Past Present Future

Today’s episode in our new series about how George Orwell tried – and failed – to make sense of WW2 as it was happening looks at the events of 1940 and 1941, from the collapse of France to Hitler’s invasion of Russia. Why did Orwell write in March 1940 that there is something ‘deeply appealing’ about Hitler? What convinced him that Churchill ‘must go’? How close did Britain get to revolution in the summer of 1940? Where did the revolution go? You can listen to David’s earlier episode about Orwell’s The Lion and the Unicorn from our Great Political Essays series on our website here ⁠⁠https://www.ppfideas.com/episodes/history-of-ideas%3A-george-orwell⁠⁠. Or scroll down in your podcast app to find it, originally broadcast on 3rd August 2023. To hear David’s conversation with Alec Ryrie about The Age of Hitler subscribe to PPF+ to get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening ⁠https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus⁠. We put that one out as a PPF+ bonus on 5th July 2025. Next time in Orwell’s War: Frozen In Time (1942-43) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode is the first in a new series about how the greatest political writer of the 20th century tried – and failed – to make sense of the central political event of the century. How did George Orwell respond in real time to the epochal events of the Second World War and how do his struggles relate to the uncertainties of our own time? What did he get right, what did he get wrong and what did he fail to understand at all? How did a writer who had vigorously opposed the war before it started find himself defending it as soon as it was underway? Who or what did he really want to win? And what did Orwell believe was worse than fascism? Join us this Friday 17th April at the Regent Street Cinema in London for the second film in our new season: a screening of South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut followed by a live podcast recording with David and director and campaigner Beeban Kidron. Tickets available now ⁠https://bit.ly/3O5rSEY⁠ And find details of all our upcoming film events here ⁠https://www.ppfideas.com/events⁠ You can find out everything you need to know about this podcast – who we are, what we do, plus merch, events and full lists of all episodes and PPF+ bonus episodes on our website ⁠https://www.ppfideas.com⁠ Next Time on Orwell’s War: False Dawn (1940-41) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode was recorded in front of a live audience at the Regent Street Cinema in London: David talks to author and journalist James Marriott about Whit Stillman’s Metropolitan, which dissects the lives, loves and reading habits of a group of well-to-do young New Yorkers during deb party season. It is a film about being young and feeling old and fearing that you don’t have a future any more. Is it all over for the UHBs – the urban haute bourgeoisie? Has history left them behind? Or can one more drink, one more after-party and one more conversation about Jane Austen show them the way to a better tomorrow? Join us on Friday 17th April at the Regent Street Cinema in London for the next film in our spring and summer season: a screening of South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut followed by a live podcast recording with David and director and campaigner Beeban Kidron. Tickets available now ⁠https://bit.ly/3O5rSEY⁠ And find details of all our upcoming film events here ⁠https://www.ppfideas.com/events⁠ You can find out everything you need to know about this podcast – who we are, what we do, plus merch, events and full lists of all episodes and PPF+ bonus episodes on our website ⁠https://www.ppfideas.com⁠ Next Time: Orwell’s War Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In the final episode of this series David talks to political historian David Klemperer about how political conversion works today. Is this a post-ideological age or have the ideologies simply changed? Is switching sides easier or harder in the age of social media? Who or what might play the role once performed in political conversions by the Soviet Union? Are we still capable of changing our minds? Join us on Friday 17th April at the Regent Street Cinema in London for the second film in our new season: a screening of South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut followed by a live podcast recording with David and director and campaigner Beeban Kidron. Tickets available now https://bit.ly/3O5rSEY You can find out everything you need to know about this podcast – who we are, what we do, plus merch, events and full lists of all episodes and PPF+ bonus episodes on our website https://www.ppfideas.com Next Time: PPF Live Film Special – Metropolitan w/James Marriott Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In part three of our series about political conversions David talks to historian David Klemperer about the people who left Trotskyism behind – and where they ended up. From 1940s America to contemporary Britain, from the Second World War to the Iraq War, from James Burnham to Claire Fox, stories of one-time revolutionaries who found themselves in a very different place. What links Trotskyism to neoconservatism? And what happens when the renegade outsiders become establishment insiders? Join us on Friday 17th April at the Regent Street Cinema in London for the second film in our new season: a screening of South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut followed by a live podcast recording with David and director and campaigner Beeban Kidron. Tickets available now https://bit.ly/3O5rSEY You can find out everything you need to know about this podcast – who we are, what we do, plus merch, events and full lists of all episodes and PPF+ bonus episodes on our website https://www.ppfideas.com Next Time on Political Conversions: Switching Sides in the 21st Century Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In today’s episode David talks to political historian David Klemperer about a group of writers and other intellectuals who embraced and then renounced Communism before and during the Second World War. Was the pull of Communism really comparable to the experience of religious conversion? Why did so many who took up the faith at the start of the 1930s become disillusioned with it by the end of the decade? How did they justify their renunciation and what did it cost them? Why were writers and intellectuals so vulnerable to changing their minds? You can find out everything you need to know about this podcast – who we are, what we do, plus merch, events and full lists of all episodes and PPF+ bonus episodes on our website https://www.ppfideas.com Next Time on Political Conversions: From Trotskyism to Neoconservatism Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode is the first in a new series of conversations with political historian David Klemperer about what causes people to switch sides, ideologies and worldviews – stories of political conversion. We begin with converts from socialism to fascism, looking in particular at the notorious case of Oswald Mosley. Why did he wind up in and then give up on the Labour Party? What made him ditch democratic politics for fascist violence? How does his political journey compare to other socialists turned fascists in continental Europe? Did he ever repent? Out now on PPF+: a bonus episode in which David explores the myth of the 1945 general election. Why does this event still exert such a grip on the political imagination of Labour politicians? What do they get wrong about how it really happened and what it really meant? To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ now https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus You can find out everything you need to know about this podcast – who we are, what we do, plus merch, events and full lists of all episodes and PPF+ bonus episodes on our website https://www.ppfideas.com Next Time on Political Conversions: Communism – The God That Failed Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In today’s episode, which was recorded in front of students, parents and teachers from three schools in Oxford, David talks to historian of America Adam Smith about whether the US might be drifting into another civil war. Are the circumstances of today in any way comparable to the 1860s? What are the faultlines in 2026 that might see America tear itself apart? If division doesn’t lead to widespread violence, how else might the federal government fail? What would it mean for the rest of us? Out tomorrow on PPF+: a bonus episode in which David explores the myth of the 1945 general election. Why does this event still exert such a grip on the political imagination of Labour politicians? What do they get wrong about how it really happened and what it really meant? To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ now https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus You can find out everything you need to know about this podcast – who we are, what we do, plus merch, events and full lists of all episodes and PPF+ bonus episodes on our website https://www.ppfideas.com Next Time: Political Conversions – Going Fascist Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode was recorded last Wednesday in front of a live audience at Friends’ House in London, where David was joined by the BBC’s Lyse Doucet, historian Chris Clark and diplomat and writer Thant Myint-U to discuss the fate of democracy in the long run and in the short term. What does the current war mean for democracy in Iran, democracy in America and democracy in the wider world? If we are at the end of an era, what is it exactly that is coming to an end? Who gets to decide what might come next? Will it be less democracy, a different democracy or no democracy at all? This event was jointly hosted with the London Review of Books. David’s 2016 article ‘Is This How Democracy Ends?’ is available to read on the LRB website https://bit.ly/416UDUz You can find out everything you need to know about this podcast – who we are, what we do, plus merch, events and full lists of all episodes and PPF+ bonus episodes on our website https://www.ppfideas.com Next Time: Live Special – Another American Civil War? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode looks backwards and forwards from 1946 to explore the different ways the UK has imagined the US over time, as friend and as foe, as inspiration and as warning, as threat and as salvation. David and Robert examine how America has both illuminated and confused Britain’s view of itself for more than two hundred years, from Andrew Jackson to Donald Trump. Is there a common thread? Is there a version to be relied on? Or are we still making it up as we go along? You can find out everything you need to know about this podcast – who we are, what we do, plus merch, events and full lists of all episodes and PPF+ bonus episodes on our website https://www.ppfideas.com Next Time: Live Special – Is This How Democracy Ends? with Lyse Doucet, Chris Clark and Thant Myint-U Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode sees the return of our occasional series with historian Robert Saunders looking at significant political anniversaries: this time it’s the 80th anniversary of Winston Churchill’s ‘Sinews of Peace’ speech given at Fulton, Missouri in March 1946. The speech is best known for introducing the idea of the ‘Iron Curtain’. What was Churchill trying to achieve? Why was his message so controversial in the United States? How did he help inaugurate the Cold War? And where was he right and where was he wrong about the ‘special relationship’? Out now on PPF+: a bonus episode to accompany our recent series with Luke Kemp in which David and Luke talk about how individual experience shapes the way we imagine humanity’s fate and can motivate us to do something about it: the personal and the political. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ now https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Join us next Thursday 19th March at the Regent Street Cinema in London for the first film in our new spring and summer season: Whit Stillman’s Metropolitan, followed by a live podcast recording with author and journalist James Marriott. Tickets for this and all our screenings are available now https://www.ppfideas.com/events You can find out everything you need to know about this podcast – who we are, what we do, plus merch, events and full lists of all episodes and PPF+ bonus episodes on our website https://www.ppfideas.com Next Time: Two Twists and Turns of the Special Relationship Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In the fourth and final conversation in this series David talks to Luke Kemp, author of Goliath’s Curse, about where we might be heading. Where does the greatest risk of global collapse lie? Who is ultimately responsible for our fate? What makes states and corporations the agents of doom? How can we humans fight back? Out tomorrow on PPF+: a bonus episode to accompany this series in which David and Luke talk about how individual experience shapes the way we imagine humanity’s fate and can motivate us to do something about it: the personal and the political. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ now https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Join us this Wednesday 11th March for a joint LRB/PPF event: The Slow Death of Democracy, with Lyse Doucet, Christopher Clark and Thant Myint-U. Lyse Doucet will be discussing what she saw when she was in Iran for the BBC last month and what the war means for the prospects of democracy there and everywhere else. Tickets are available now https://www.tickettailor.com/events/londonreviewofbooks/2062789 You can find out everything you need to know about this podcast – who we are, what we do, plus merch, events and full lists of all episodes and PPF+ bonus episodes on our website https://www.ppfideas.com Luke Kemp’s Goliath’s Curse: The History and Future of Societal Collapse is available now https://bit.ly/4aFczds Next Time: Now & Then with Robert Saunders – Churchill’s ‘Iron Curtain’ speech @80 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In today’s episode David talks to Luke Kemp, author of Goliath’s Curse, about the prospects for societal collapse in the 21st century. Are we living in a global Goliath? Is there any escape in an age when personal data has become the primary lootable resource? Does interconnectedness mean we are more vulnerable to collapse than ever? And what can we learn from the fate of Somalia? Join us on 11th March for a joint LRB/PPF event: The Slow Death of Democracy, with Lyse Doucet, Christopher Clark and Thant Myint-U. Tickets are available now https://www.tickettailor.com/events/londonreviewofbooks/2062789 You can find out everything you need to know about this podcast – who we are, what we do, plus merch, events and full lists of our episodes and PPF+ bonus episodes on our website https://www.ppfideas.com Luke Kemp’s Goliath’s Curse: The History and Future of Societal Collapse is available now https://bit.ly/4aFczds Next Time: Societal Collapse – The Future Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In today’s episode David talks to Luke Kemp, author of Goliath’s Curse, about the strengths and weaknesses of modern states and modern structures of authority. Are modern states any different from the criminal enterprises of coercion that preceded them? Does democracy change the dynamic of societal collapse? What are the lootable resources of the modern age? And why are all states essentially empires? Tickets are on sale now for our new film season at the Regent Street Cinema in London – starting on 19th March with James Marriott talking to David about Whit Stillman’s Metropolitan. Details of all our film events are here https://www.ppfideas.com/events Join us on 11th March for a joint LRB/PPF event: The Slow Death of Democracy, with Lyse Doucet, Christopher Clark and Thant Myint-U. Tickets are available now https://www.tickettailor.com/events/londonreviewofbooks/2062789 You can find out everything you need to know about this podcast – who we are, what we do, plus merch, events and full lists of our episodes and PPF+ bonus episodes on our website https://www.ppfideas.com Luke Kemp’s Goliath’s Curse: The History and Future of Societal Collapse is available now https://bit.ly/4aFczds Next Time: Societal Collapse – The Present Day Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode is the first in a series of conversations about what causes human societies to fall apart and what might come next. David talks to Luke Kemp, author of Goliath’s Curse, about how we build our structures of authority and how they can fail. How were human societies organised before we had governments? What drove the creation of the first hierarchies of domination? Why did rising inequality so often lead to societal collapse? What does this teach us about the vulnerability of our own societies? Out now on PPF+: a bonus episode to accompany our recent exploration of the past, present and future of nuclear warfare in which David discusses John Hersey’s Hiroshima (1946), the definitive account of what it’s actually like to be on the receiving end of a nuclear attack. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Join us on 11th March for a joint LRB/PPF event: The Slow Death of Democracy, with Lyse Doucet, Christopher Clark and Thant Myint-U. Tickets are available now https://www.tickettailor.com/events/londonreviewofbooks/2062789 Tickets are on sale now for our new film season at the Regent Street Cinema in London – starting on 19th March with James Marriott talking to David about Whit Stillman’s Metropolitan. Details of all our film events are here https://www.ppfideas.com/events Sign up now for our free fortnightly newsletter and you'll receive our 50th edition straight to your inbox https://www.ppfideas.com/newsletters You can find out everything you need to know about this podcast – who we are, what we do, plus merch, events and full lists of our episodes and PPF+ bonus episodes on our website https://www.ppfideas.com Luke Kemp’s Goliath’s Curse: The History and Future of Societal Collapse is available now https://bit.ly/4aFczds Next Time: Societal Collapse – The Modern Age  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode is the third and final of David’s conversations with S. M. Amadae about nuclear weapons and nuclear war, this time looking to the future. What are the prospects for nuclear disarmament in the 21st century? How does the risk of nuclear war intersect with other existential risks, from climate change to AI? Is the world more dangerous than it has ever been? What are the grounds for hope we might still get out of this alive? Out tomorrow on PPF+: a bonus episode to accompany this series of conversations in which David explores John Hersey’s Hiroshima (1946), the definitive account of what it’s actually like to be on the receiving end of a nuclear attack. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ now https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Tickets are on sale now for our new film season at the Regent Street Cinema in London – starting on 19th March with James Marriott talking to David about Whit Stillman’s Metropolitan. All the details are here https://www.ppfideas.com/events Join us on 11th March for a joint LRB/PPF event: The Slow Death of Democracy - with Lyse Doucet, Christopher Clark and Thant Myint-U. Tickets are available now https://www.tickettailor.com/events/londonreviewofbooks/2062789 You can find out everything you need to know about this podcast – who we are, what we do, plus merch, events and full lists of our episodes and PPF+ bonus episodes on our website https://www.ppfideas.com Next Time: Where Are We Going? Societal Collapse Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In today’s episode David talks to S. M. Amadae about what happened when the nuclear age turned into an all-consuming arms race. What is the supposed logic and the terrifying illogic behind the idea of Mutually Assured Destruction? What is the difference between M.A.D. and N.U.T.S.? Do we really believe that our leaders would press the button? And how have we managed to survive to this point – rationality, luck or merely a stay of execution? Tickets are on sale now for our new film season at the Regent Street Cinema in London – starting on 19th March with James Marriott talking to David about Whit Stillman’s Metropolitan. All the details are here https://www.ppfideas.com/events Next Time: How Will the Nuclear Age End? You can find out everything you need to know about this podcast – who we are, what we do, plus merch, events and full lists of our episodes and PPF+ bonus episodes on our website https://www.ppfideas.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For the first in a new series of conversations exploring the future that faces us all, David talks to S. M. Amadae about what nuclear weapons and the prospect of nuclear war have done to the human condition. Was 1945 the decisive watershed in the history of humanity? What made the possibility of nuclear conflict different from previous ideas of catastrophe? How did we reconcile ourselves to the horrifying consequences of what we had built? Out now on PPF+: a bonus episode to accompany our recent series What’s Wrong With Political Philosophy? in which David and Paul talk about how personal experience shapes our political and philosophical outlook – a conversation exploring luck, accidents, human frailty and human connection. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ now https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next Time: M.A.D. and N.U.T.S. You can find out everything you need to know about this podcast – who we are, what we do, plus merch, events and full lists of our episodes and PPF+ bonus episodes on our website https://www.ppfideas.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode explores the ideas of two late-twentieth-century thinkers who argued that political philosophy needs to be concerned with more than just justice. David talks to Paul Sagar about why Bernard Williams thought we should focus on questions about legitimacy and why Judith Shklar believed we should spend more time worrying about cruelty. Is the fundamental political question about how to achieve the best or is it about how to avoid the worst? And if it’s the second, where should we start? Out tomorrow on PPF+: a bonus episode to accompany this series in which David and Paul talk about how personal experience shapes our political and philosophical outlook – a conversation exploring luck, accidents, human frailty and human connection. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening for £5 a month or £50 for the year, sign up to PPF+ now https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Paul Sagar’s Substack is called Diary of a Punter – it is highly recommended https://substack.com/@diaryofapunter Next Time: Where Are We Going? Nuclear Weapons You can find out everything you need to know about this podcast – who we are, what we do, plus merch, events and full lists of our episodes and PPF+ bonus episodes on our website https://www.ppfideas.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In the third part of our series David and Paul Sagar explore what the German writer and sociologist Max Weber can teach us about the pitfalls of political life and political philosophy. Why is doing politics so hard? Why is it so hard to know what to do for the best when all the options are bad ones? How can we still do our best when the only means at our disposal is violence? And where does all this leave the prospects for lasting political change? Next Time: Learning from Bernard Williams and Judith Shklar You can find out everything you need to know about this podcast – who we are, what we do, plus merch, events and full lists of our episodes and PPF+ bonus episodes on our website https://www.ppfideas.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In the second episode in our short series about how the history of ideas can help with the deepest puzzles of politics, David talks to political theorist Paul Sagar about the eighteenth-century polymath Adam Smith. Normally thought of as the original champion of free-market economics, Smith was far more interested in history, human psychology and the problems inherent in all political systems. What does it mean to live in a commercial society? How should we understand the promise and pitfalls of equality? Where does human liberty come from? And why has the Adam Smith Institute made a mockery of his name? Next time: Learning from Max Weber You can find out everything you need to know about this podcast – who we are, what we do, plus merch, events and full lists of our episodes and PPF+ bonus episodes on our website https://www.ppfideas.com  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today it’s the first episode in a new series asking why contemporary political philosophy struggles to make sense of the deepest problems of politics and exploring how the history of ideas might help. David talks to political theorist Paul Sagar about why looking for justice might be the wrong place to start. Instead, Paul suggests we start with Aristotle, for whom the search for justice was the problem not the solution. So what should we do instead? To keep up with what’s coming next and for more news about the podcast do follow us on Bluesky: @ppfideas.bsky.social Next time: Learning from Adam Smith Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode is the second part of David’s conversation with Helen Thompson about what makes living in a world dominated by the United States so strange. What has changed about American power in the twenty-first century? Is Trump a deviation from the norm or is he simply an extension of it? Why does Greenland matter? And what is at stake as the contest between the US and China ramps up to the next level? Next Time: What’s Wrong with Political Philosophy?  Incogni Special Offer for PPF listeners: https://incogni.com/pastpresentfuture (then use code PPF for 60% off annual plans) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The first of a two-part conversation in which David talks to Helen Thompson about how to understand the extraordinary and unlikely power of the United States, from its origins to its current incarnation. How strange would it once have seemed to live in a world dominated by a state from the Western hemisphere? When did the US overcome its natural disadvantages to achieve superpower potential? What does the rest of the world get wrong about how American power actually operates? And what might come next? A reminder that the second part of David’s conversation with Glen Rangwala about the trial and execution of Saddam Hussein is available now on PPF+. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ today https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next Time: The Weirdness of American Power Part 2 – Trump and the Future Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For the final episode in this series David talks to historian and political scientist Glen Rangwala about the trial and execution of Saddam Hussein in 2006. What plans did the Americans have for Saddam before the Iraq war began? How was it decided what to charge him with once he had been captured? Did his trial exacerbate rather than overcome the sectarian divisions tearing Iraq apart? Was justice served? Part 2 of this conversation, in which David and Glen discuss the circumstances of Saddam’s execution and the legacy of his fate for the politics of Iraq and the wider world, is available tomorrow on PPF+. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ now https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time: Talking Geopolitics with Helen Thompson – The Weirdness of American Power Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For the penultimate episode in this series David examines the criminal trial of O. J. Simpson in 1995 to ask what it reveals about how power really works in America. How did the prosecution fail to grasp what was really happening in the courtroom? Did jury selection decide the outcome of the case before it had even begun? Why was the massive volume of evidence against Simpson something that worked in his favour? And how does the legacy of the Simpson trial help explain the arrival of Donald Trump in the White House? Next time: The Trial and Execution of Saddam Hussein Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In today’s episode David explores the trial that gripped China at the end of 1980: the case against the three men and one woman accused of being responsible for the worst excesses of the Cultural Revolution (1966-76). How did the court try to hold Mao’s followers responsible for the catastrophe while exculpating Mao himself? How did Mao’s widow Jiang Qing fight back? Who were the others in the dock and what were they doing there? And what made the trial emblematic of the new direction China was taking? Next time in Politics on Trial: O. J. Simpson vs the Evidence  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode is about the epic battle between Muhammad Ali and the US government over its attempt to draft him during the Vietnam war and what happened when that fight reached the US Supreme Court. What were Ali’s grounds for claiming to be a conscientious objector? How did that argument cut across wider questions of race, religion and power? Why did the Supreme Court change its original decision against Ali to find unanimously in his favour? And who won and who lost as a result? Out now on PPF+: Part two of David’s conversation with Robert Saunders about the fight over Irish Home Rule: how close did Britain get to an actual civil war in 1914 before another war intervened? To hear this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ now https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time in Politics on Trial: The Gang of Four Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode in our occasional series with historian Robert Saunders on significant political anniversaries looks at the event that blew British politics apart at the start of 1886. The ‘Hawarden Kite’ – when William Gladstone’s son Herbert floated the idea that his father had committed to Irish Home Rule – split the Liberal party, upended political allegiances and set the country on the path to potential civil war. How did it happen? Why were passions running so high on the question of Ireland? And how does it all compare to Brexit? Out tomorrow on PPF+: Part 2 of David’s conversation with Robert in which they take the story of the fight over Irish Home Rule up to the crisis of 1912-1914. How close did Britain come to an actual civil war? To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ now https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time in Politics on Trial: Muhammad Ali vs. the Draft Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

