Issue 150
September 2008
Contents
Harvard loses its lustre
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
An MBA from Harvard Business School used to buy entry into the financial and political elite of any country in the world. But as America's economic lead starts to fade, so too does the value and relevance of its most prestigious powerhouse
The return of goodness
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
Contemporary liberalism's insistence that morality is a mere matter of rights and obligations empties life of its ethical meaning. We need a return to the virtue ethics of the pre-moderns, and a renewed conception of the good life
An alien inheritance
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
Colonial powers created African states with arbitrary borders and unsuitable systems of "winner-takes-all" multi-party electoral democracy. As recent elections show, this has been a failure. It is time to develop an African form of democracy
The future will not be nuclear
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
The government is pinning its hopes on a nuclear renaissance to meet Britain's climate change goals. Planning procedures are being eased and hidden subsidies offered. But the policy is based on a misunderstanding of nuclear power's lousy economics, and will fail
Flirting with Stalin
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
While 1917 saw a cultural flowering in Russia, the post-Soviet intelligentsia has failed to articulate a liberal vision and produced only shallow art. Little wonder that Putin has been able to exploit nostalgia for Soviet "greatness"
A noble death
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
Bullfighting is seen by many as cruel. But it is not merely a gaudy circus spectacle; at its best it is an art form. Can aesthetics justify the suffering of the animal?
Comment (1)Hyun Jeong-eun
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
Hyundai's dynamic boss shattered the glass ceiling when she succeeded her husband at the South Korean conglomerate. Now she's helping to open up the even more chauvinist North
Behavioural economics: is it such a big deal?
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
Behavioural economics is becoming increasingly fashionable. Does it represent a revolution in economic thinking? Or does it merely provide a few handy insights into the more irrational behaviours of individuals
The dangers of appeasement
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
There are no parallels between Kosovo and South Ossetia. Russia's brutal expansionism must be checked now—or we will pay the price later
India's imprisoned farmers
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
By refusing to move on from its outdated approach to agriculture, India is condemning farmers to misery and impoverishing its own citizens
A falling house of cards
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
The Crosby report shows that the market can't solve the mortgage crisis alone. It's time for the state to step in
No Left Bank on the Clyde
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
The rise of the SNP has not led to a renaissance of Scotland's political culture
Why Hamlet's heirs are happy
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
Shakespeare's prince was a gloomy sort. But a trusting society makes today's Danes rather jolly
The mill towns round our neck
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
A think tank report has been attacked for its scepticism about urban regeneration. But it is right
British subjects—not God's
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
The founder of the anti-Islamist Quilliam Foundation responds to last month's Prospect critique
It takes a village
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
There are no winners in Georgia's crisis. It shows how great power games can easily get out of hand
The sweet pain of betrayal
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
Howard Jacobson's early works show him to be a master of comic complaint and morbid eroticism. But his latest novel is a departure for more complex, compromised territory—and a sobering lesson in the interconnectedness of fidelity, love and fury
Building a better Futura
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
The history of typefaces may seem irrelevant in a digital age. But it is tradition and not technology that defines the letters we read
A model modern Boswell
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
A new biography of Alasdair Gray doesn't answer the big questions. But it is canny and charming on the small ones
An artist of the abstract world
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
Janna Levin's first novel is a compelling fictionalisation of the lives of two great scientists. But her gift lies not so much in bringing science to life as in showing how life itself fuels great science
Widescreen
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
I went to see Mamma Mia! in Stockholm expecting clichés and thin characters—and found them. What I wasn't expecting was a dazzling piece of cinema
Private view
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
Art history too often ignores prints. Now the British Museum has made a persuasive case for their importance in 20th-century American culture
Performance notes
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
A revolutionary production of Parsifal in Bayreuth triumphantly confronts the politics that have tainted Wagner's legacy
Smallscreen
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
Britain has woken up to the dramatic quality of HBO's The Wire. But the programme also reveals how our TV viewing habits are changing
Love and honour and pity and pride and compassion and sacrifice...
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
I haven't seen my father in three years. But with my writer's block and looming deadline, he's come to visit at the worst possible time
The prisoner
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
My homosexuality estranges me from those inmates with families, and also from my fellow Christians. Still, as a writer I need a certain amount of isolation
Washington watch
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
McCain is ahead in some polls, after a TV advert suggesting Obama is the Antichrist. It seems Mark Penn has dirt on Obama—but what? Plus, could McCain's ferret win it for him?
China café
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
The local media have turned me into the most popular person in this part of China, and made my dog as famous as Lassie. Plus, how to civilise a road, Chinese-style
Lab report
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
Was The Day After Tomorrow right after all? New data from Germany suggests that global temperatures could plummet within a single year. Plus, how vitamin C can destroy tumours
This sporting life
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
China's basketball team was whacked by a surprisingly disciplined US in the Olympics, but there is a vast, and growing, appetite for the sport in the country
Berliner brief
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
Angela Merkel may well win another term as chancellor, but she'll probably get stuck with the Social Democrats again. Plus, Helmut Schmidt makes a comeback
Brussels diary
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
The Doha trade talks may have failed, but thanks to Mandelson, the EU is escaping the blame. Plus, even a PR agency can't save Bulgaria from having its aid suspended
Common law
28th September 2008 — Issue 150
My client has been caught on camera punching someone in the face. The footage looks damning. But sometimes CCTV can be turned to the defence's advantage