(s): Dr Tariq Tell | Dr Tell will provide context to contemporary politics in Jordan by examining the history of the emergence and consolidation of the modern state in Jordan under Ottoman, British, and Hashemite rule. He will explorehow the sources of Hashemite social power in Jordon were forged and why they have proven more durable than those fashioned under more auspicious circumstances elsewhere in the Arab east. The talk will focus on the historical political economy of Trans-Jordan and the evolution of a militarized monarchical social pact that exchanged loyalty for economic security and bound the peasants and pastoralists of the East Bank to the throne. This is in contrast to much of what has been written on Hashemite rule in Jordan, which has concentrated on the statecraft of the Hashemite monarchs, or paid prime attention to the dynamics of their policies towards the Palestinian question. Dr Tariq Tell is a political economist currently teaching at the Centre for Arab and Middle Eastern Studies at the American University of Beirut. He has previously taught at the American University in Cairo and the University of Manchester (UK). He has also held research posts at the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London, and in Amman at the Centre d’Etudes et de Recherche sur le Moyen Orient Contemporain (CERMOC) and the Royal Scientific Society. Tell has co-edited Village, Steppe and State: The Social Origins of Modern Jordan (I.B. Tauris, 1994) and edited The Resilience of Hashemite Rule: Politics and the State in Jordan before 1967 (Cahier de Cermoc, 2001). His book, The Social and Economic Origins of Monarchy in Jordan will be published by Palgrave in 2013. He has degrees from St. Antony’s College (Oxford University), the Institute of Development Studies (University of Sussex) and the London School of Economics and Political Science. His current research interests include the comparative history and politics of Arab monarchies and the relationship between imperialism, food security, and popular protest in the Middle East.
Contributor(s): Professor Luis Garicano, Professor Wouter Denhaan, Professor Paul de Grauwe, Professor John Van Reenen | It is still possible to find a way out of the Eurozone crisis if policy-makers address two problems: dealing with the legacy costs of the initially flawed design of the Eurozone, and fixing the design itself. Luis Garicano is professor and head of the Managerial Economics and Strategy Group in the LSE’s Department of Management. Francesco Caselli is Norman Sosnow chair in economics at LSE. Wouter Denhaan is professor of economics. Paul de Grauwe is John Paulson chair in European Political Economy and head of European Institute. John Van Reenen is professor of economics and director of CEP.
Contributor(s): Professor Christopher Clark | Few episodes in the history of modern Europe have attracted such intense and lasting historical interest as the July Crisis of 1914. The chain of events that led to the outbreak of World War One still offers one of the most dramatic and intellectually enthralling narratives in modern history. Yet the size and sophistication of the existing secondary literature poses a challenge: how to generate fresh insights into a crisis that has preoccupied historians and generated controversy for nearly a century. This lecture revisits the crisis of 1914, reflects on trends in the recent and older writing on the outbreak of war and examines some new angles of approach. Christopher Clark is professor of modern European history at the University of Cambridge and a fellow of St Catharine's College, Cambridge. His principal publications include The Politics of Conversion. Missionary Protestantism and the Jews in Prussia, 1728-1941 (OUP: Oxford, 1995), Kaiser Wilhelm II. A Life in Power (Allen Lane: London, 2009) and (co-edited with Wolfram Kaiser) Culture Wars. Catholic-Secular Conflict in Nineteenth-Century Europe (CUP: Cambridge, 2003) and Iron Kingdom. The Rise and Downfall of Prussia, 1600-1947 (Allen Lane: London, 2006).
Contributor(s): Professor John Coatsworth | John Coatsworth will talk about the major foreign policy challenges facing the second Obama administration: the decline of international norms and institutions; the drift toward deeper recession in Europe, the obstacles to demilitarization of Middle Eastern policy, the pressures toward militarization of the US “pivot” to East Asia, and the lack of coherent approaches to Africa and Latin America. John Coatsworth is provost and professor of international and public affairs and of history at Columbia University. Previously, he taught at the University of Chicago (1969-1992) and at Harvard, where he was Monroe Gutman Professor of Latin American Affairs (1992-2007) and served as the founding director of the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies (1994-2006). He also chaired the Harvard University Committee on Human Rights Studies. Professor Coatsworth received his degree in History from Wesleyan University and his MA and Ph.D. degrees in Economic History from the University of Wisconsin, Madison.