An extra episode to accompany our Films of Ideas series: David explores The Designated Mourner by Wallace Shawn, the writer and co-star of My Dinner with Andre. How did a play first performed in 1996 turn into a prophetic text for our times? How was it shaped by Shawn’s experiences in Central America and his view of Reagan’s America? What makes it one of the greatest of all contemporary political fictions? Next time – Now & Then with Robert Saunders: Home Rule for Ireland! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today it’s the last in our series of live episodes recorded at the Regent Street Cinema in London: David talks to film director and campaigner Beeban Kidron about Michel Gondry’s Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004), a much-loved film that’s also chock full of interesting ideas. Is memory the same as identity? Are all relationships founded on manipulation? What happens when we try to curate our mental distress? How should we resist the tech panacea of a painless existence? Who gets to choose what we remember and what we forget? Next time: The Designated Mourner Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The fourth episode in our season of live recordings from the Regent Street Cinema is about another film that explores the relationship between biography and philosophy: Derek Jarman’s Wittgenstein (1993), which tells the story of an extraordinary life in a way that is both light and profound. David talks to writer and philosopher Nikhil Krishnan about Ludwig Wittengenstein’s ideas of war, science, truth, freedom, sexuality, language, loyalty and communism and how they are portrayed on screen. Does the life explain the ideas or do the ideas explain the life? Next time: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind w/Beeban Kidron Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode in our season of live recordings from the Regent Street Cinema looks at the biopic of a revolutionary: Margaretha von Trotta’s Rosa Luxemburg (1986), which explores the deeply unstable relationship between the personal and the political. David talks to writer and philosopher Lea Ypi (Free, Indignity) about where biography ends and philosophy begins and whether revolutionary politics requires the leading of a revolutionary life. What was Rosa Luxemburg’s true cause? Who or what betrayed her and her ideas? And how does her legacy live on? Out now on PPF+: a bonus episode to accompany this series in which David and film historian Harrison Whitaker discuss the greatest Christmas film of ideas: Frank Capra’s It’s A Wonderful Life, which is much more than just a seasonal tearjerker. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time: Wittgenstein w/Nikhil Krishnan Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The second episode in our live series from the Regent Street Cinema explores Louis Malle’s My Dinner with Andre (1981), in which two men discuss the meaning of theatre, capitalism, love, science, faith and freedom over a meal. David talks to playwright and screenwriter Lee Hall (Billy Elliot, Rocketman) about how a great film can be made out of a single conversation. Who was the real Andre? How scripted was the dialogue? Who won the argument? And why has this film had such an extraordinary afterlife? Out tomorrow on PPF+: a bonus episode to accompany this series in which David and film historian Harrison Whitaker discuss the greatest Christmas film of ideas: Frank Capra’s It’s A Wonderful Life, which is much more than just a seasonal tearjerker. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ now https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus If you are looking for last minute Christmas presents we have 6- and 12-month gift subscriptions to PPF+ giving access to all our bonus episodes, ad-free listening and automatic sign-up to our fortnightly newsletter – which can be delivered to the recipient of your choice on Christmas Day! ⁠https://ppf.supportingcast.fm/gifts⁠ Next time: Rosa Luxemburg w/Lea Ypi Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today it’s the first in our series of live episodes recorded at the Regent Street Cinema in London: David talks to the crime writers Nicci Gerrard and Sean French (aka Nicci French) about Alfred Hitchcock’s Rope (1948), based on Patrick Hamilton’s play of the same name, itself based on the real-life case of Leopold and Loeb. What is the true subject of this film: murder, sex, morality or something else? Why is James Stewart so hopelessly miscast? And how does all this connect to Nietzsche? If you are still looking for Christmas presents we have 6- and 12-month gift subscriptions to PPF+ giving access to all our bonus episodes, ad-free listening and automatic sign-up to our fortnightly newsletter – which can be delivered to the recipient of your choice on Christmas Day! ⁠https://ppf.supportingcast.fm/gifts⁠ Next time: My Dinner with Andre w/Lee Hall Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode explores the trials of Nelson Mandela, variously charged by South Africa’s apartheid state with treason, incitement, illegal foreign travel, sabotage and conspiracy across a decade that saw him more often in court than out. How did Mandela defend himself? What changed from his first trial to his last? Could any justice be found in a system of blatant oppression? And what happens when the line between lawyer, defendant and prisoner becomes impossibly blurred? The final film in our season at the Regent Street Cinema in London is coming up on Friday 19th December: a screening of David Cronenberg’s A Dangerous Method followed by a live recording of PPF with writer, psychoanalyst and feminist Susie Orbach. Do join us – tickets are still available https://bit.ly/3KHBp3g Next time we start our season of Films of Ideas: Hitchcock’s Rope w/Nicci Gerrard and Sean French Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode is about a momentous trial and the incendiary book that followed: the trial was of Adolf Eichmann, convicted by an Israeli court in 1961 of orchestrating the Holocaust, and the book was Hannah Arendt’s Eichmann in Jerusalem (1963), which questioned the grounds on which he was prosecuted. What did Arendt mean by ‘the banality of evil’? Why was she convinced that the case against Eichmann was badly misjudged? Was the trial really intended to serve as a history lesson? And if it was, what was it designed to teach? Next time in Politics on Trial: Nelson Mandela vs Apartheid Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today we return to our series about epoch-making trials with the case of the book they tried and failed to ban. In 1960 Penguin Books was prosecuted at the Old Bailey under the new Obscene Publications Act (1959) over its plans to produce a cheap, unexpurgated edition of D. H. Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover. How did the prosecution try to persuade the jury that the book was a menace to public morals? Who were the expert witnesses called in its defence? What were the decisive arguments? And why was the judge’s summing-up such a mistake? Out tomorrow on PPF+: David discusses the book at the heart of the case. Was Lady Chatterley’s Lover really all about sex? Or was it all about class? Or was it in fact about something else entirely? To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ now https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus If you are looking for Christmas presents we have 6- and 12-month gift subscriptions to PPF+ giving access to all our bonus episodes, ad-free listening and automatic sign-up to our fortnightly newsletter – which can be delivered to the recipient of your choice on Christmas Day! https://ppf.supportingcast.fm/gifts Plus we have gorgeous PPF canvas tote bags and bone china PPF mugs, all available now https://www.ppfideas.com/merch Next time in Politics on Trial: Eichmann in Jerusalem Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

