New year, new debates: forthcoming events and media appearances
We're nothing if not busy at the Academy of Ideas. Here's a round up of some of the things we've done and what's coming up.
The new year has begun with a series of major international events and upheavals. Iran is in tumult against the Islamic regime. The war in Ukraine goes on, with millions facing blackouts after Russian attacks on energy infrastructure and still more international discussions about how it might end. And, of course, Donald Trump has been at the centre of the action, snatching the president of Venezuela and demanding that Denmark hand over control of Greenland.
On the home front, Keir Starmer is trying to engineer another reboot for his government while abolishing jury trials for many offences, trying to force through his widely unpopular deal on the Chagos Islands and promising a ‘reset’ with the EU that seems to be all give and no take. There seems little by way of positive government, just ever greater efforts to stop Reform.
I’ve been involved in a couple of podcasts that hopefully will shed some light on recent events, see below.
Also, get your diaries out and mark these big events in there. In March, we’re bringing the spirit of the Battle of Ideas festival to Manchester for Battle of Ideas North. I urge you to come along to the fantastic residential weekend organised by Ideas Matter, The Academy, in August. And of course, there’s the Battle of Ideas festival in London in October – plus much more. Details below.
Claire
Podcasts
The spiked podcast: Venezuela, Greenland and Trump’s new world disorder
Claire Fox was a guest this week. Watch here.
Gender Ideology Isn’t Over: Why Institutions Still Reject Reality
Claire Fox was a guest on Sunil Sharma’s podcast, Rational Voices with Sunil.
Listen here.
Forthcoming events
Classical Philosophy Reading Group
Plato’s Republic: Session 2
Sunday 11 January, 6pm via Zoom
Free to attend. Register here.
For session 2 - reread Chapter 1 and add Chapter 2 in Republic - Oxford World’s Classic. Stephanus numbers 327 to 367 for other versions.
Dido Powell’s London Art Gallery tours 2026:
Inspiration and Imagination
Venue: The National Gallery, Trafalgar Square
Sunday 18 January, 3pm-4.30pm
Price: £15 pp
To book your place, please contact wendyearle@me.com
Battle Book Club: Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead by Olga Tokarczuk
Tuesday 20 January, 6:30pm-8:00pm, via Zoom
Join the book club to discuss this existential thriller, introduced by Maeve Halligan. Unpick themes of madness, injustice, sentience, power and religion.
Free to attend, register via Eventbrite.
Academy of Ideas Education Forum: Education Book Club
Man’s Search for Meaning by Victor Frankl
Monday 2 February, 7pm, via Zoom
Free to attend, register here.
Battle of Ideas North
Saturday 7 March
Venue: The Pendulum Hotel/Manchester Conference Centre
A full day of discussion and debate on some of the biggest issues of our time. Tickets available soon.
The Academy 2026
Saturday 22 and Sunday 23 August
Venue: Wyboston Lakes Resort, Bedfordshire
EARLY BIRD TICKETS ON SALE NOW
Join us for a residential weekend of bold ideas, lectures, and discussions, organised by Ideas Matter.
Today’s state is a sprawling leviathan. It reaches into our lives to an historically unprecedented degree. Yet it is, at the same time, fragmenting, incompetent and unable to maintain control of safety and security, internally or externally.
Beyond this, something is missing: any sense of legitimacy. Political legitimacy in the modern era is conferred by the people – the demos – yet the contemporary state often appears to be set explicitly against them. Ordinary people are seen as a problem to be managed, a source of danger, as something for the state to be protected from.
The Academy 2026 will explore the origins and development of the contemporary state. Why is the state, which seems to be growing inexorably, apparently incapable of delivering? Is it increasingly set against the people – and if so, why?
Tickets and info here.
Battle of Ideas festival 2026
Saturday 17 & Sunday 18 October
Church House, Great Smith St, Westminster, London, SW1P 3BN
Buy early bird tickets here.
Debating Matters Transatlantic
Wednesday 11 to Saturday 14 November, London
UK and US sixth-form students debate contemporary issues.
Watch our previous debates
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