Contributor(s): Lucy Scott-Moncrieff | Lucy Scott-Moncrieff will reflect on the disappointing progress of human rights and anti-discrimination law, and consider whether the language we use may be part of the problem. Lucy Scott-Moncrieff is the president of the Law Society and managing partner of Scott-Moncrieff and Associates LLP.
Contributor(s): Laurie Penny | Taking in Pussy Riot and the 2011 uprisings, and stretching back to the Paris Commune, a contextual look at how the rage and pride of women is personal, political – and endlessly powerful. Laurie Penny is a journalist, blogger and author. She is currently a columnist and reporter for New Statesman.
Contributor(s): Ping Fu | We’ve spent the past 20 years capturing physical objects in the digital world. But in the coming decade, as the physical and digital worlds collide, their boundaries will blur in spectacular fashion. Ping will describe how the evolution of robots, sensors, 3D printers and other IT is making it possible to see, feel and make everything digital in a new (human) computer industry. This lecture is rich in lessons for entrepreneurs, creators, and innovators to instigate rather than follow, and to challenge the status quo. Ping will also talk about her personal story of resilience, a journey from the dogmatic anticapitalism of Mao’s China to the high-stakes, take-no-prisoners world of technology start-ups in the US. Her new book Bend, Not Break will be published in January by Portfolio Penguin. Ping Fu is the founder and CEO of Geomagic, a global company providing 3D technology for digital reality. Previously she worked at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications, where she initiated and managed the NCSA Mosaic software project that led to Netscape and Internet Explorer. Fu is one of the few women CEOs in technology and was named the 2005 "Entrepreneur of the Year" by Inc. Magazine. She is a member of President Obama's National Council on Innovation and Entrepreneurship and sits on the board of the Long Now Foundation.
Contributor(s): Chrystia Freeland | There has always been some gap between rich and poor but it has never been wider - and now the rich are getting wealthier at such breakneck speed that the middle classes are being squeezed out. Acclaimed business journalist and global editor-at-large of Reuters, Chrystia Freeland has unprecedented access to the richest and most successful people on the planet, from Davos to Dubai. She offers a timely insight into the current state of capitalism and its most wealthy players. Forget the 1% - it's time to get to grips with the 0.1%. This event marks the publication of her latest book Plutocrats: The Rise of the New Global Super Rich. Chrystia Freeland is Editor of Thomson Reuters Digital, following years of service at the Financial Times both in New York and London. She was the deputy editor of Canada's Globe and Mail and has reported for the Financial Times, Economist, and Washington Post. Freeland's last book was Sale of a Century: The Inside Story of the Second Russian Revolution. She lives in New York City.
Contributor(s): Richard Brown | LSE London's 2013 Lent term seminar series begins on the 14th of January. Speakers from within and beyond academia will focus on many of the implications of the current economic and political environment for London, covering relevant issues such as the road pricing, UK trends in higher education, census data and localism. Presenters include academics and practitioners from relevant fields.