David talks to novelist Ian McEwan, who was our first ever guest on PPF, about how the future will view our present once the disasters we are brewing come to pass. How might humanity scrape through the rest of the century? Will future generations see us as intellectually vibrant or essentially trivial? If we turn out to be unknowable to those who follow us, does that mean we are unknowable to ourselves? A wide-ranging conversation about how past, present and future co-exist in time. Ian McEwan’s latest novel is What We Can Know https://bit.ly/4ogYN5u If you are looking for Christmas presents we have 6- and 12-month gift subscriptions to PPF+ giving access to all our bonus episodes, ad-free listening and automatic sign-up to our fortnightly newsletter – which can be delivered to the recipient of your choice on Christmas Day! https://ppf.supportingcast.fm/gifts Plus we have gorgeous PPF canvas tote bags and bone china PPF mugs, all available now https://www.ppfideas.com/merch Next time in Politics on Trial: Lady Chatterley’s Lover  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode is the second part of David’s conversation with historian Robert Saunders about the life and legacy of Margaret Thatcher. What is the meaning of Thatcherism in the twenty-first century? Why is she still such a polarising figure? Was she a distinctively British political phenomenon? Which politicians can plausibly claim to be channelling her example today? If you are looking for Christmas presents, how about a gift subscription to PPF+? You can choose between 6- and 12-months subscriptions – giving access to our entire archive of bonus episodes, plus two new bonuses every month, ad-free listening and automatic sign-up to our fortnightly newsletter – to be delivered to the recipient of your choice on Christmas Day. All the details you need are here https://ppf.supportingcast.fm/gifts Next Time: Novelist Ian McEwan on imagining the present as a future past   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode in our occasional series about momentous political anniversaries with historian Robert Saunders looks at the life and legacy of Margaret Thatcher one hundred years on from her birth. What made Thatcher such a distinctive politician? What did she believe in before she became prime minister? How did her time is power alter her political outlook? And did she succumb to her own myth in the end? Out now on PPF+: Part 2 of David’s conversation with Henry Gee about the rise and fall of Homo sapiens – how near are we to the end? To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus We would love to hear from anyone who uses this podcast in an educational setting –  teachers, lecturers or students – to help us understand what other educational resources we can add and what would be helpful. Do get in touch with your comments, ideas and suggestions https://www.ppfideas.com/contact  Next time: Thatcher@100 – Her Legacy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode explores some very big picture history: David talks to palaeontologist and science writer Henry Gee about the story of the human species from origin to peak to inevitable decline. When and how did Homo sapiens see off the competition from its rivals in the human and animal world? Why did that point mark the start of an inexorable drift towards extinction? In what ways are our strengths as a species also our fatal weaknesses? And how near are we to the end? Part two of this conversation, which takes the story of human species from the hunter-gatherer period to the present and beyond to explore how long we have left, is available tomorrow on PPF+. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ now https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Henry Gee’s The Decline and Fall of the Human Empire is available wherever you get your books https://bit.ly/4pshODe Read more by David about depopulation and human extinction in the current issue of the London Review of Books https://bit.ly/43FEwiO There are still a few tickets remaining for the next film in our autumn 'Films of Ideas' season at the Regent Street Cinema in London: join us on Friday 28th November for a screening of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind followed by a live recording of PPF with special guest Beeban Kidron https://bit.ly/4a78KyZ Next time – Now & Then with Robert Saunders: Thatcher @100 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Part two of David’s conversation with historian Chris Clark asks whether the best historical insights into Trump-like leadership come from comparison with kings or commoners, democrats or dictators. Does Trump’s leadership style share much if anything with an epoch-making politician like Bismarck? Should Trump’s public persona be understood as standing outside the norm of presidential politics or as quintessentially American? And what can we learn from a close reading of his magnum opus, The Art of the Deal? Next time: The Rise and Fall of Homo sapiens Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode is the first of a two-part conversation with historian Chris Clark exploring how German history might help us understand Trump-like leadership, but not through looking at the Nazi period. Instead, David and Chris explore the character and leadership style of Kaiser Wilhelm II, a monarch with many Trumpian qualities. Was Wilhelm a populist or an elitist? Did he know what he was doing and what he was saying? Or was he out of his depth? Plus, how did his maverick and mercurial behaviour impact on those around him trying to run the country - and how did it help lead his country to ruin? Next time on Trump-like leadership in German History: Chancellor, Tyrant, Emperor? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode is the second part of David’s conversation with historian Julian Jackson about the case of Marshal Pétain and the crimes of the Vichy regime. Did Pétain really play a ‘double game’ in which he tried to deceive the Nazis? How then to explain the vicious antisemitism of the Vichy regime? Why did the fate of France’s Jews not get more attention at Pétain’s trial? And how does the case of Pétain and the question of Vichy still resonate in French politics today?  Julian Jackson’s France on Trial: The Case of Marshal Pétain is available wherever you get your books https://bit.ly/4oTHcRP Next Time: Chris Clark on Trump-like leaders from German history (and it’s not the one you think!) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode is the first of two on the extraordinary treason trial of Marshal Pétain in the summer of 1945 that ended up putting wartime France in the dock. David talks to historian of modern France Julian Jackson about how Pétain found himself so quickly charged with treason and who was judging him. What was the essence of Pétain’s crime? Conspiracy? Surrender? Collaboration? Complicity in genocide? And what on earth was his defence? Julian Jackson’s France on Trial: The Case of Marshal Pétain is available wherever you get your books https://bit.ly/4oTHcRP Available now on PPF+: our second episode on the Moscow Show Trials in which David and Edward Acton discuss the 1938 trial of Nikolai Bukharin, the most celebrated defendant of them all, whose case inspired some of the world’s great political literature.  To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ today https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time in Politics on Trial: The Case of Marshal Pétain Part 2 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode is the first of two exploring the origins, conduct and legacy of the Moscow Show Trials that Stalin staged from 1936-38. David talks to historian of Russia Edward Acton about what motivated these grotesque spectacles, how the defendants were chosen, how their confessions were extracted, why the rhetoric was so violent and who was fooled by what they saw and heard. Plus: how did the trials of these few lead to the murders of so many? Available tomorrow on PPF+: our second episode on the Moscow Show Trials in which David and Edward discuss the 1938 trial of Nikolai Bukharin, the most celebrated defendant of them all, whose case inspired some of the world’s great political literature.  To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ today https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time in Politics on Trial: De Gaulle vs Pétain Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We return to our series about the most significant trials in history with the trial of the twentieth century: Scopes ‘Monkey’ (1925), which was meant to be about a Tennessee schoolteacher but became a battle between science and religion and everything in between. What made it such a blockbuster showdown? Who really won and who really lost? And how are arguments from one hundred years ago still roiling American politics today?  To get our free fortnightly newsletter delivered to your inbox with guides, clips and much more to accompany all our episodes sign up now https://www.ppfideas.com/newsletters Next time in Politics on Trial: the Moscow Show Trials Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode was recorded in front of a live audience at the Cheltenham Literature Festival: David talks to Bruno Maçães and Sarah Wynn-Williams about who is winning in the fight for control between China and America, between state power and corporate power and between AI and humanity. Where are the battlegrounds in the fight for the future? What are the weapons? And how will we know what victory looks like? Out now on PPF+: A bonus episode with more of your questions and suggestions for how to fix democracy and more answers from the two Davids. Should MPs be chosen by lottery? What has happened to the centre-right? Which needs fixing first: democracy or capitalism? To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ today https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus The 4th film in our autumn Films of Ideas season at the Regent Street Cinema in London is coming up on Weds 5th November: a screening of Derek Jarman’s Wittgenstein followed by a live recording of PPF with writer and philosopher Nikhil Krishnan. Get your tickets now https://bit.ly/47bsJcN Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In today’s episode the two Davids try to answer some of the hundreds of questions, comments and suggestions we have had in response to this series, ranging from the very broad to the very specific. How do we know if democracy is broken? Have we ever had a real democracy anyway? Should old people be banned from voting? Or should we simply ban the internet instead? Plus much, much more. Out tomorrow on PPF+: A bonus episode with more questions on how to fix democracy and more answers from the two Davids. Should MPs be chosen by lottery? What has happened to the centre-right? Which needs fixing first: democracy or capitalism? To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ today https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time: PPF Live Special recorded at the Cheltenham Literature Festival – Who Rules the World? w/ Sarah Wynn-Williams and Bruno Maçães Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For the final episode in this series David talks to historian Ayse Zarakol about the prospects for democracy in the age of strongman politics, from Trump to Erdogan, from Orban to Modi. Where did the strongmen come from? How unusual is this kind of politics in the broad sweep of history? Does democracy have the wherewithal to resist its pull? And if not, what happens next? The 4th film in our autumn season at the Regent Street Cinema in London is coming up on Wednesday 5th November: a screening of Derek Jarman’s Wittgenstein followed by a live recording of PPF with writer and philosopher Nikhil Krishnan. Get your tickets now https://bit.ly/47bsJcN Up next: Fixing Democracy Q & A w/David Klemperer Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In our penultimate episode in this series David talks to writer Sam Freedman about whether democracy can cope with the demands of the social media age. Are we really more vulnerable to disinformation than we have ever been? Is the bigger problem our ever-shrinking attention spans or our ever-divided politics? What happens to democracy as visual communication squeezes out the written word? And what might make things better? Sam Freedman’s Substack is Comment is Freed https://samf.substack.com/ Next time on Fixing Democracy: Confronting the Strongmen Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In this special live episode recorded in front of pupils from Hill House and Hayfield schools in Doncaster, David talks to political scientist Rob Ford about whether Nigel Farage is really going to be the UK’s next PM. Is there anything comparable to the prospect of a Farage premiership in British political history? What are the electoral routes that might lead Farage to No 10? What are the events or scandals that might derail him? Plus we hear from the pupils as well – what do they think of Reform and its leader? Next time on Fixing Democracy: What is TikTok doing to Politics? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

