Issue 122
May 2006
Contents
Chastened hegemon
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
Neoconservatism is dead. And, as Francis Fukuyama's latest book spells out, a new US foreign policy consensus is emerging. It eschews doctrine and combines elements of "realist" and "idealist" positions
Goodbye isiXhosa
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
The South African constitution guarantees "parity of esteem" to no less than 11 languages. But English, despite being the mother tongue of only 9 per cent of the population, will soon crowd out the rest
Hammer & tickle
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
Communism is the only political system to have created its own international brand of comedy. The standard interpretation is that communist jokes were a form of resistance. But they were also a safety valve for the regimes and jokes were told by the rulers as well as the ruled—even Stalin told some good ones
Comment (2)Water, water, everywhere
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
Desalination—the removal of salt from seawater to make it drinkable —has long been a possible answer to the world's water shortages. Can technological advances bring it into the mainstream, or will it remain too expensive and energy-inefficient?
Divide and heal
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
Despite the imminent formation of a government of national unity, Iraq is splintering into its three historic provinces. The break-up can be managed, but it cannot be avoided. The western powers and Iraqi nationalists must now accept that radical federalism is the only alternative to civil war
John Stuart Mill
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
Mill left no systematic legacy— there is no "Millism." But 200 years after his birth, his liberalism is still relevant. And Britain's greatest ever public intellectual was often surprisingly contrarian
Torture doesn't work
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
In last month's Prospect, Michael Ignatieff wondered if torture, under some circumstances, may make us safer. The answer is a firm no
Blame the neoliberals
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
Some of the problems identified by Alison Wolf are real, but it is not the emancipation of women that is to blame. It is rather the neoliberal economic policies of Britain, as international comparisons make clear
Dilemmas of insanity
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
The mental health bill fiasco is a classic dilemma of public protection versus human rights
Skewed sampling
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
Some pundits predicted general election success for the Tories on the basis of their local election performance. Not so fast
Rehabilitating Freud
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
Sigmund Freud and psychoanalysis have taken something of a battering over the last few decades. On the 150th anniversary of Freud's birthday, here is the case for the defence
My mate MSG
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
Monosodium glutamate gets a terrible press, but without it there would be no Marmite
Councils in charge
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
Local authorities are about to become a lot less dependant on central government
Their riots…
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
Who governs France? Not parliament, trampled on by the street and the president
…our riots
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
Five years ago, the northern riots exposed Britain's racial divides. Have things improved?
Newspaper studies
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
It was impossible to get my pupils interested in news—until I threatened to fail them
The science of belief
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
Sceptics increasingly seek to explain faith as a product of nature; Lewis Wolpert thinks it is down to tool-making. But maybe there is a problem with the word "origin"
Global Shakespeare
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
The critical snobbery aimed at the Globe Theatre has not stopped it from creating some of the best productions of Shakespeare in the country
Learning to be ordinary
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
There are many books about autism, but few as original as Kamran Nazeer's. This is a description of a group of autistics struggling to attain the obvious
Can you get Lost?
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
Enlightenment philosophers, polar bears and pirate ships all feature in "Lost." But if the series is about anything, it's about contemporary America
A taste of the Wigmore
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
John Gilhooly's first season as artistic director of the Wigmore Hall will be a test of taste and judgement rather than of personality
Private view
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
The Serpentine's new curator is about to shift British art away from the market manipulations of the Saatchi model to a new era of art theory—or babble
Smallscreen
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
The second series of Green Wing has so far been a disappointment. What is it about British comedies that makes them harder to sustain than American ones?
Widescreen
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
100 years ago the 100-minute standard length in the cinema was "found." Isn't it time now to lose it? The possibilities for long or short movies are wide open
The American brick problem
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
My father learned about Malaysian rubber from me, and began burning it to make bricks
An anxious man
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
Through his investments, Joseph becomes gripped by a seething, uncontrollable obsession
Tillyard's tales
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
Living in Italy, the arguments that rage in Britain over work/life balance and children reach me like discordant music from another world
Out of mind
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
A Cambodian woman is paralysed just like her husband, but she has not had a stroke. She is in a grey region of "conversion disorders"
Inefficient markets
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
The outlook for the Doha round may not be as bad as it looks; why a dreary North sea gas pipeline is at the centre of things; and Gordon's productivity problem
Washington watch
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
If the polling is to be believed, the Democrats might be heading for a stunning victory in November's mid-term elections. But don't write off Karl Rove
Lab report
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
What lessons can we draw from the Northwick drug trial catastrophe? Plus new data provides evidence for cosmic inflation theory. Or does it?
Brussels diary
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
Gordon Brown's performance in Vienna has got diplomats wondering exactly how Eurosceptic he is. Plus Turkey's fall from European grace
Common law
20th May 2006 — Issue 122
If your client is convicted at trial, you turn to mitigating factors or hope for an impressive character witness. You can't do much better than a blubbing boss