Nudging: The very Antithesis of Choice
‘Nudge: improving decisions about health, wealth, and happiness’ by Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein; Penguin, 2008. 224pp Reviewed by Martyn Perks | 19 December 2008 Organ donation is a contentious issue. As it stands in the UK, losing a close relative can suddenly mean a difficult decision on whether or not to donate their organs, especially if they did not indicate any prior consent. There are moves towards...
The Meaning of (Terry Eagleton’s) Life
‘The Meaning of Life’ by Terry Eagleton; Oxford University Press, 2007. 128pp Reviewed by Dennis Hayes | 8 May 2008 We discover at the end of this short book that the ‘meaning of life’, for Eagleton, can be expressed in the metaphor of a jamming jazz band. This form of ‘collectivity’ is both a replacement for lost forms of radical social and political tradition and an offer of something seemingly positive in our atomised...
‘The Islamist’
‘The Islamist’ by Ed Husain; Penguin, 2007. 288pp Reviewed By Robin Walsh | April 2008 Ed Hussein’s tale of his time as a member of Hizb ut Tahrir is part memoir of misspent radical youth, part post-911 exploration of Islamic extremism. But despite falling between two genres known for their tendency towards the hysterical, Hussein’s book is both engaging and quite revealing about a number of aspects of contemporary...
The Craftsman
‘The Craftsman’ by Richard Sennett; Allen Lane, 2008. 304pp Reviewed by Martin Earnshaw | April 2008 The roots of The Craftsman, the first book in a forthcoming three volume work, go deep into the belly of the Cuban Missile Crisis. Richard Sennett recalls a conversation he had with his old teacher Hannah Arendt about the relationship between material innovation and politics. The relevance of such a conversation at the...
More than Bricks and Mortar
Dave Clements | November 2007 In a speech given at Battle of Ideas 2007, Dave Clements argues that housing has become a vehicle for contemporary prejudices, anxieties and orthodoxies about how we live. The figures … The government’s plan is to build three million homes by 2020 The annual target is to build 200,000 homes a year We are already falling short by around 30,000 a year The target will increase to 240,000 a year from 2016...
The Islamist
‘The Islamist’ by Ed Husain; Penguin, 2007. 288pp Reviewed By Martin Earnshaw | November 2007 Since 7/7 made us aware that Islamist terrorism is as more likely to be produced at home than abroad, there has been a hardening of attitude towards the “extremists” in our midst and calls for “moderate” Muslims to disown them. Ed Husain’s book is a well-timed intervention in these debates, billed as an insider’s account of what...
ESSAY: The political engagement’s off
Austin Williams | October 2007 The e:petitions web page was launched on Number 10’s website in November 2006 ‘enabling anyone to address and deliver a petition directly to the Prime Minister.’ Presumably, someone thought that it would be a good wheeze to minimise the photo opportunities for aggreived members of the public to present a paper petition to the Prime Minister in full view of the waiting media. Oh well, back to the drawing...
Immigrants: Your Country Needs Them
‘Immigrants: Your Country Needs Them’, by Philippe Legrain; Abacus, 2007. 384pp Reviewed By Steve Nash | September 2007 This is a thought-provoking and timely book. Thought-provoking in that it makes you think through your ideas about migration; timely in that it goes to the heart of society’s feelings about change and the modern world. The issue of immigration is never far from the news and raising the question of open...
ESSAY: Eating the greens
Austin Williams | July 2007 Tony Juniper, Executive Director of Friends of the Earth told a Local Groups conference in September 2006 that ‘environmentalists have had a reputation for being against change’. He went on to say that ‘this reputation, whether accurate or not, has enabled some of those who we seek to influence, to present us as a backward looking and conservative force.’ God forbid. But Friends of the Earth aside, the...
An Un-American Life
‘An Un-American Life: The Case of Whittaker Chambers’ by Sam Tanenhaus; Old Street Publishing, 2007. 672pp Reviewed by Austin Williams | 9 June 2007 ST refuses to be drawn. On anything. I have come to interview him about his re-released book ‘Whitaker Chambers: An Un-American Life’ exploring and explaining the lives and times of the key players during the McCarthy period in post-war America. His new introduction mentions...
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