David talks to political theorist Alan Finlayson about what’s gone wrong with political speech and how it can be improved. Why do so many contemporary political arguments feel so sterile? What can we learn from the ancient art of rhetoric about how to do democratic politics better? Does the problem lie with the politicians or with the tools of communication at their disposal? And is good political speech something that all citizens should aspire to? Out now on PPF+: A bonus episode on Fixing Democracy with Nic Cheeseman exploring whether there should be quotas for female representation in democratic politics. It’s much more common than you might think. Why? Why only women? Who else deserves seeing more people like them in parliament? To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ today https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Fixing Democracy Q&A coming up! Do send in your questions and suggestions on Fixing Democracy now: ⁠⁠https://www.ppfideas.com/contact⁠⁠ Next time: PPF Live Special: Prime Minister Farage? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In today’s episode David talks to political historian David Klemperer about whether voting should be required by law and what might change if non-participation was no longer an option. Why have some countries made voting compulsory? What difference has it made? Can the people who think democracy has got nothing to offer them be made to think otherwise? Can the politicians who normally ignore the wishes of those people be forced to pay more attention? Available on Saturday on PPF+: A bonus episode on Fixing Democracy with Nic Cheeseman exploring whether there should be quotas for female representation in democratic politics. It’s much more common than you might think. Why? Why only women? Who else deserves to see more people like them in parliament? To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ today ⁠https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus⁠ And send in your questions and suggestions on Fixing Democracy for David and David now: ⁠https://www.ppfideas.com/contact⁠ Tickets are available now for our live PPF recording at the Cheltenham Literature Festival on 15th October with Bruno Maçães and very special guest Sarah Wynn-Williams - 'Who Rules The World? Trump, Tech and the Fight for the Future'. Tickets are available now: https://www.cheltenhamfestivals.org/events/who-rules-the-world-trump-tech-and-the-fight-for-the-future Next Up in Fixing Democracy: Better Rhetoric Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In today’s episode David talks to Alan Renwick from UCL’s Constitution Unit about the pros and cons of referendums. When does a democratic question need to be put direct to the people? Do some countries do it better than others? How can referendums be used to open up political debate? And how can we avoid a rerun of the pitfalls of the Brexit referendum? There are just a few tickets left for the 3rd film in our autumn film season at the Regent Street cinema on Thursday 9th October: a screening of Rosa Luxemburg, followed by a live recording of PPF with philosopher and writer Lea Ypi. We’d love to see you there https://bit.ly/4nDuKoY Next Up in Fixing Democracy: Compulsory Voting Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The second part of David’s conversation with Robert Saunders marking the 40th anniversary of Neil Kinnock’s party conference speech attacking the Militant tendency takes the story up to the present and beyond. Was Jeremy Corbyn’s victory in the Labour leadership contest of 2015 the revenge of the ‘Loony Left’? What’s the difference between Momentum and Militant? Which parts of the Labour Party pose the biggest threat to Keir Starmer today? And what lessons might events in Liverpool forty years ago have to teach the Democratic Party in 2025? Next time in Fixing Democracy: What’s Wrong with Referendums? Find out everything you need to know about PPF on our website https://www.ppfideas.com/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode in our occasional series with Robert Saunders to mark momentous events in British political history explores the lasting consequences of a speech delivered 40 years ago this week. Labour leader Neil Kinnock’s attack on Militant at his party’s annual conference in 1985 brought a long-running conflict out into the open. Who were Militant? Why did the speech have such an explosive impact? What did it mean for the past, present and future of the Labour Party? Next time: From Kinnock to Corbyn to Starmer Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In today’s episode on how to fix democracy David talks to political scientist Nic Cheeseman about how to stop governments rigging elections around the world, from Africa to the United States. How widespread is the problem? Has digital technology made it worse? What makes an election free and fair? And what are the chances that the next US presidential election will be a free and fair one? Tickets are available for the 3rd film in our PPF Films of Ideas season at the Regent Street Cinema in London on Thursday 9th October: join us for a screening of the biopic Rosa Luxemburg followed by a live recording of the podcast with Lea Ypi https://bit.ly/4mNzNCT Next Time: Now & Then with Robert Saunders on Neil Kinnock, Labour and Militant Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

David talks to Claudia Chwalisz, founder and CEO of Democracy Next, about how citizens’ assemblies could help fix what’s wrong with democracy. Where does the idea of a jury of citizens chosen at random to answer political questions come from? What are the kinds of contemporary questions it could help to settle? How does it work? And what would encourage politicians to listen to citizens’ assemblies rather than to their electorates? Out now on PPF+: The second half of David’s conversation with Hannah White in which they discuss how we could get better decision-making at the heart of government. Why do politicians find it so hard to address the biggest challenges that they face? To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ today https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus The 2nd film in our autumn Films of Ideas season at the Regent Street cinema is coming up on Thursday 25th September: a screening of My Dinner with Andre, followed by a live recording of PPF with playwright and screenwriter Lee Hall, creator of Billy Elliot. Tickets are available now https://bit.ly/4fWDa7V Tickets are also now available for a special recording of PPF Live at the Cheltenham Literature Festival on Wednesday 15th October: Who Rules The World? Trump, Tech and the Fight for the Future. David will be talking to writer, philosopher and ex-politician Bruno Maçães – plus a special guest to be announced – about where the power really lies. Get your tickets now https://bit.ly/4m2pZno Next Up in Fixing Democracy: How To Stop Election Rigging Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In today’s episode David talks to Hannah White, Director of the Institute for Government, about legislatures in general and the British parliament in particular. Are law-making bodies really being sidelined by strongarm executives? What would enable parliaments to work better? How can they better fulfil their role of scrutinising what government does? And why oh why oh why has it taken forever to reform the House of Lords? Available from Saturday on PPF+: The second half of David’s conversation with Hannah White in which they discuss how we could get better decision-making at the heart of government. Why do politicians find it so hard to address the biggest challenges that they face? To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up now to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus The 2nd film in our autumn film season at the Regent Street cinema is coming up on Thursday 25thSeptember: a screening of My Dinner with Andre, followed by a live recording of PPF with playwright and screenwriter Lee Hall, creator of Billy Elliot. Tickets are available now https://bit.ly/4fWDa7V Next Up in Fixing Democracy: Citizens’ Assemblies Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For the first episode in a new series about the ideas that could help democracy work better David talks to David Klemperer of the Constitution Society about proportional representation. How did nineteenth-century advocates of PR think it could improve democratic representation? Why did PR get adopted in some places but not in others during the twentieth century? What are the advantages of proportional systems? And when will we get serious electoral reform in the UK? The 2nd film in our autumn season of Films of Ideas at the Regent Street cinema is coming up on Thursday 25th September: a screening of My Dinner with Andre, followed by a live recording of PPF with playwright and screenwriter Lee Hall, creator of Billy Elliot. Tickets are available now ⁠https://bit.ly/4fWDa7V⁠ Next Up in Fixing Democracy: Parliamentary Reform Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

David talks to Lea Ypi about her new book Indignity: A Life Reimagined, which tells the story of her grandmother’s extraordinary life and in doing so uncovers the hidden history of mid-twentieth-century Europe. But it is also a book about the different philosophies of dignity and how those ideas can shape, make and break individual human lives. A conversation about death and displacement, identity and betrayal, secrecy and salvation.  Indignity: A Life Reimagined by Lea Ypi is out now – get it wherever you get your books. ⁠https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/458930/indignity-by-ypi-lea/9780241661925⁠ The 2nd film in our autumn season of Films of Ideas at the Regent Street cinema is coming up on Thursday 25th September: a screening of My Dinner with Andre, followed by a live recording of PPF with playwright and screenwriter Lee Hall, creator of Billy Elliot. Tickets are available now ⁠https://bit.ly/4fWDa7V⁠ Next up, the start of a new series: Fixing Democracy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode is the first in a three-part conversation with philosopher and writer Lea Ypi about the idea of dignity and its role in the history of ideas and in the story of our lives. What is the difference between dignity and dignitas? How does our conception of dignity shape the ways that we think about death? And why is Kant so important for showing what the idea of dignity is capable of? Out tomorrow on PPF+: Part 2 of this conversation, in which David and Lea explore the role of dignity in human rights and in identity politics and ask how much it matters that our politics has become so undignified. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up now to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Lea Ypi’s new book is Indignity: A Life Reimagined – get it wherever you get your books. ⁠https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/458930/indignity-by-ypi-lea/9780241661925⁠ Tickets are available now for a special recording of PPF Live at the Cheltenham Literature Festival on Wednesday 15th October: Who Rules The World? Trump, Tech and the Fight for the Future. David will be talking to writer, philosopher and ex-politician Bruno Macaes plus a special guest to be announced about where the power really lies. Get your tickets now ⁠https://www.cheltenhamfestivals.org/events/who-rules-the-world-trump-tech-and-the-fight-for-the-future⁠ Next time: Lea Ypi talks about her remarkable new book Indignity: A Life Reimagined Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In today’s episode some more highlights from the PPF+ archive of 35 bonus episodes and counting: here are a few more excerpts we think you might enjoy. In this episode you’ll hear David talking about In the Loop and the question of why politicians do and don’t resign; Robert Saunders on the legacy of Brexit for politics in 2025; Shannon Vallor on why AI is a vision not of the future but of the past; David on the appeal of High Noon for American presidents; and Alec Ryrie on the relationship between Calvinism, Puritanism and the rise and fall of apartheid South Africa. To get all these episodes along with the whole of our PPF+ archive, two new bonus episodes every month, plus ad-free listening and automatic sign up for our fortnightly newsletter, join PPF+ now. It’s £5 per month or £50 per year – and every subscription really helps support this podcast https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus If you would like to gift a PPF+ subscription to someone you know who is starting college or university or a new school or who you think might be interested in what we do for whatever reason, it’s easy: sign them up here https://ppf.supportingcast.fm/gifts Next time in Politics on Trial: Hitler vs Weimar Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s epic political trial is the one that should have been the end of Adolf Hitler but ended up being the making of him: his treason trial in 1924 for the so-called Beer Hall Putsch. How close did Hitler’s attempted coup come to succeeding? Why was he allowed to turn the court that tried him into a platform for his poisonous politics? What were the missed opportunities to silence him once and for all? Out now on PPF+: Part 2 of David’s conversation with Fintan O’Toole about the Easter Rising trials of 1916 – here they explore the treason trial of Sir Roger Casement and the question of what makes a traitor. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up now to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Tickets are still available for the first screening in our autumn Films of Ideas season at the Regent Street Cinema in London on 5th September: Alfred Hitchcock’s Rope followed by a live recording of PPF with special guests Nicci Gerrard and Sean French, aka the best-selling husband-and-wife crime-writing due Nicci French. Get your tickets here https://bit.ly/4fOp2xx Next Up: Lea Ypi on Dignity Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today it’s the first of two episodes with journalist and historian Fintan O’Toole about the trials that followed the 1916 Easter Rising in Ireland. What did the leaders of the rising hope to achieve, with or without German help? How and why did the British get it so wrong by court martialling the supposed ring leaders in secret? Were those trials anything more than kangaroo courts? And why are fourteen martyrs more potent than thousands of victims? Available from Saturday on PPF+: Part 2 of David’s conversation with Fintan O’Toole, where they explore the treason trial of Sir Roger Casement and the question of what makes a traitor. Plus, what part was played by George Bernard Shaw? To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up now to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Tickets are still available for the first screening in our autumn film season at the Regent Street Cinema in London on 5th September: Alfred Hitchcock’s Rope followed by a live recording of PPF with special guests Nicci Gerrard and Sean French, aka the best-selling husband-and-wife crime-writing duo Nicci French. Get your tickets here https://bit.ly/4fOp2xx Next Up: Hitler vs Weimar Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode is something a little bit different – it is nearly 18 months since we started PPF+ and there are now 34 bonus episodes waiting for you as soon as you sign up. It costs £5 per month or £50 per year and you will get two new bonus episodes every month along with ad-free listening, automatic sign-up to our newsletter and access to the whole archive. It’s easy and we would really value your support https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus In this episode you’ll hear some PPF+ highlights: David talking to Helen Thompson about Apocalypse Now, David exploring Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, unpicking the relationship between The Futurist Manifesto and fascism, reflecting on Claude Lanzmann’s epic Holocaust documentary Shoah and in conversation with historian Chris Clark about 1848 and the future of liberal politics. All these episodes and many more are available as soon as you sign up. If you would like to gift a 6-month or 12-month PPF+ subscription to someone you know who is starting college or university or a new school or who you think might be interested in what we do for whatever reason, it’s also easy: sign them up here https://ppf.supportingcast.fm/gifts Next time in Politics on Trial: Fintan O’Toole on The Trials of the Easter Rising 1916. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode in Politics on Trial is about the most famous trial in literature and one that never actually takes place. David talks to writer and literary scholar Ian Ellison about Franz Kafka’s The Trial, first published in 1925. What is the meaning of a book about a legal process that never happens? How was it inspired by Kafka’s failed love life? Why has it given rise to so many different understandings of what makes our world Kafkaesque? And how did a work of fiction that is full of weird and wonderful ideas get associated with mindless bureaucracy? If you’d like to get tickets for the first screening in our autumn film season at the Regent Street Cinema in London on 5th September – Alfred Hitchcock’s Rope, followed by a live recording of PPF with the crime writers Nicci Gerard and Sean French – they are available now https://www.ppfideas.com/events Coming Next: a PPF+ Highlights Special Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today in Politics on Trial David tells the tale of the Dreyfus Affair that split France down the middle at the turn of the last century and revealed the grip of a whole host of conspiracy theories. Across a series of courts martial, libel trials, treason trials and parliamentary commissions, the story of a letter found in a wastebin turned into a saga about who really controlled the country. Was it the Jews? The Jesuits? The Freemasons? The army? The Germans? Or nobody at all? Why did Alfred Dreyfus find himself at the centre of it all? And what does all this madness tell us about the paranoid state of American politics today? Tickets are available now for our autumn film season at the Regent Street Cinema in London, starting on 5th September with a screening of Alfred Hitchcock’s Rope followed by a live recording of PPF with special guests Nicci Gerrard and Sean French, aka the best-selling husband-and-wife crime-writing duo Nicci French. For tickets and details on all the films https://www.ppfideas.com/events Next Time in Politics on Trial: Anniversary Special: Kafka’s The Trial at 100 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode in Politics on Trial is about three trials that took place over two months in the late spring of 1895 that brought about the destruction of Oscar Wilde. Why did Wilde trigger his own doom by suing his nemesis Lord Queensbury for libel? What did he fail to understand about how he would come across in a courtroom? And how did the persecution of Wilde and his gay lifestyle reveal the hidden terrors of late Victorian England and its high society, up to and including the prime minister? Out now on PPF+: Part 2 of David’s latest conversation with Robert Saunders in which they talk about the past, present and future of the politics of unemployment. Can Labour ever again be the party of labour? Whose work is it anyway? To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up now to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Tickets are now available for our autumn film season at the Regent Street Cinema in London, starting on 5th September with a screening of Alfred Hitchcock’s Rope followed by a live recording of PPF with special guests Nicci Gerrard and Sean French, aka the best-selling husband-and-wife crime-writing duo Nicci French. For tickets and details on all the films https://www.ppfideas.com/events Next time in Politics on Trial: Dreyfus vs the Conspiracy Theory Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode is the first in a new strand with the historian Robert Saunders looking at significant political anniversaries and their meaning for today. Summer 2025 is 70 years since the UK recorded its lowest ever unemployment rate in peacetime: just 1% (or 215,800 people) in July 1955. David and Robert explore the history of unemployment: how it’s been measured, what it means, why it matters and when it changes the course of political history. From Victorian trade unionism to the Thatcher revolution: who gets to decide on the value of work? Out now on PPF+: Part 2 of this conversation taking the story from the 1980s to the present, via New Labour, the financial crisis of 2008 and Covid. How has the meaning of work changed over that period? How has it got mixed up with the politics of immigration? And is the Labour Party still the party of labour? To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up now to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time in Politics on Trial: Oscar Wilde vs the Philistines Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For today’s episode in Politics on Trial it’s two trials for the price of one, which between them changed the course of British and Irish history. In 1889 the leading Irish politician Charles Parnell was cleared of any involvement in the notorious Phoenix Park murders by Irish republican terrorists seven years earlier. In 1890 Parnell was found to be the adulterer in a divorce case involving his mistress and her husband. That scandal destroyed him, permanently split the campaign for Irish self-government and upended Liberal politics in Britain. How did Parnell come to have such a hold on British and Irish politics? Why could he survive accusations of terrorism but not of adultery? And what does his fate reveal about the high-wire politics of a highly decorous and extremely dangerous age? For all the information about our autumn season of screenings and live recordings, 'Films of Ideas', and to book tickets, go to our website: https://www.ppfideas.com/events Next Time: Now and Then w/Robert Saunders: Whatever Happened to Full Employment? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s political trial is one of the most notorious in American history: eight men charged with and convicted of murder in 1886 for a terrorist outrage that none of them committed. A bomb had been thrown at the police during a workers’ rally in Chicago but this trial was not about punishing the person who threw it. Rather it was a witch hunt of the men and the movement that were thought to have inspired it. Anarchism was put on trial and condemned in the Haymarket case. Who promoted and who resisted the invasion of paranoia and conspiracy theories into an American courtroom? And was it anarchists or was it the forces of law and order that were ultimately responsible for Chicago’s descent into violence and retribution? For all the information about our autumn season of screenings and live recordings, 'Films of Ideas', and to book tickets, go to our website: https://www.ppfideas.com/events Next time in Politics on Trial: Charles Parnell vs the English Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s great political trial concerns the prosecution and execution of John Brown in 1859 for his raid on Harper’s Ferry in the attempt to free America’s slaves, an event that helped precipitate the American Civil War. It was also a trial that produced three of the greatest speeches in American history: by Brown himself, by Henry Thoreau and by Frederick Douglass, which between them constitute an indictment of slavery for the ages. How did one man’s unilateral declaration of war convulse an entire nation? And how did his trial confirm what was becoming increasingly clear: that a house divided against itself cannot stand? For all the information about our autumn season of screenings and live recordings, 'Films of Ideas', and to book tickets, go to our website: https://www.ppfideas.com/events Next time in Politics on Trial: The Haymarket Eight vs the Police Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For today’s epic political trial, David talks to American historian and PPF regular Gary Gerstle about the treason trial of Aaron Burr in 1807. Why was Burr not put on trial for killing Alexander Hamilton in a duel? Was Burr really planning to invade Mexico or was it a set-up? Why was President Thomas Jefferson so determined to bring Burr down? Why was Supreme Court Chief Justice Thomas Marshall so determined to prevent that from happening? And why did being acquitted of treason still end Burr’s career once and for all? For all the information about our autumn season of screenings and live recordings, 'Films of Ideas', and to book tickets, go to our website: https://www.ppfideas.com/events Next time in Politics on Trial: John Brown vs Slavery Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s epoch-making political trial concerns the interrogation, conviction and execution of Louis XVI at the heart of the French Revolution in 1792-3. For many at the time and since this event had powerful echoes of the trial and execution of Charles I - but in fact the trial of Louis was very different in almost every way. Why and how did Louis choose to defend himself? Was he condemned because he was a king or because he was no longer a king? Was the decision to send him to the guillotine really only decided by one vote out of more than seven hundred? And who won in the court of history? Out now on PPF+: Part 2 of David’s conversation with Alexander Douglas about the pitfalls of the search for identity, from Silicon Valley to ‘impostor syndrome’. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up now to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus For all the information about our autumn season of screenings and live recordings, 'Films of Ideas', and to book tickets, go to our website: https://www.ppfideas.com/events Next time in Politics on Trial: Aaron Burr vs the Constitution w/Gary Gerstle Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

