Prospect Magazine - September 2006

Page 2

CONTRIBUTORS TO THIS ISSUE
PHILIP BALL’s most recent book is The Devil’s Doctor (Heinemann) PETER BERGEN is author of The Osama bin Laden I Know (Simon & Schuster) STEPHEN CHAN

contents
Issue one hundred and twenty-six September 2006

is dean of law and social sciences at Soas edited Russian Short Stories from Pushkin to Buida (Penguin)

ROBERT CHANDLER

ROBERT COLLS

is the author of Identity of England (OUP)

COVER STORY

MARK COUSINS is the author of The Story of Film (Pavilion Books) KENNETH NEIL CUKIER

32
The right dialectic
DANNY KRUGER

is technology correspondent at the Economist

STEPHEN EVERSON

is writing a book on metaphysics and the mind

JAMES FERGUSSON’s

The Vitamin Murders (Portobello) is forthcoming

CHARLES GRANT is director of the Centre for European Reform VASILY GROSSMAN

(1905-64) is the author of Life and Fate (Vintage)

NICHOLAS HUMPHREY is a professor at the London School of Economics TIM KING

The contest between equality and liberty has become a dispute about who owns the ground of “fraternity” and whether the state (Gordon Brown) or the individual (David Cameron) will lift its banner there.

is a writer living in France

DANNY KRUGER

is an adviser and speechwriter to David Cameron works for the underground

OPINIONS

SYMPOSIUM

DAN KUPER

10 Pakistani puzzles
KAMRAN NAZEER

18 The unfinished war
AMIR TAHERI, AUGUSTUS RICHARD NORTON, JUDITH PALMER HARIK

PHILIPPE LEGRAIN is the author of Open World: The Truth about Globalisation MARK LEONARD

is the author of Why Europe Will Run the 21st Century presents BBC4’s Art Safari

Pakistan is abuzz with conspiracy theories about the latest terror plot in Britain.

BEN LEWIS

Why did the war in Lebanon happen and whose interests did it serve? What is life like under Hizbullah?

11 Bipartisan disaster
ANATOL LIEVEN

is a senior research fellow at the New America Foundation
ANATOL LIEVEN DENIS MACSHANE ALEX MCBRIDE

is a Labour MP

is a criminal barrister is a writer

Americans’ unease with US foreign policy is not reflected by either of the two political parties.

INTERVIEW

26 Michael Jay
CHARLES GRANT & MARK LEONARD

KAMRAN NAZEER

13 Threat to the net
KENNETH NEIL CUKIER

AUGUSTUS RICHARD NORTON

is a professor at Boston University is the author of

The recently retired head of the diplomatic service tries to explain why the foreign office matters.

JUDITH PALMER HARIK

Hezbollah (IB Tauris) is a freelance historian, philosopher and blogger
JONATHAN RÉE ALEX RENTON

“Network neutrality” is a good idea—but enshrining it in law is not the right way.

ESSAY

14 Labour’s good book
DENIS MACSHANE

38 A brief history of air-conditioning
JAMES FERGUSSON

won the 2006 Glenfiddich award for best food writer is professor of mathematics at Warwick University is editor of the foreign policy journal Politique Internationale is a novelist, screenwriter and journalist living in London

IAN STEWART

The Future of Socialism was the last important book written by a Labour politician.

As use of air-conditioning grows, so does its contribution to climate change.

AMIR TAHERI

16 Scramble for China
STEPHEN CHAN

MY STORY

44 Shearer’s paradox
ROBERT COLLS

ERIK TARLOFF

Africa is desperate for Chinese investment, but only South Africa will get much of it.

Newcastle United doesn’t understand the magic it works.

2 PROSPECT September 2006