A lecture by Mirek Topolánek, Prime Minister of the Czech Republic [Audio]
Speaker(s): Mirek Topolánek | Mirek Topolanek has been Prime Minister of the Czech Republic since September 2006. He has been chairman of the Civic Democratic Party (ODS) since November 2002. Mr Topolanek will speak about the priorities of the forthcoming Czech Republic's EU Presidency.
The Great Transformation: how China changed in the long 1970s [Audio]
Speaker(s): Professor Chen Jian | Professor Chen offers a historian's overview of China's 1970s transformation and the beginning of global systemic change that this transformation helped create. Chen Jian is Philippe Roman Chair in History and International Affairs for 2008-09 at LSE. He is the Michael J Zak Chair of the History of US China Relations at Cornell University.
Why 2009 is a crucial year for Europe [Audio]
Speaker(s): Bruno Le Maire | Bruno Le Maire is the French minister of state for European affairs, prior to this he was principal private secretary to the Prime Minister, 2006-2007, advisor to the Prime Minister, 2005-2006, advisor to the Minister of the Interior, 2004-2005 and advisor to the Minister of Foreign Affairs, 2002-2004. Bruno has been National Assembly deputy for Eure since 2007, and is a member of the National Assembly Finance Committee. He is also the Finance Committee special rap
Celebrities and Aid: new humanitarians or just another fad? [Audio]
Speaker(s): Professor John Street, Kris Torgeson; Ann McFerran | Why do charities use celebrities to speak out on humanitarian action? Who do celebrities represent? Are they genuinely committed to the causes they espouse or have causes become another path to self-promotion? John Street is a Professor of Politics at the University of East Anglia. Kris Torgeson is the International Secretary for the Midecins Sans Frontihres International Office. Award-winning journalist and freelance feature write
A Good Childhood: searching for values in a competitive age [Audio]
Speaker(s): Professor Judy Dunn, Professor Lord Richard Layard | (We apologise for the poor audio quality, this was because of technical problem with the audio-visual system) Is childhood all it should be? Or has it been spoilt by broken homes, junk food, alcohol and exam stress? The speakers will present the findings of The Good Childhood Inquiry. Judy Dunn is professor of developmental psychology at King's College London, and was chair of The Good Childhood Inquiry. Richard Layard is director
Democracy in Kuwait and its effect on the Gulf [Audio]
Speaker(s): Abdullah Bishara | Significant political reform processes are underway in all six member-states of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). In this lecture the first secretary-general of the GCC will reflect on their progress and future prospects. Abdullah Bishara was secretary-general of the GCC from 1981-93.
Thinking Like a Social Scientist: public economics and pub economics [Audio]
Speaker(s): Professor Nicholas Barr | In this lunchtime series lectures, a selection of LSE's academics from across the spectrum of the social sciences explain the latest thinking on how social scientists work to address the critical problems of the day. They survey the leading ideas and contributions made by their discipline, explain the types of problems that are addressed and the tools that are used, and explore the kinds of solutions proposed. Nicholas Barr is professor of public economics a
Kosovo's Independence: One Year On [Audio]
Speaker(s): Ambassador Muhamet Hamiti | Dr Muhamet Hamiti is the current and the first ambassador of the Republic of Kosova to the UK. Born in Podujeva in Kosovo in 1964, Ambassador Hamiti earned his BA in English Language and Literature at the University of Pristina in 1987; earned his MA in English Literature at the University of Zagreb (Croatia) in 1990, and his PhD in English literature at the University of Pristina in 2006 with a thesis on the prose fiction of James Joyce and Joseph Conrad.
Can International Law Change the World? [Audio]
Speaker(s): Judge Sir Christopher Greenwood | While each system of national law seeks to regulate affairs within only one society, international law concerns the entire world. Yet it has almost none of the methods of enforcement available to national legal systems. So, can it change the world? Christopher Greenwood was elected a judge at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in November 2008. He is an authority in international law who taught at LSE for 12 years, and was a practising barriste
Individual and Corporate Social Responsibility [Audio]
Speaker(s): Professor Jean Tirole | This is the third annual Coase-Phillips lecture, hosted jointly by Economica and the Department of Economics. Jean Tirole is one of the world's most eminent economists working in the fields of industrial organisation, finance and game theory.