To start our new instalment of episodes about the most consequential political trials in history David explores the trial of the eighteenth century: the impeachment of Warren Hastings that ran in the British parliament from 1788-95. Hastings had been Governor-General of Bengal, controlling much of India for Britain and for the East India Company and making himself and many others rich in the process. So why did his former allies turn on him? Why did his trial last for seven years? Why did it end up as a festival of hypocrisy and madness? And why would its closest twenty-first century parallel be the impeachment of Elon Musk? Out now on PPF+: Part 2 of David’s conversation with Alexander Douglas in which they talk about how Silicon Valley took a philosophical concept of identity and turned it into a commodity to be marketed. Plus, how should we think about ‘impostor syndrome’? To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up now to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus For all the information about our autumn season of screenings and live recordings, 'Films of Ideas', and to book tickets, go to our website: https://www.ppfideas.com/events Next time in Politics on Trial: Louis XVI vs the People Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For the final episode in our current series on the history of bad ideas, David talks to philosopher Alexander Douglas about the damage that can be done by the idea of identity. Why is the search for a distinctive personal identity such a futile quest? How does it lead to an identity politics of exclusion and violence? What can we learn from the philosopher Spinoza about having an identity without identity? And what can we glean from the experience of dementia about losing ourselves? 'Against Identity: The Wisdom of Escaping the Self' by Alexander Douglas is out now wherever you get your books https://bit.ly/40d8xES Available from Saturday on PPF+: Part 2 of David’s conversation with Alexander Douglas in which they talk about how Silicon Valley took a philosophical concept of identity and turned it into a commodity to be marketed. Plus, how should we think about ‘impostor syndrome’? To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up now to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time we return to Politics on Trial with an 18th-century blockbuster: Warren Hastings vs the British Empire Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In today’s episode of the history of bad ideas, David talks to political philosopher Alan Finlayson about behaviourism, a theory of psychology that has penetrated to the heart of politics. How did we get from Pavlov’s Dog to a prescription for a better society? What is the relationship between behavioural utopianism and contemporary economics? How did behaviourism get turned into something called ‘Nudge’? And if we are being nudged into better behaviour, what is left for politics? Next time on The History of Bad Ideas: Identity Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s bad idea is one with a short history but a big reach: the term polycrisis only came into being at the end of the last century but now it seems to be everywhere. David talks to historian Gary Gerstle about how this idea was originally conceived, what its current vogue says about the times in which we live and whether this really is a polycrisis or something else. Why is it comforting to think that the crises through which we are living are all connected in some way? Why is it also dangerous to think like that? And what does it say about our sense of powerlessness that we haven’t got a better way of describing the problems of our world? Next time on The History of Bad Ideas: Behaviourism Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For today’s episode in the history of bad ideas David talks to philosopher Shannon Vallor about the myth that technology can be value free. It’s easy to see why Silicon Valley is so keen on the idea that it’s never the fault of the tech, only of the people who use it. But why do we let them get away with it? Where did this idea come from? How has it also poisoned arguments about gun laws and nuclear weapons? And what can we do to fight it and try to get technology that works with – not against – basic human values? Out now on PPF+: A bonus episode with historian of religion Alec Ryrie exploring ‘The Age of Hitler’. When did not being like Hitler rather than trying to be like Jesus become the benchmark of moral conduct? And why is that period coming to an end? To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up now to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time on The History of Bad Ideas: Polycrisis Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For today’s episode in the history of bad ideas David talks to economic historian Marc Palen about monopoly, an idea that has always had its defenders as well as its fierce critics. Why do monopolies arise even in supposedly competitive economies? How did the anti-monopoly movement of Henry George in the late-19th century argue that the monopolists could be taken down? How are those struggles echoed in the fight against Silicon Valley monopolists today? And what has all this got to do with Monopoly the board game? Coming on Saturday on PPF+: A bonus episode with historian of religion Alec Ryrie exploring ‘The Age of Hitler’. Why did not being like Hitler rather than trying to be like Jesus become the benchmark of moral conduct? And why is that period now coming to an end? To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up now to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time on The History of Bad Ideas: Value-free Tech Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s bad idea is one that started out as satire and ended as a political slogan. David talks to historian of ideas Ben Jackson about meritocracy and its origins in Michael Young’s book The Rise of the Meritocracy published in 1958. Young foresaw a populist revolt against the meritocratic elite in the year 2034. Was his vision prophetic? Why did politicians like Tony Blair embrace a concept that Young thought was antithetical to a fair and just society? And who are the winners and losers from meritocracy today? Next time on The History of Bad Ideas: Monopoly Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For today’s episode in the history of bad ideas David talks to cultural historian Tom Wright about charisma, a term that often feels essential for understanding modern politics but which ends up obscuring far more than it explains. How did an old idea from Christian theology get used to explain the hold that political leaders have over crowds? Why is it so important not to confuse charm with charisma? What has made a word from early twentieth-century social science ubiquitous on twenty-first-century dating sites? And if Trump hasn’t got charisma, then what has he got? Out now on PPF+: A bonus bad ideas episode in which David and Dan Snow talk about all sorts of ‘decisive battles’ that weren’t what they seem: Yarmuk, Hastings, Agincourt, Trafalgar, Warsaw 1920, Stalingrad, and more. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up now to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time on The History of Bad Ideas: Meritocracy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In today’s episode about the power of bad ideas, David talks to historian and podcaster Dan Snow about the myth that wars are settled on the battlefield. Why are we so drawn to the idea of the decisive military showdown? Is Napoleon to blame? What are the forces that actually settle military conflicts? Plus: were Abba really so wrong that Waterloo won the war? Out tomorrow: A bonus episode in which David and Dan explore a range of battles to see what got settled and what didn’t: Yarmuk, Hastings, Agincourt, Trafalgar, Warsaw 1920, Stalingrad. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up now to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time on The History of Bad Ideas: Charisma Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s bad idea is ‘genius’, the label that has enabled all sorts of terrible behaviour through the ages. Writer and broadcaster Helen Lewis explains how and why the idea of genius gets misapplied to people and things that just aren’t. Why are geniuses meant to be tortured? Why are individual geniuses prized over the collaborations that lie behind most innovations? Why do we think that people who are brilliant at one thing will be good at everything else? Plus, David makes the case for Dickens as a bona fide genius. The Genius Myth by Helen Lewis is out from today wherever you get your books https://bit.ly/3FSAKda David’s new 20-part series Postwar – about the 1945 general election and the making of modern Britain – is available now on BBC Radio 4 and BBC Sounds. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m002d8v1 Next time on The History of Bad Ideas: The Decisive Battle w/Dan Snow Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For the first episode in our new series about how bad ideas take hold, David talks to economist Mark Blyth about austerity, the cost-cutting idea that refuses to die. Why is it an article of faith that states need periodic purging to stop them getting too greedy? Why does this so often happen at times when it does most harm, from the 1930s to the financial crisis that began in 2008? And how is the politics of austerity playing out today, in Starmer’s Britain, in Milei’s Argentina and in the DOGE wars happening in Trump’s America? David’s new 20-part series Postwar – about the 1945 general election and the making of modern Britain – is available now on BBC Radio 4 and BBC Sounds https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/series/m002d8v1 Next time on The History of Bad Ideas: Genius w/Helen Lewis Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s political trial is perhaps the most consequential in English history: the trial and execution of King Charles I for treason in January 1649. How could a king commit treason when treason was a crime against the king? How could a court try a king when a king has no peers? How could anyone claim to speak for the people after a civil war when so many people had been on opposite sides? The answers to these questions would cost more than one person his life – but they would also change forever the prospect of holding tyrants to account. Out now on PPF+: Part 2 of David’s conversation with Robert Saunders about the 1975 European referendum and the question of why it all ended up so differently in the Brexit referendum of 2016. Sign up now to get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus David’s new 20-part series Postwar – about the 1945 general election and the making of modern Britain – is available now on BBC Radio 4 and BBC Sounds. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m002d8v1 Next time: The History of Bad Ideas: Austerity w/Mark Blyth Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s trial is one of the most notorious in history but also one of the most misremembered. Galileo’s epic confrontation with the Catholic Church over the question of whether the earth moves round the sun – culminating with his interrogation and condemnation in Rome in 1633 – was not just a matter of truth vs ignorance or science vs superstition. It was also twenty-year long struggle on the part of both sides to find a way to co-exist. Did they succeed? Not exactly, but it wasn’t for want of trying. Then – and perhaps now – science and religion needed each other. Out now on PPF+: Part 2 of David’s conversation with Robert Saunders about the 1975 European referendum and the question of why it all ended up so differently in the Brexit referendum of 2016. Sign up now to get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus David’s new 20-part series Postwar – about the 1945 general election and the making of modern Britain – starts on BBC Radio 4 tomorrow and the first 10 episodes will be available to download on BBC Sounds https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m002d8v1 Next time in Politics on Trial: Charles I vs Parliament Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode is about a pivotal event in British history that took place exactly 50 years ago: the 1975 referendum on Britain’s membership of the European Community. David talks to historian Robert Saunders about why it was so different in so many ways from the Brexit referendum in 2016. Why in 1975 were Labour and the SNP the Eurosceptic parties? What made the Tories pro-European? Where was immigration as an election issue? How did the Yes campaign overturn a big deficit in the polls? Plus: why didn’t it settle the question, so that another referendum had to be held four decades later? Available tomorrow on PPF+: Part 2 of this conversation in which David and Robert try to make sense of the many differences between the 1975 and 2016 referendums as well as exploring where Britain stands in relation to Europe in 2025. Sign up now to get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Robert Saunders’s definitive history of the 1975 referendum Yes To Europe! is available wherever you get your books https://bit.ly/3FE04mP Next time in Politics on Trial: Galileo vs the Inquisition Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In today’s episode an extraordinary political trial that culminated in the execution of one queen at the behest of another: Mary Queen of Scots, convicted of treason in 1586 and beheaded in 1587. But who really wanted her dead, Queen Elizabeth or Elizabeth’s powerful political servants? Why did Mary demand to be tried before parliament rather than a court of noblemen? How did she attempt to defend herself in the face of apparently overwhelming incriminating evidence against her? And who was the only person who voted for her acquittal? Listen to David’s episode about Schiller’s Mary Stuart as part of our Great Political Fictions series https://www.ppfideas.com/episodes/the-great-political-fictions%3A-mary-stuart Next time: 50 years on from the 1975 Europe Referendum w/Robert Saunders Coming soon in Politics on Trial: Galileo vs the Inquisition   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In today’s episode another trial that forms the basis for great drama: the case of Thomas More, tried and executed in 1535, events dramatised by Robert Bolt in A Man for All Seasons and Hilary Mantel in Wolf Hall. How did More try to argue that silence was no evidence of treason? Why was his defence so legalistic? Was he really ‘the Socrates of England’? And who was the true villain in this case: Thomas Cromwell, Richard Rich or the King himself? Available now on PPF+: Socrates part 2, in which David explores the verdict of history on this case and the fierce arguments it still inspires. Sign up now to get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time in Politics on Trial: Mary Queen of Scots vs the Secret State Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s political trial took place in 1431 though it was still being re-litigated right through to the twentieth century: the case of Joan of Arc, charged with heresy by the Church and burned at the stake. Why was a political prisoner tried in an ecclesiastical court? Why were her interrogators so obsessed by her choice in clothes? How did Joan seek to explain her visions? And was this trial any more of a fix than the later trials that exonerated her? Available now on PPF+: Socrates part 2, in which David explores the verdict of history on this case and the fierce arguments it still inspires. Sign up now to get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time in Politics on Trial: Thomas More vs the King Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The first political trial in our new series is the one that set the template for all the others: the trial of Socrates in Athens in 399 BCE, which ended with a death sentence for the philosopher and a permanent stain on the reputation of Athenian democracy. Why, after a lifetime of philosophy, was Socrates finally prosecuted at the age of 70? Was the case motivated by private grievance or public outrage? What should Socrates have said in his own defence? Why, in the end, did he choose defiance instead? Out on Saturday on PPF+: Socrates part 2 - David explores the verdict of history on this case and the fierce arguments it still inspires. Sign up now to get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time in Politics on Trial: Joan of Arc vs the Church Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