Contributor(s): Professor Henry G. Overman, Alexandra Jones, Adam Marshall | Britain’s cities are facing profound challenges – both in the short run as a result of the recession and in the long run as a result of underlying structural change. In this lecture Henry Overman considers the nature of these challenges and considers what urban policy should do to help cities effectively respond to them. Henry Overman is Professor of Economic Geography at the LSE and Director of the Spatial Economics Research Centre. Alexandra Jones has been Chief Executive of the Centre for Cities since 2010. Prior to this, Alexandra led Ideopolis, the Cities team at The Work Foundation and worked in the former Department for Education and Employment. Adam Marshall was named Director of Policy and External Affairs at the British Chambers of Commerce in July 2009. In this role, he represents the accredited UK Chamber network - with 104,000 companies employing over 5 million people - in Whitehall, Westminster, Brussels and the media. He holds degrees from Yale University (BA) and the University of Cambridge (MPhil, PhD). The Spatial Economics Research Centre is based at the LSE and aims to provide high quality independent research to further understand why some regions, cities and communities prosper, whilst others do not. Research will focus on why there are disparities in economic prosperity at all spatial levels including regional, city-region, local and neighbourhood. LSE Works is a series of public lectures, that will showcase some of the latest research by LSE's Research Centres. In each session, LSE academics will present key research findings, demonstrating where appropriate the implications of their studies for public policy. A list of all the LSE Works lectures can be viewed online.
Contributor(s): Sanjeev Sanyal | The history of any country begins with its geography. Marking the launch of his new book, Sanjeev Sanyal looks at how India’s history was shaped by its rivers, mountains and cities. Sanjeev Sanyal is Deutsche Bank’s Global Strategist and was named “Young Global Leader 2010” by the World Economic Forum. This event is co-hosted by LSE Cities, the Asia Research Centre and the India Observatory.
Contributor(s): Dr Daniel Stedman Jones, Professor Mark Pennington, Professor Lord Skidelsky | How did American and British policymakers become so enamoured with free markets, deregulation, and limited government? Based on archival research and interviews with leading participants in the movement, Daniel Stedman Jones has traced the ascendancy of neoliberalism from the academy of interwar Europe to supremacy under Reagan and Thatcher and in the decades since. He contends that there was nothing inevitable about the victory of free-market politics. Far from being the story of the simple triumph of right-wing ideas, the neoliberal breakthrough was contingent on the economic crises of the 1970s and the acceptance of the need for new policies by the political left. In his lecture he will describe neoliberalism's road to power, beginning in interwar Europe, then shifting its centre of gravity after 1945 to the United States, especially to Chicago and Virginia, where it was developed into an uncompromising political message, communicated through a transatlantic network of think tanks, businessmen, politicians, and journalists held together by Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman. A discussion for anyone who wants to understand the history behind the Anglo-American love affair with the free market, as well as the origins of the current economic crisis. Daniel Stedman Jones is a barrister in London. He was educated at the University of Oxford and at the University of Pennsylvania, where he earned a PhD in history. He has worked as a policy adviser for the New Opportunities Fund and as a researcher for Demos. His latest book is Masters of the Universe: Hayek, Friedman, and the Birth of Neoliberal Politics. Mark Pennington is Professor of Public Policy and Political Economy, King's College, University of London, prior to which he spent eleven years at Queen Mary, University of London. He holds a PhD from the London School of Economics. Mark's work lies at the intersection of politics, philosophy and economics with a particular emphasis on the classical liberal tradition. His latest book, Robust Political Economy (2011: Cheltenham, Edward Elgar) examines challenges to classical liberalism derived from neo-classical economics, communitarian political theory and egalitarian ethics. From January 2013 Mark will be the European Editor of the Review of Austrian Economics. Robert Skidelsky is Emeritus Professor of Political Economy at the University of Warwick. His three-volume biography of the economist John Maynard Keynes (1983, 1992, 2000) received numerous prizes, and he recently published Keynes: The Return of the Master.
Contributor(s): Baroness Afshar | Prominent Muslim feminist and peer Haleh Afshar will speak on the situation facing Iranian women in their country today. The BRISMES Annual Lecture will be given at LSE by Professor the Baroness Haleh Afshar. The annual BRISMES Award for Services to Middle Eastern Studies will be presented to Baroness Afshar at this event. Haleh Afshar (BA York, PhD University of Cambridge) teaches Politics and Women's Studies at the University of York and serves as a Crossbench Peer in the House of Lords. In 2005 she was awarded an OBE for services to equal opportunities. She is also the Visiting Professor of Islamic Law at the Faculté Internationale de Droit Comparée at Strasbourg. She was born and raised in Iran where she worked as a journalist and a civil servant. She has served as the Chair for the British Association of Middle Eastern Studies and Chair of United Nation Association's International Services. Alistair Newton is President of the British Society for Middle Eastern Studies.
