Issue: July 2024
Why we all feel let down
Reflecting upon the corrosive power of disillusionment in politics and why our leaders are virtue vacuums who lack both competence and character
Europe invaded
We must heed the warnings from Hungary and Poland about migration
When things could only get better
Fans of the 1990s aren’t nostalgic reactionaries. They celebrate an era of optimism, peace, prosperity and great popular culture
Balance the books
Britain’s soaring debt may not be as sustainable in the long term as figures suggest
Riffs or rigour?
Arts practice has gained the upper hand over scholarship
The Gradel Quadrangles at New College, Oxford
Postmodernity perches precariously in the porter’s lodge
Of mice and men and Magdalen
C. S. Lewis’s Oxford by Simon Horobin
Being economical with the truth
The Invisible Doctrine: The Secret History of Neoliberalism (& How It Came to Control Your Life). By George Monbiot and Peter Hutchison
Is Beer the solution to all of life’s problems?
The Unaccountability Machine: Why Big Systems Make Terrible Decisions — And How The World Lost its Mind. By Dan Davies
A commanding life
Iron Imperator: Roman Grand Strategy Under Tiberius. By Iskander Rehman
Most Read
American strategy in Iran is wiser than it seems
President Trump’s intervention will leave the world safer than it was
Saint Nicola
Nicola Sturgeon wants sympathy for her husband’s crimes—but after years spent avoiding awkward questions, her latest reinvention may be the hardest sell yet.
The lonely death of Henry Nowak
We must draw lessons from a horrendous and disgraceful case
Rewatching the English
English identity has become too surreal and discomfiting to define
A failed war on fags
The black market has taken over the tobacco trade Down Under
Won over by a stately Italian saga
A fictional Italian president and a cinema spin-off
Low energy
Rachel Reeves and Mel Stride are inconsistent while Reform are invisible
How procedure is enabling petty criminals
We should support workers who confront criminals
It is time to cut pensions
The economic burden on younger people is unsustainable
Chopping The Onion
It is neither brave nor clever to portray dissenting women as insane
The poetry of Easter
Reason cannot entirely account for the particular and the mysterious
Wrestling with realignment
Labour will use the Irish Sea border as an excuse to realign with the EU’s rules
Gas shock therapy
Ed Miliband must abandon his absurd and failing approach to energy
How to get Britain building
A new policy paper proves that the government can beat bureaucratic sclerosis if it wants to
The miracle of the magical migrants
Is a man’s identity is fluid when he steps on British soil, but calcified on African soil?
Trump will not discredit Europe’s populist right
European populism is a lot deeper than mere Trumpism