To introduce our new series about historic political trials – from Socrates to Marine Le Pen – David explores what makes political confrontations in a court of law so fascinating and so revealing. Why do even the worst of dictators still want to play by the rules? What happens when realpolitik and legal principles collide? How does the political system often find itself in the dock? Who wins and who loses in the great game of lawfare? Out now: a new bonus episode on PPF+ where David tries to answer your questions about Trump and the international order. Sign up now to get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time in Politics on Trial: Socrates vs Democracy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For the final episode in this series David talks to the leading economist Dani Rodrik about the case he made in the early 2000s that globalisation was unsustainable in its current form. How does he think this prediction has been borne out? What forms of globalisation might work in the 21st century? Where are the strengths and weaknesses of the existing system? And what does he make of the antics of Donald Trump? Available from Saturday on PPF+: David tries to answer your questions about Trump and the international order. Is it over? Is he over? When will it all be over? To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up now to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time: Politics on Trial: A History of Lawfare Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

David talks to historian Meg Jacobs about how the 1970s changed everything for America’s understanding of its place in the global economy. How did first the Nixon Shock and then the Oil Shock reshape American politics? Why did America’s politicians respond to these shocks not with tariffs or sabre-rattling but with calls to national self-sacrifice? Did anyone heed those calls? And what lessons did Donald Trump draw from America’s crisis decade? The latest edition of our free fortnightly newsletter is out now with guides, insights and clips to accompany this series, plus David writes about whether Nigel Farage really spells the end of two-party politics in the UK. It’s easy to sign up https://www.ppfideas.com/newsletters Next time on Ideas of Globalisation: What’s Gone Wrong? w/Dani Rodrik Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today David talks to political and economic theorist Leah Downey about the role that central banks in general – and the Federal Reserve in particular – have played in the story of globalisation. How has the Fed tried to reconcile its obligations to American democracy with its obligations to the global order? Is the Eurodollar a token of American strength or American vulnerability? Are the world’s central bankers really just a private club? And what does history tell us about the likely outcome of Trump vs Powell? The latest edition of our free fortnightly newsletter is out tomorrow with guides, insights and clips to accompany this series, plus David writes about whether Nigel Farage really spells the end of two-party politics in the UK. Sign up now https://www.ppfideas.com/newsletters Next time on Ideas of Globalisation: The Crisis of the 1970s (and Trump!) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

David talks to historian Gary Gerstle about the last time the Republican party got caught up in a tariffs disaster and how it changed American politics. The Smoot-Hawley Act of 1930 brought tariffs back and helped bring down both the Republican Party and the global economy. Why didn’t Hoover stop it? What did the fiasco reveal about the limits of presidential power back then? And what does it suggest about the limits of presidential power today? Next time on Ideas of Globalisation: Central Banks vs the People (and Trump!) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today we explore the explosive fight over tariffs that took place in Britain in the first decade of the twentieth century. David talks to historian Robert Saunders about how Joseph Chamberlain made tariff reform a great popular cause and how it nearly destroyed his party. Are there parallels with Trump’s tariff wars today? Yes! Are there lessons for Trump’s opponents too? Yes! Out now on PPF+: Lenin and Trotsky part 2, taking the story on from 1917 to explore civil war, the rise of Stalin and the re-invention of Trotskyism. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up now to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time on Ideas of Globalisation: The Smoot-Hawley disaster (and Trump!) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We start a new mini-series on the history of ideas of globalisation by exploring how arguments from 150 years ago foreshadow what’s happening with Trump today. David talks to economic historian Marc Palen about the nineteenth-century fight between economic nationalists and the champions of an open economy. Was free trade for everyone or just for white people? Was it possible to be an imperialist and a globalist? What did the socialists want? And who thought that Canada should be annexed by the United States? Out now on PPF+: Lenin and Trotsky part 2, taking the story on from 1917 to explore civil war, the rise of Stalin and the re-invention of Trotskyism. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up now to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time on Ideas of Globalisation: The Tariff Wars of the 1900s.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

To conclude this part of our revolutionary ideas series, we explore the overlapping lives and thinking of two emblematic twentieth-century revolutionaries: Lenin and Trotsky. David talks to historian of Russia Edward Acton about what inspired them, what connected them and what divided them. How were they radicalised? How did they interpret the failure of the 1905 revolution? How did they make the 1917 revolution happen? Available from Saturday on PPF+: Lenin and Trotsky part 2, taking the story on from 1917 to explore civil war, the rise of Stalin and the re-invention of Trotskyism. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up now to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Out tomorrow a new edition of our free fortnightly newsletter with links, clips and guides to all our recent episodes. Join our mailing list https://www.ppfideas.com/newsletters Next time the start of a new series: The History of Globalisation Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode is the second of our two recent live recordings of PPF, this one in front of an audience at the Bath Curious Minds Festival. David talks to historian Robert Saunders about the life of Winston Churchill and all its twists and turns of fortune: from disgrace in WWI, economic disaster in the 1920s, wilderness in the 1930s, through to redemption in 1945 and rejection by the voters in the same year. How to make sense of it all? Is there a thread that connects the ups and downs? Has there ever – anywhere – been another political life like it? Out now on PPF+: David discusses the influence of Marinetti’s Futurist Manifesto (1909) – from cars to cod liver oil, from fascism to techno-optimism, from the madness of pre-WWI Europe to the craziness of Silicon Valley today. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time: The History of Revolutionary Ideas: Lenin and Trotsky Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Our third Parisian revolution is another explosive night in the theatre, this time in the world of dance. David talks to Dominic Dromgoole about Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring, which provoked absolute outrage when it premiered in 1913. Is that what its impresario Diaghilev wanted? How did Nijinsky cope? Did the response foreshadow the trauma to come in 1914? And how did the set designer Roerich end up playing a part in American presidential history? Dominic Dromgoole’s Astonish Me! First Nights that Changed the World is available wherever you get your books https://profilebooks.com/work/astonish-me/ Out this weekend: a new bonus episode on PPF+ exploring the far-reaching impact of Marinetti’s Futurist Manifesto (1909), from pre-WWI Europe to Silicon Valley. Sign up now to get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time: PPF Live: Churchill – The Politician With Nine Lives Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s Parisian revolution is a theatrical performance that produced a riot. David talks to theatre director Dominic Dromgoole about Alfred Jarry’s Ubu Roi (1896), which only ran for a couple of nights but left an indelible mark on the culture of the age and has resonated ever since. Why did a play effectively written by children provoke such a storm among the adults? What made it it blow the mind of W. B. Yeats who was in the audience? How can something so bad be so liberating? Next time: Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode is the first of three this week with the theatre director and writer Dominic Dromgoole, exploring revolutionary events in the world of art and theatre, starting with the opening of the Salon des Refusés in Paris in May 1863. How did the Emperor Napoleon end up sponsoring such a counter-cultural event? Why did it provoke such public outrage and astonishment? And in what ways did Manet’s Le Déjeuner sur l’herbe revolutionise what was possible in the creation and consumption of modern art? A new edition of our newsletter is out now with guides to the events of the Paris Commune and much more. Sign up to get it every fortnight https://www.ppfideas.com/newsletters Next time: Ubu Roi w/Dominic Dromgoole Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today the first of four episodes about Parisian revolutions. We start with the definitive nineteenth-century revolutionary and his definitive revolution: David talks to historian Bruno Leipold about why Karl Marx thought the Paris Commune in 1871 was the model of a workers' uprising and provided a vision of the socialist future. How had the Communards reinvented democracy? Was this a social, an economic or a political revolution? And how did Marx reconcile himself to its bloody failure? Bruno Leipold’s intellectual biography of Marx and Marxism Citizen Marx is available now https://bit.ly/4i8Gmga A new edition of our free fortnightly newsletter is out tomorrow with guides to the events of the Paris Commune and much more. Sign up now https://www.ppfideas.com/newsletters Next time: Salon des Refusés w/Dominic Dromgoole Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s revolutionary idea is one with a long history, not all of it revolutionary: David talks to the historian Fara Dabhoiwala about the idea of free speech. When did free speech first get articulated as a fundamental right? How has that right been used and abused, from the eighteenth century to the present? And what changed in the history of the idea of free speech with the publication of J. S. Mill’s On Liberty in 1859? Fara Dabhoiwala’s What Is Free Speech? is available now https://bit.ly/4jgcvDt Next time: Marx and the Paris Commune w/Bruno Leipold Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We take a brief break from revolutionary ideas for a special live episode of PPF recorded in front of an audience at the Regent Street Cinema in London. David talks to writer and journalist Helen Lewis about Network (1976), a film still best remembered for its catchphrase: ‘I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take this anymore!’ Just how prophetic is that cry of rage in the age of Trump? What does the film say about the continuing power of television in the era of social media? And who or what does it remind us of: Ye, Tucker Carlson, Russell Brand, WWE wrestling… or is it about something else entirely? Out now on PPF+: the second part of David’s conversation with Adam Rutherford about Darwin and the most revolutionary idea of them all. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up now to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time: J. S. Mill and Free Speech w/Fara Dabhoiwala Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