Contributor(s): Anders Borg | For the fifth year running Europe is preoccupied with financial turmoil, weak public finances, anemic growth and high unemployment. Progress has been made but with global growth weakening and downside risks on the rise fiscal consolidation remains challenging. The Swedish experience shows that prudent reforms can foster growth while maintaining social cohesion and an extensive welfare state. Twenty years ago, Sweden had large deficits and high debt and experienced a major economic crisis and the loss of investor confidence. Today, Sweden is lauded for its sustainable public finances, real wages have grown at a solid pace for twenty years and a fair income distribution has been maintained. What are the key priorities for growth? And how should policymakers strike a balance between strengthening public finances, sustaining demand and promoting growth? Anders Borg is Minister for Finance in Sweden and has chaired the ECOFIN Council during the 2009 Swedish EU Presidency. He has previously worked as an advisor on monetary policy issues at the Swedish Central Bank and as chief economist at several Swedish banks.
Contributor(s): Dr Joseph Mazor | In defending circumcision the speaker will consider bodily integrity, autonomy, reduction of sexual pleasure, the likelihood of the child choosing circumcision, and the possibility of religious alienation. Joseph Mazor is a fellow in the Department of Philosophy, Logic and Scientific Method at LSE.
Contributor(s): Len McCluskey | The Labour movement has started to put itself once more at the heart of British politics but it also needs to link up with social protest to develop a new working-class politics. Len McCluskey is the general secretary of Unite.
Contributor(s): John Elkington | Drawing from his recent book The Zeronauts: Breaking the Sustainability Barrier, John Elkington will provide an account of his personal journey over 40 years on “the sustainability frontier” and his proposals on how to meet global challenges. John Elkington is co-founder and executive chairman of Volans. He is also the co-founder of SustainAbility, where he remains today as a a non-executive member of the board. Dr Mason is a senior lecturer in the department of Geography and Environment and an associate of the Grantham Research Institute for Climate Change and the Environment.
Contributor(s): Professor Elizabeth A. Povinelli | Are all progressive politics inevitably acts of absolute extinguishment and emancipation, of the production and repression of life? If so why has a progressive imaginary been loathe to confront its own politics of extinguishment. Povinelli examines one strand of progressive political thought--the conversation among critical sexuality studies, immanent critique, and the biopolits--in order to open the problem of ethics and extinguishment beyond the safety of liberal adjudication and justification. Elizabeth A. Povinelli is Professor of Anthropology & Gender Studies at Columbia University. She has directed the Institute for Research on Women and Gender, co-directed the Center for the Study of Law and Culture, and currently Chair of the Department of Anthropology. Povinell’s research seeks to produce a critical theory of late liberalism. She is the author of four books (Labor’s Lot, Chicago, 1994; The Cunning of Recognition, Duke, 2002; The Empire of Love, Duke 2006; Economies of Abandonment, Duke, 2011). The Cunning of Recognition receiving a Bookforum Best Book of the Year. Karrabing-Low Tide Turning, a film she co-directed with Liza Johnson, was selected for the Berlinale Shorts Competition in 2012. She was the German Transatlantic Program Fellow at the American Academy in Berlin, Fall 2011; a Wyse Visiting Professorship at Cambridge University Spring 2012; and a Hallsworth Visiting Professorship at Manchester, Spring 2013.
Contributor(s): Tony Travers | LSE London's 2013 Lent term seminar series begins on the 14th of January. Speakers from within and beyond academia will focus on many of the implications of the current economic and political environment for London, covering relevant issues such as the road pricing, UK trends in higher education, census data and localism. Presenters include academics and practitioners from relevant fields.