Intelligence Squared

In this week's episode we were joined by Danielle Pletka, Washington Post commentator and senior fellow at the American Enterprise; and Emily Tamkin, U.S editor of The New Statesman, to speak about how the candidates have performed in the final weeks of the race, the battleground States listeners should look out for and what's at stake for the country as a whole. The episode was hosted by Manveen...

Rep. Ilhan Omar, the groundbreaking Somali-American community organizer from Minnesota, speaks to public intellectuals Dr Cornel West and Professor Tricia Rose. She lays out her #PeopleFirst plan to transform our society and how the progressive movement will do if Democrats win back the Senate and the White House. This special episode is a 'takeover' of the Intelligence Squared podcast by The Tigh...

John Bolton knows a thing or two about Donald Trump. So many things, in fact, that he’s now being investigated by the US Justice Department for potentially spilling classified information in his new book. On Wednesday October 28 he came to Intelligence Squared Plus to share what he knows – days before what could be the most important presidential election in American history. How does Bolton rate...

Fear is on the march. All over the world citizens have surrendered basic freedoms to the state in order to be protected from Covid-19. Good government has become not just important but a matter of life and death. But the assumption that Western governments have any advantage over the rest of the world is questionable: ask yourself, where would you feel safer today – in Los Angeles and Barcelona or...

Les Payne, the renowned Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist, embarked in 1990 on a nearly thirty-year-long quest to interview anyone he could find who had actually known Malcolm X - including siblings, classmates, friends, cellmates, FBI moles and cops, and political leaders around the world. His goal was ambitious: to transform what would become hundreds of hours of interviews into a...

In the years just before and after the fall of the Berlin Wall, people from across the political spectrum in Europe and America celebrated a great achievement, felt a common purpose and, very often, forged personal friendships. Yet over the following decades the euphoria evaporated, the common purpose and centre ground gradually disappeared, extremism rose once more and eventually the relationship...

This week's podcast is from our friends at Intelligence Squared Germany who hosted a live debate in Berlin last week on whether the EU's 'Green Deal', a plan to deliver both economic growth and carbon neutrality, is really achievable. The debate was held in partnership with The European Council on Foreign Relations and featured Franziska Brantner of the German Green Party taking on renowned climat...

In this week's episode Helen Pluckrose documents the evolution of the ideas that inform today's radical social justice activism, from its coarse origins in French postmodernism to its refinement within activist academic fields. Pluckrose argues this dogma is recognizable as much by its effects, such as cancel culture and social-media dogpiles, as by its tenets, which are all too often embraced as...

Thomas Friedman has been called ‘the most influential columnist in America’. The Financial Times has described him as a ‘global star’ and he has won the Pulitzer Prize three times. On October 6, Friedman will be joining us online less than a month before Americans go to the polls to elect their next president. In conversation with ITV’s political editor Robert Peston, one of Britain’s leading jour...

North Korea shocked the world in September 2017 by exploding the most powerful nuclear device tested anywhere in 25 years. Months earlier, it had conducted the first test flight of a missile capable of ranging much of the United States. Soon after, Kim Jong Un, the reclusive state’s ruler, declared that his nuclear deterrent was complete. World leaders, intelligence officials and many ordinary peo...

In this bonus episode we preview a new podcast created by Intelligence Squared called No Bullsh*t Leadership hosted by Chris Hirst, CEO of advertising group Havas Creative. Today's guest is the sporting legend and rugby coach Clive Woodward who speaks about his approach to leadership, relentless learning and creating a winning culture.  SUBSCRIBE TO THE NO BULLSH*T LEADERSHIP PODCAST AND LISTEN TO...

According to Laura Bates a vast network of incels and other men who hate women are able to operate, virtually undetected online. These extremists commit deliberate terrorist acts and violence against women. Vulnerable teenage boys are groomed and radicalised. In this episode Bates, the bestselling author and founder of The Everyday Sexism Project, speaks to Sonia Sodha about going undercover to ex...