David talks to geneticist and science writer Adam Rutherford about the book that fundamentally altered our understanding of just about everything: Darwin’s On The Origin of Species (1859). What made the idea of natural selection so different from the theories of evolution that preceded it? How did Darwin arrive at it? What changed when he published his theory and why is it, in so many ways, the most revolutionary idea of them all? Out tomorrow on PPF+ Darwin Part 2: Adam Rutherford explores how Darwin’s ideas evolved after 1859 and how the revolution in thinking that he started has continued to this day. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ now https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time: PPF Live recorded at the Regent Street Cinema: Network w/Helen Lewis Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s revolutionary ideas come from China: David talks to historian Julia Lovell about the Taiping Revolution, another massive mid-19th-century upheaval that nearly overturned the established order. How did Christianity inspire an uprising against the Qing dynasty? Was it a revolution or a civil war? What was the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom? And where does this cataclysmic event fit into China’s 20th-century revolutionary history? Out now: a bonus episode on 1848 with Chris Clark looking at the counter-revolution – how did the ruling regimes of Europe fight back? To get this and a year’s worth of bonus episodes sign up to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Available tomorrow: the latest edition of our free fortnightly newsletter with clips, guides, further reading and much more. Sign up now https://www.ppfideas.com/newsletters Next time: Darwin w/Adam Rutherford Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In our second of three episodes on the revolutions that swept through Europe in 1848 David and Chris Clark explore the forces demanding radical change. What was ‘the Social Question’ and who was asking it? Where did the violence that erupted in the summer of 1848 come from? What, if anything did it achieve? And who paid the price? Out tomorrow: a final bonus episode on 1848 looking at the counter-revolution: how did the ruling regimes of Europe fight back? To get this and a year’s worth of bonus episodes sign up now to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time: The Taiping Revolution w/Julia Lovell Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In the first of three episodes about the revolutions that swept through Europe in 1848 David is joined by historian Chris Clark to explore the ideas behind this continental upheaval. We start with the ‘Liberal Revolution’: Who were the liberals and what had turned them into revolutionaries? How did the original French Revolution overshadow their hopes and fears? Were parliaments and constitutions capable of sustaining revolutionary fervour? And did the liberals of 1848 realise what they had unleashed? Come to see PPF Live at the Bath Curious Minds Festival: join us on Saturday March 29th to hear David in conversation with Robert Saunders about the legacy of Winston Churchill: The Politician with Nine Lives https://bit.ly/42GPp3X Next time: 1848: The Radical Revolution w/Chris Clark Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s revolutionary idea is something a bit different: David talks to statistician David Spiegelhalter about how an eighteenth-century theory of probability emerged from relative obscurity in the twentieth century to reconfigure our understanding of the relationship between past, present and future. What was Thomas Bayes’s original idea about doing probability in reverse: from effect to cause? What happened when this way of thinking passed through the vortex of the French Revolution? How has it come to lie behind recent innovations in political polling, AI, self-driving cars, medical research and so much more? Why does it remain controversial to this day? The latest edition of our free fortnightly newsletter is available: to get it in your inbox sign up now https://www.ppfideas.com/newsletter  Next time: 1848: The Liberal Revolution w/Chris Clark Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode is about a very different revolution from any we’ve discussed so far: David talks to historian Hank Gonzalez about the Haitian Revolution, which for the first time in history saw a slave revolt result in an independent free state. How did the Haitian Revolution intersect with the American and French Revolutions that preceded it? Why were European powers unable to reverse it despite massive military intervention? What is its legacy for the state of Haiti today? Tickets are still available for PPF Live at the Bath Curious Minds Festival: join us on Saturday 29th March to hear David in conversation with Robert Saunders about the legacy of Winston Churchill: The Politician with Nine Lives https://bit.ly/42GPp3X Out tomorrow the latest edition of our free fortnightly newsletter: to get it in your inbox sign up now https://www.ppfideas.com/newsletters Next time: The Bayesian revolution w/David Spiegelhalter Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For our third episode on the ideas behind the French Revolution, David talks to Richard Whatmore about the ubiquitous Thomas Paine, the Englishman who championed revolutionary politics around the world. How did Paine come to see France as the locus of all his revolutionary hopes? How were those hopes ultimately disappointed? And what happened to Paine’s vision of the Rights of Man? Out now on PPF+: a special bonus episode on King Donald The First. David explores the arguments being made in 2025 for the restoration of monarchy in America. Who’s making them and why? What on earth are they thinking? Sign up now to get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time: Slave uprising: the Haitian Revolution Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For our second episode on the people and ideas behind the French Revolution David talks to historian and biographer Ruth Scurr about the man who came to embody the revolution in all its radicalism and all its terror: Maximilien Robespierre. Who was he and how did he rise so fast once the upheaval was underway? How did he harness the power of the Jacobin Club? How did he marshal the violence of the streets? What did he believe in? And what made him think it was possible to reconcile virtue with terror? Out now: a special bonus episode for PPF+ subscribers on King Donald The First: David explores the arguments being made in 2025 for the restoration of monarchy in America. Who’s making them and why? What on earth are they thinking? Sign up now to get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time: French Revolution 3: Paine Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In the first of three episodes about the people and ideas behind the French Revolution, David talks to Lucia Rubinelli about the man who helped kickstart it all: the Abbé Sieyès. How did an obscure cleric galvanise a nation? What did he mean by the Third Estate and why did he think it was everything? What went wrong with his idea of a new constitutional order for France? And what happened when Sieyès encountered Napoleon? Out now on PPF+: a special bonus episode on King Donald The First. David explores the arguments being made in 2025 for the restoration of monarchy in America. Who’s making them and why? What on earth are they thinking? Sign up now to get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time: French Revolution 2: Robespierre Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In the second of our two episodes about the American Revolution David talks to historian Eric Nelson about the ideas that shaped the US Constitution. Was the office of President a victory for the people who still wanted a king or for those who never wanted one again? What was old and what was new about the idea of the separation of powers? What really divided the Federalists and the Antifederalists? And how are these arguments still being played out in the early days of Trump 2.0? Out tomorrow: a special bonus episode for PPF+ subscribers on King Donald The First: David explores the arguments being made in 2025 for the restoration of monarchy in America. Who’s making them and why? What on earth are they thinking? Sign up now to get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Also sign up now for the latest edition of our free fortnightly newsletter out tomorrow https://www.ppfideas.com/newsletters Next time: French Revolution 1: Sieyes Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today it’s the first of two episodes about one of the most significant revolutions of all: the American Revolution. David talks to historian Eric Nelson about the ideas behind America’s Declaration of Independence in 1776. How did a fight with the British parliament become a repudiation of the British king? What turned royalists into republicans? What kind of republic did they think they were building? And whose consent was going to be needed to build it? Next time: American Revolution 2: The Constitution Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode is about a revolution that started 250 years ago and is still going on (in the form of the digital revolution): the Industrial Revolution. David talks to economic historian Alexis Litvine about how new ways of making things changed human understanding of the world around us. Did the Industrial Revolution invent the idea of progress? Did it revolutionise the concept of nature? Did it upend the way we think about time? And what was the cost? Tickets are available for PPF Live at the Bath Curious Minds Festival: on Saturday 29th March David will be in conversation with Robert Saunders about the legacy of Winston Churchill: The Politician with Nine Lives https://bit.ly/42GPp3X Next time: American Revolution: The Declaration of Independence Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In the second of our episodes with historian Clare Jackson on the English revolutions of the 17th century we discuss the one that usually gets called ‘Glorious’: the revolution of 1688. Was it a revolution or was it an invasion? What rights did parliament win and what powers did it acquire? Was this the beginning of the modern military state? And does the Glorious Revolution deserve its name? Out now: the latest edition of our free fortnightly newsletter with guides to the most recent episodes, links, clips and further reading: sign up now https://www.ppfideas.com/newsletters Tickets are available for PPF Live at the Bath Curious Minds Festival: on Saturday March 29th David will be in conversation with Robert Saunders about the legacy of Winston Churchill: The Politician with Nine Lives https://bit.ly/42GPp3X. Come be a part of recording PPF live! Next up in The History of Revolutionary Ideas: The Industrial Revolution Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode in our history of revolutionary ideas is about the event that is sometimes – but not always – called the English Revolution: the Civil War of the 1640s and the short-lived republic that followed. David talks to historian Clare Jackson about whether this really was a revolution and about the thinking that inspired it. What was old, what was new, what was borrowed and what was left when it was all over – what happened to the dreams of a brave new world? Out tomorrow: the latest edition of our free fortnightly newsletter with guides to the most recent episodes, links, clips and further reading: sign up now https://www.ppfideas.com/newsletters Tickets are available for PPF Live at the Bath Curious Minds Festival: on Saturday March 29th David will be in conversation with Robert Saunders about the legacy of Winston Churchill: The Politician with Nine Lives https://bit.ly/42GPp3X Next up in The History of Revolutionary Ideas: English Revolution 2: 1688 Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode is about a revolution that took centuries to happen if it ever really happened at all: The Scientific Revolution. David talks to historian of science Simon Schaffer about what changed in human understanding – and what didn’t – in the age of Galileo and Newton. Was the new science a revolution of ideas or of practices? What did it mean for the hold of religious and political authority? Who or what were the driving forces behind it? And did the people who lived through it realise what was happening? Out now on PPF+: David’s conversation with Alec Ryrie about Jean Calvin, who may have been the Reformation’s true revolutionary. What was Calvinism and how did it change the world? To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up now to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Tickets are available now for PPF Live at the Bath Curious Minds Festival: join us on Saturday 29th March to hear David in conversation with Robert Saunders about the legacy of Winston Churchill: The Politician with Nine Lives https://bit.ly/42GPp3X Next Time on the History of Revolutionary Ideas: The English Revolutions (part one): The Civil War Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s revolutionary thinker is Martin Luther, the man who upended the religious, political and intellectual life of Europe, maybe without entirely meaning to. David talks to historian Alec Ryrie about how a German monk took on the entire authority of the Catholic Church and survived the experience. What did he hope to achieve? Who were his principal backers? How did he reimagine the idea of human freedom? And where is his influence most widely felt today? Out tomorrow on PPF+ a new bonus episode: David talks to Alec Ryrie about Calvin, who may have been the Reformation’s true revolutionary. What was Calvinism and how did it change the world? To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up now to PPF+https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Tickets are available now for PPF Live at the Bath Curious Minds Festival: on Saturday March 29th David will be in conversation with Robert Saunders about the legacy of Winston Churchill: The Politician with Nine Lives https://bit.ly/42GPp3X Next up in The History of Revolutionary Ideas: The Scientific Revolution Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode in our history of revolutionary ideas is about a medieval movement that used the ancient past to rethink and reimagine the present and the future. David talks to historian Eric Nelson about humanism and its enormous impact on the history of ideas. How did humanism emerge out of catastrophe? What did it do to the hold of Church and Empire on the medieval mind? Was humanist politics really revolutionary politics? And where is the ‘human’ in humanism? As part of our Great Political Films series we are hosting a special screening of Network (1976) at the Regent Street Cinema in London on 18th March, followed by a live podcast recording with David and Helen Lewis. Aaron Sorkin said: ‘No predictor of the future – not even Orwell – has ever been as right as Network.’ Come see why! Tickets now available https://www.ppfideas.com/event-list Next up in The History of Revolutionary Ideas: The Reformation 1: Luther Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode in our history of revolutionary ideas is about a medieval document that is sometimes thought to contain a ground-breaking promise of basic political rights. David talks to historian Nick Vincent about Magna Carta (1215) and what it did and didn’t actually say. Why did the warring parties agree to it? Was it a constitutional charter or a peace treaty? What happened when its terms were broken? And how did it come to acquire the totemic significance it has today? Sign up now to get our free fortnightly newsletter out tomorrow – with writing, clips, links and more to accompany this series https://www.ppfideas.com/newsletters Come to see PPF recorded live! As part of the Curious Minds festival in Bath David will be in conversation with regular PPF contributor Robert Saunders about the legacy of Winston Churchill: The Politician With Nine Lives. It’s happening at the Komedia in Bath at 11am on Saturday 29th March. Tickets now available https://www.ppfideas.com/event-list Next up in The History of Revolutionary Ideas: Humanism Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode in our history of revolutionary ideas explores the world-altering impact of Islam from the seventh century onwards. David talks to the leading Islamic scholar Tim Winter (Abdal Hakim Murad) about what changed – and what didn’t – with the appearance of Islamic law, Islamic culture and Islamic ideas of community. Was Islam really egalitarian? How could a universalist religion encompass so much variety? Why did it spread so fast? And what caused it to split so soon? Come see PPF recorded live! As part of the Curious Minds festival in Bath David will be in conversation with regular PPF contributor Robert Saunders about the legacy of Winston Churchill: The Politician With Nine Lives. It’s happening at the Komedia in Bath at 11am on Saturday 29th March. Priority booking for PPF listeners opens at 9am on Tuesday 28th January – just go to our website for more info and to get your tickets: https://www.ppfideas.com/event-list Out now on PPF+: the second part of David’s conversation with Agnes Callard about Socrates, exploring politics, AI, therapy and death. Sign up now for £5 per month or £50 for a whole year to get this and all our bonus episodes (21 and counting!) plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next up in The History of Revolutionary Ideas: Magna Carta Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode in our series on revolutionary ideas is a conversation covering two millennia with the historian Tom Holland exploring the never-ending upending of human understanding brought about by Christianity. How can weakness be the ultimate strength? How can political order be built out of the glorification of suffering? How can a universal religion create so much hierarchical division? And in a Christian world, is it ever possible to escape the charge of hypocrisy? Out now on PPF+: the second part of David’s conversation with Agnes Callard about Socrates, exploring politics, AI, therapy and death. Sign up now for £5 per month or £50 for a whole year to get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next up in The History of Revolutionary Ideas: Islam w/Tim Winter Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

