Austin Williams

Austin Williams is associate professor in architecture at XJTLU, Suzhou, China; and director of the Future Cities Project in London. He is also the managing editor of www.MasterplanningtheFuture.org - the first independent, online architecture magazine in China.

Williams is the author of The Enemies of Progress: The dangers of sustainability and co-editor of The Future of Community and The Lure of the City: From Slums to Suburbs. He is currently writing China’s Urban Revolution: Understanding Chinese Eco-Cities (Bloomsbury) and 20 Chinese Architects (Thames & Hudson). His other books include The Enemies of Progress: The dangers of sustainability, The Future of Community and The Lure of the City: From Slums to Suburbs. He is the China correspondent for the Architectural Review and a founding member of New Narratives.

In London he retains his position as director at FCP Ltd, an independent film-making production unit specialising in architecture and the built environment. He also devised and chairs the Bookshop Barnies.

Related Sessions
Saturday 19 October 2013, 10.30am Free Stage
Saturday 19 October 2013, 1.30pm Cinema 3
Sunday 20 October 2013, 5.15pm Pit Theatre
Friday 25 October 2013, 6.30pm Foyles Charing Cross, 113-119 Charing Cross Road, London WC2H 0EB

Publications

The Future of Community: Reports of a Death Greatly Exaggerated (ed, with Alastair Donald, Martin Earnshaw and Dave Clements) (Pluto Press, 2008)
Enemies of Progress: The Dangers of Sustainability  (Societas, 2008)

Sex in the brain: do men and women think differently?

"I was impressed by the intensity of the debate and the high level of intellectual engagement, not least by the audience. It was an invigorating, even exhilarating experience to be part of a festival based on the conviction that disagreement is good. The Battle of Ideas is a fantastic concept, may it spread epidemically to the rest of the world. I am already looking forward to next year's event."
Thomas Hylland Eriksen, professor of social anthropology, University of Oslo; novelist

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