Reading for Battle
Battle Readings is a regularly updated compilation of articles, essays, and opinion pieces relevant to the themes of the Battle of Ideas.
Choose a theme from the listing on the left to narrow your search, or view all readings.
Lifestyle & Society
The Price of Inequality: the avoidable causes and invisible costs of inequality
The top 1 percent have the best houses, the best educations, the best doctors, and the best lifestyles, but there is one thing that money doesn't seem to have bought: an understanding that their fate is bound up with how the other 99 percent live.
Joseph Stiglitz, Allen Lane, 28 June 2012
An invitation for kids to be cruel
The humiliation of New York bus monitor Karen Klein reveals a great deal about the erosion of adult authority.
Nancy McDermott, spiked, 27 June 2012
The humiliation of New York bus monitor Karen Klein reveals a great deal about the erosion of adult authority.
Nancy McDermott, spiked, 27 June 2012
The Shard is the perfect metaphor for modern London
Expensive, off-limits and owned by foreign investors – the Shard extends the ways in which London is becoming more unequal
Aditya Chakrabortty, Guardian, 25 June 2012
Expensive, off-limits and owned by foreign investors – the Shard extends the ways in which London is becoming more unequal
Aditya Chakrabortty, Guardian, 25 June 2012
Run for my life!
Some 2,500 years after the jog that launched a million shin splints, marathoning has gone from heroic journey to commonplace event.
Mary Elizabeth Williams, Salon, 20 June 2012
Some 2,500 years after the jog that launched a million shin splints, marathoning has gone from heroic journey to commonplace event.
Mary Elizabeth Williams, Salon, 20 June 2012
Britain's 'last witch': Campaign to pardon Helen Duncan
Campaigners looking to clear the name of Britain's last convicted witch may apply for a judicial review.
BBC News, 15 June 2012
Campaigners looking to clear the name of Britain's last convicted witch may apply for a judicial review.
BBC News, 15 June 2012
Why do some people want drugs to be legal?
A few years ago it seemed unthinkable. But recently, public figures on both the Right and Left have called for the decriminalisation of drugs. What are they thinking?
Nigel Farndale, Daily Telegraph, 12 June 2012
A few years ago it seemed unthinkable. But recently, public figures on both the Right and Left have called for the decriminalisation of drugs. What are they thinking?
Nigel Farndale, Daily Telegraph, 12 June 2012
Time for European football to face the racists
Michel Platini's remarks about Mario Balotelli's suggestion that he would walk off if subjected to racist abuse were ill-judged
Observer, 10 June 2012
Michel Platini's remarks about Mario Balotelli's suggestion that he would walk off if subjected to racist abuse were ill-judged
Observer, 10 June 2012
Pop-Up Populism
How the Temporary Architecture Craze is Changing Our Relationship to the Built Environment
Kelly Chan, Blouin Artinfo, 8 May 2012
How the Temporary Architecture Craze is Changing Our Relationship to the Built Environment
Kelly Chan, Blouin Artinfo, 8 May 2012
The Rise of the Temporary City
While artists, activists and event organizers have embraced the pop-up phenomenon, urban visionaries have remained overwhelmingly concerned with permanence. That may be changing, according to The Temporary City, a new book by urban planner Peter Bishop and environmental scientist Lesley Williams.
David Lepeska, Atlantic, 1 May 2012
While artists, activists and event organizers have embraced the pop-up phenomenon, urban visionaries have remained overwhelmingly concerned with permanence. That may be changing, according to The Temporary City, a new book by urban planner Peter Bishop and environmental scientist Lesley Williams.
David Lepeska, Atlantic, 1 May 2012
Ban outdoor advertising
We can choose the magazines we look at. But we've no freedom to walk down the street without facing the advertisers' assault
Neal Lawson, Guardian, 20 April 2012
We can choose the magazines we look at. But we've no freedom to walk down the street without facing the advertisers' assault
Neal Lawson, Guardian, 20 April 2012
Scared of the Kids
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Clare Gerada, GP; chair-elect, Royal College of General Practitioners
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