IHL and International Human Rights Law in Non-International Armed Conflicts [Audio]
Speaker(s): Professor Marco Sassòli | Professor Sassoli will explore the relationship between International Humanitarian and Human Rights Law during non-international armed conflict, by applying the lex specialis principle. Marco Sassrli is professor of international law at the University of Geneva and associate professor at the Universities of Quebec and Laval.
Why Did Nobody Tell Us? Reporting the Global Crash of 2008 [Audio]
Speaker(s): Alex Brummer, Vince Cable MP; Evan Davis; Gillian Tett; Professor Willem Buiter | This event will discuss the reporting leading up to the global credit crash of 2008. Alex Brummer has been City Editor for the Daily Mail since 2000. He has over thirty years' experience in the media. Vincent Cable is the Liberal Democrat Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer and speaks for his party on issues of Finance, European Economic and Monetary Union and the City. Evan Davis is a presenter of BBC R
The Islamic Republic of Iran After 30 Years [Audio]
Speaker(s): Professor Fred Halliday | Thirty years after the fall of the Shah of Iran and the advent of Ayatollah Khomeini to power, the Iranian revolution continues to exert a dynamic ideological and political influence across the Middle East. In a retrospective analysis of the revolutionary period itself, some of whose decisive moments he witnessed at first hand, and of the subsequent development of the Islamic Republic Professor Fred Halliday will attempt to set these dramatic events in conte
Democracy in America: Jefferson, Tocqueville, and Lincoln [Audio]
Speaker(s): Professor Peter Onuf | Professor Onuf explores the development of the elusive and controversial ideal of democracy from Thomas Jefferson's revolutionary writings to Abraham Lincoln's great effort to vindicate republican principles in the American Civil War. Peter Onuf is Thomas Jefferson Foundation Professor of History at the University of Virginia and Harmsworth Professor of American History at the University of Oxford.
LSE Literary Weekend - Designing Spaces for Thought [Audio]
Speaker(s): Antony Gormley, Professor Richard Sennett; Neven Sidor | By exploring the experiential and social impacts of creating spaces for public engagement, contemplation and education - including the Fourth Plinth at Trafalgar Square and the LSE's New Academic Building - an artist, an architect and a sociologist discuss the intellectual practice of 'designing spaces for thought'.
LSE Literary Weekend - The Financial Crisis, Climate Change and Energy [Audio]
Speaker(s): Professor Lord Anthony Giddens | Political action and intervention, on local, national and international levels, is going to have a decisive effect on whether or not we can limit global warming, as well as how we adapt to that already occurring. At the moment, however, Anthony Giddens argues controversially, we do not have a systematic politics of climate change.
LSE Literary Weekend - Dreams of Rivers and Seas [Audio]
Speaker(s): Dr. Laura Bear, David Lan; Tim Parks | A reading from Tim Parks' latest novel Dreams of Rivers and Seas followed by a discussion on the anthropological themes explored within it.
LSE Literary Weekend - I Shall Die by Inches: Contemporary Approaches to Death and Dying [Audio]
Speaker(s): Will Self | "All but death" wrote Emily Dickinson "can be adjusted", and yet, the cold fact that bodies must eventually die only serves to hide the reality of death as a contested cultural domain, where competing notions of public and private, tradition and innovation, individual and collective, are played out, and discourses within literature, art, jurisprudence, medicine, religion, and politics all stake their claim to knowledge of the great unknown. This talk will illuminate the
Constitutional Continuity: The Role of Lord Chancellor in a Modern Democracy [Audio]
Speaker(s): Jack Straw | Jack Straw was appointed as lord chancellor and secretary of state for Justice on 28 June 2007. He has previously served as leader of the House of Commons, secretary of state for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, and home secretary. In Opposition he served as shadow home secretary, shadow environment secretary and shadow education secretary.
What should the next G20 meeting do? [Audio]
Speaker(s): Professor Michael Cox, Will Hutton; Professor Danny Quah | The upcoming meeting of the G20 in London in early April 2009 is crucial for the development of policies to stabilise the world economy and reform the international financial architecture. What will the G20 do and what should it do? Will Hutton, Danny Quah, Mick Cox and David Held debate the issues.