How can we mobilise mindsets to turn anxiety about the climate crisis into action? This week Intelligence Squared Recommends an episode from the How To Lead a Sustainable Business podcast, hosted by Alannah Weston, chairman of Selfridges Group. Alannah speaks with activist Clover Hogan, the 21-year-old founder of ‘Force Of Nature’ - a youth-led organisation empowering Gen Z to step up, rather than...

This week we were joined by Philip Rowley Media Futurist & Futures Director at Omnicom to explore how Covid-19 will shape the next decade of culture, politics and entertainment. From remote working to video gaming Phil provides a roadmap for businesses and individuals to adapt to the next decade. The conversation was hosted by author and research director Carl Miller. Support this show http://supp...

JK Rowling, Scarlett Johansson, Kanye West. All have been ‘cancelled’ – denounced on social media for doing or saying something considered wrong or offensive, often on matters to do with race or gender. In this week's episode Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Julie Bindel debated Billy Bragg and Kehinde Andrews on whether cancel culture is a mob mentality, or a long overdue way of speaking truth to power. The d...

For most of its history, the People’s Republic of China limited public discussion of the war against Japan. It was an experience of victimization—and one that saw Mao Zedong and Chiang Kai-shek fighting for the same goals. But now, as China grows more powerful, the meaning of the war is changing. In this week's episode Rana Mitter argues that China’s reassessment of World War II is central to its...

Jo Marchant and Helen Czerski take us on a journey through humanity’s relationship with the heavens. The stars have shaped who we are - our religious beliefs, power structures, scientific advances and even our biology. But over the last few centuries we have separated ourselves from the universe that surrounds us. And that disconnect comes at a cost. To find out more about Jo Marchant’s book, The...

At the end of World War II, the United States dominated the world militarily, economically, and in moral standing – seen as the victor over tyranny and a champion of freedom. But it was clear – to some – that the Soviet Union was already executing a plan to expand and foment revolution around the world. The American government’s strategy in response relied on the secret efforts of a newly-formed C...

Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/intelligencesquared ------ One summer’s night in 1946, over 1,000 European Jews waited silently on an Italian beach to board a secret ship. They had survived Auschwitz, hidden and fought in forests and endured death marches—now they were taking on the Royal Navy, running the British blockade of Palestine. From Eastern Europe to Israel via Germany and It...

Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/intelligencesquared ------ We still talk about the British conquering India, but that phrase disguises a more sinister reality. For it was not the British government that began seizing chunks of India in the mid-18th century, as historian William Dalrymple points out, but a dangerously unregulated private company headquartered in one small office, five...

Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/intelligencesquared ------ In this week's episode we brought together two of Britain’s most esteemed experts on global pandemics to discuss what we got wrong about the virus and how we can learn from those mistakes going forward. Drawing on examples from history and scientific research, medical historian Mark Honigsbaum and former Chief Scientific Advis...

Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/intelligencesquared ------ Every week in England and Wales, two women are killed by a current or former partner. And still we ask the question: 'Why didn't she leave?' According to author award winning Jess Hill, we should be asking 'Why did he do it?' In this episode Hill speaks to Rosamund Urwin about the perpetrators of abuse and the systems that ena...

Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/intelligencesquared ------ As Japan's longest serving premier, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, steps down due to health concerns, we examine his life and legacy in a special bonus episode. We were joined by Tobias Harris, author of the new book 'The Iconoclast: Shinzo Abe and the New Japan' to discuss the story of Abe’s meteoric rise and stunning fall, his r...

Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/intelligencesquared ------ Human beings, we’re taught, are by nature selfish and governed by self-interest. From Hobbes’ theory about the state of nature to Richard Dawkins’ ‘selfish gene’, the roots of this belief are deeply ingrained in Western thought. But historian Rutger Bregman believes we have got human nature wrong – and that deep down we are al...

Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/intelligencesquared ------ Democracy is in crisis, and unaccountable and untraceable flows of money are helping to destroy it. According to Peter Geoghegan, politicians lie gleefully, making wild claims that can be shared instantly with millions of people on social media. Donald Trump, Boris Johnson, Jair Bolsonaro and populists in many other countries...