To begin our history of revolutionary ideas in earnest, David talks to the philosopher Agnes Callard about Socrates, the philosopher who changed – and can still change – everything. Just what is so radical about the Socratic method? How does it open up new ways of thinking about the meaning of life? Can anyone do it? And where does it leave 2000+ years of intervening philosophy? Out tomorrow on PPF+: the second part of David’s conversation with Agnes Callard about Socrates, exploring politics, AI, therapy and death. Sign up now for £5 per month or £50 for a whole year to get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Open Socrates: The Case for a Philosophical Life by Agnes Callard is available now https://bit.ly/4h0pZmg Next up in The History of Revolutionary Ideas: Christianity w/Tom Holland Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

To kick off our new series on revolutionary ideas past, present and future David talks to two regular PPF contributors – the philosopher Lea Ypi and the scientist Adam Rutherford – about what makes an idea truly revolutionary. Do revolutionary ideas change the world? Can the world be changed without them? Can bad ideas ever be revolutionary ideas? And where should we be looking for revolutionary ideas today? Sign up to our free fortnightly newsletter to get more ideas, clips, reading suggestions and extra insights to accompany this and all our series. Join our mailing list now: https://www.ppfideas.com/newsletters Next Time: The History of Revolutionary Ideas: Socrates w/Agnes Callard Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The final episode in our great political films series explores Jonathan Glazer’s The Zone of Interest (2023), his haunting take on the home life of the man who ran Auschwitz. This is a film like nothing else. It is not about the banality of evil or the proximity of innocence to horror. Instead it takes us inside a nightmare world from which there is no escape: the grimmest fairy story of them all. Out now: a new bonus episodes on PPF+ exploring the joys of Armando Iannucci’s In The Loop, not just one of the smartest films about contemporary politics but also the funniest. Sign up now for £5 per month or £50 for a whole year to get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Coming next: we begin our new series on The History of Revolutionary Ideas Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The penultimate episode in our great political films series explores Kathryn Bigelow’s Zero Dark Thirty (2012), her controversial take on the War on Terror. Tracking the CIA’s years-long pursuit of Osama Bin Laden, it’s part spy procedural, part story of a female outsider in a man’s world, and part a complex disquisition on political violence. Where does bureaucracy end and killing begin? Can torture ever be justified? And whose judgment is ultimately the one that counts? Out now: a new bonus episodes on PPF+ exploring the joys of Armando Iannucci’s In The Loop, not just one of the smartest films about contemporary politics but also the funniest. Sign up now for £5 per month or £50 for a whole year to get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time: The Zone of Interest Coming soon: a new series on The History of Revolutionary Ideas Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The second David Fincher film in our series (after Fight Club) is The Social Network (2010), the Aaron Sorkin-scripted take on how Mark Zuckerberg created Facebook and the price paid by everyone else. A tale of power and privilege, innocence and cynicism, it is also about how exploitation can be sold as exclusivity. What is left when we have given away our control over who we are in order to decide who counts as a friend? Out later this week: a new bonus episodes on PPF+ exploring the joys of Armando Iannucci’s In The Loop, not just one of the smartest films about contemporary politics but also the funniest. Sign up now for £5 per month or £50 for a whole year to get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time: Zero Dark Thirty Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Our great political films series reaches the twenty-first century with Paul Thomas Anderson’s unforgettable There Will Be Blood (2007), starring Daniel Day-Lewis as oilman Daniel Plainview in one of the all-time great screen performances. Based on Upton Sinclair’s novel Oil! (1927), the movie swaps out Marx for Nietzsche and tells a story of money vs religion and family vs both. What, in the end, is the force that cannot be overcome? Out now: two bonus episodes on PPF+ to accompany this series: Shoah part one and Shoah part two, exploring Claude Lanzmann’s path-breaking, harrowing, unforgettable 9-hour documentary about the Holocaust. Sign up to PPF+ to get all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time: The Social Network Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

David talks to writer and journalist Helen Lewis about David Fincher’s Fight Club (1999), the film that launched a thousand memes. Does this tale of thwarted masculinity and corporate malfeasance code left or code right? Who, in the end, is Tyler Durden: Joe Rogan or Jordan Peterson, Elon Musk or Andrew Tate? Is Fight Club a relic of the pre-digital age or a prophetic vision of what was coming? And … Meat Loaf?! Out now: two new bonus episodes on PPF+ to accompany this series: Shoah part one and Shoah part two, exploring Claude Lanzmann’s path-breaking, harrowing, unforgettable 9-hour documentary about the Holocaust. Sign up to PPF+ to get all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next Time: There Will Be Blood Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Our political films season has reached the late 1980s with Do The Right Thing (1989), Spike Lee’s searing take on racial tension on a Brooklyn block on a boiling hot summer’s day. How does a fight over pizza turn into a full-blown riot? With everyone feeling exploited, who is really to blame? And where do Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcom X – not to mention Jesse Jackson Jr. – fit in? Out now: two new bonus episodes on PPF+ to accompany this series: Shoah part one and Shoah part two, exploring Claude Lanzmann’s path-breaking, harrowing, unforgettable 9-hour documentary about the Holocaust. Sign up to PPF+ to get all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time: Fight Club w/ Helen Lewis Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s great political film is Akira Kurosawa’s epic of war and deception Kagemusha (1980). Set in late sixteenth-century Japan it tells the story of a thief tasked with impersonating a warlord. Can physical resemblance translate into political authority? How far does the conspiracy need to go? And who in the end is the real criminal? Out now: two new bonus episodes on PPF+ to accompany this series: Shoah part one and Shoah part two, exploring Claude Lanzmann’s path-breaking, harrowing, unforgettable 9-hour documentary about the Holocaust. Sign up to PPF+ to get all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time: Spike Lee’s Do The Right Thing Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s great political film is Chantal Akerman’s Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles (1975), voted the greatest film of all time in the 2022 Sight and Sound poll. A classic of feminist cinema it is also a film about the meaning of time and the illusions of choice. How can a movie which shows a woman peeling potatoes in real time have you on the edge of your seat? If the personal is the political, what do three days in the life of a Belgian housewife tell us about the true nature of power? Coming this weekend on PPF+: two new bonus episodes to accompany this series: Shoah part one and Shoah part two, exploring Claude Lanzmann’s path-breaking, harrowing, unforgettable 9-hour documentary about the Holocaust. Sign up to PPF+ to get all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time in our regular slot: Kagemusha (1980) Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode is a conversation between David and the former politician Chris Smith (long-time MP and Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport in Tony Blair’s first government) about The Candidate (1972), the first great political film of the 1970s. How does its portrayal of the compromises of running for office hold up today? Is it a cynical film or an inspiring one? And what lessons does it have for politics in the age of Trump? To find out about gifting a PPF+ subscription for Christmas and beyond just click on the link https://ppf.supportingcast.fm/gifts Next time: Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles (voted the greatest film of all time in the 2022 Sight and Sound critics’ poll)  Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We resume our series on the great political films with Costa-Gavras’s Z (1969), the quintessential late 60s movie about assassination, conspiracy, street politics and police brutality. How could a film shot in Algeria and starring French actors so faithfully reconstruct a recent Greek political killing? How did it capture the spirit of the times? And what does it say about the relationship between politics as violence and politics as story-telling? To find out about our gift offerings for Christmas and beyond visit the gift page on our website https://www.ppfideas.com/gifts Next time: The Candidate (1972) w/Chris Smith Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

To finish this series of bad ideas, David tries to persuade Gary Gerstle of the futility of televised leadership debates. From Nixon vs Kennedy to Harris vs Trump, do the voters really learn anything from these supposed exchanges of ideas? Are they ever much more than a competition to avoid gaffes? And what did British politics gain when it introduced prime ministerial election debates (apart from a brief attack of Cleggmania)? A new bonus bad idea is available to accompany this series: David talks to Lucia Rubinelli about what’s wrong with the idea of sovereignty. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up now to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus To find out about our gift offerings for Christmas and beyond visit the gift page on our website https://www.ppfideas.com/gifts The latest edition of the PPF newsletter is out now - sign up to get it every fortnight https://www.ppfideas.com/newsletters  Next time: The Great Political Films resumes with Z (1969) Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For our penultimate bad idea in this series, David talks to Robert Saunders about what’s gone wrong with British politics since party members got to decide who leads the party – and in some cases who gets to be prime minister. Is the problem the principle of the thing or the people who end up in charge (Corbyn, Truss)? How did reforms undertaken in the name of democracy manage to undermine democracy? And what are the alternatives? A new bonus bad idea is available to accompany this series: David talks to Lucia Rubinelli about what’s gone wrong with the idea of sovereignty. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up now to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus To find out about our gift offerings for Christmas and beyond visit the gift page on our website https://www.ppfideas.com/gifts Next Bad Idea: Televised Leadership Debates Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s bad idea is a theory of the universe: David talks to astrophysicist Chris Lintott about Steady State Theory, the rival cosmological model to the Big Bang, which held its own for a while in the 1940s and 1950s but turned out to be unsustainable. Why did its best-known champion Fred Hoyle have so much faith in it? What did it expose about the limitations of Big Bang theory? And what does it reveal about scientific hubris and human weakness in the face of the unknown? Available now is a new bonus bad idea to accompany this series: David talks to Lucia Rubinelli about what’s gone wrong with the idea of sovereignty. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next Bad Idea: Party Members Choosing Leaders Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s bad idea concerns history itself: David talks to world historian Ayse Zarakol about the temptations and the pitfalls of the idea of The End of History. Francis Fukuyama popularised the phrase in 1989 at the end of the Cold War. What did his vision of the triumph of liberal democracy miss? Was it a Western fantasy or a modern fantasy or both? How has history exacted its revenge? And if history doesn’t end, does it repeat? Coming on Saturday a bonus bad idea to accompany this series: David talks to Lucia Rubinelli about what’s gone wrong with the idea of sovereignty. To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Looking for Christmas presents? We have a special Xmas gift offer: give a subscription to PPF+ and your recipient will also receive a personally inscribed copy of David’s new book The History of Ideas. Find out more https://www.ppfideas.com/gifts Next Bad Idea: Steady State Theory Past Present Future is part of the Airwave Podcast Network Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For today’s bad idea David talks to political philosopher Alan Finlayson about what goes wrong when politicians get their hands on the concept of modernisation. Why does it leave them so in thrall to new technology? What does it miss about how change really happens? And where does the modernisation project end? Looking for Christmas presents? We have a special Xmas gift offer: give a subscription to PPF+ and your recipient will also receive a personally inscribed copy of David’s new book The History of Ideas. Find out more https://www.ppfideas.com/gifts Next Bad Idea: The End of History Past Present Future is part of the Airwave podcast network. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s bad idea is about how ideas get adopted, argued over and rejected: David talks to political philosopher Alan Finlayson about what’s wrong with seeing this as a competitive marketplace. From St. Paul to Citizens United, from John Stuart Mill to Jordan Peterson, what happens when ideas get turned into commodities? Who wins and who loses? And what is an ‘ideological entrepreneur’? Looking for Christmas presents? We have a special Xmas gift offer: give a subscription to PPF+ and your recipient will also receive a personally inscribed copy of David’s new book The History of Ideas. Find out more https://www.ppfideas.com/gifts To sign up for the latest edition of our free fortnightly newsletter, out tomorrow, join our mailing list https://www.ppfideas.com/newsletters Next Bad Idea: Modernisation! Past Present Future is part of the Airwave podcast network. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For our latest bad idea with an interesting history David talks to the geneticist and science writer Adam Rutherford about what’s wrong with Nobel Prizes. Why do we revere the winners of the science prizes when we know how contrived the other prizes are? What makes us so attached to this relic of an outmoded idea of scientific progress? And what happens when someone is struck down with ‘Nobelitis’? Looking for Christmas presents? We have a special Xmas gift offer: give a subscription to PPF+ and your recipient will also receive a personally inscribed copy of David’s new book The History of Ideas. PPF merch available too! Find out more at https://www.ppfideas.com/gifts Next up on Bad Ideas: The Marketplace of Ideas Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

To kick off our new series on the history of bad ideas David talks to historian Sophie Scott-Brown about the idea of ‘the silent majority’, beloved by American presidents from Nixon to Trump. Where does this idea come from? Is it conservative or revolutionary? If the majority are actually silent, how can anyone know what they are thinking? And aren’t the silent majority really the dead? Looking for Christmas presents? We have a special Xmas gift offer: give a subscription to PPF+ and your recipient will also receive a personally inscribed copy of David’s new book The History of Ideas. Find out more https://www.ppfideas.com/gifts Next up on Bad Ideas: Nobel Prizes Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For the final (extended) episode in our American Elections series David talks to Gary Gerstle about the historical significance of Donald Trump’s decisive victory this week. Was this election and its outcome unprecedented in American history or are there parallels to guide us? Can Trump be both an existential threat to American democracy and a politician it’s possible for his opponents to work with? What is the likely shape of the new political order that his administration represents? And will democracy itself survive the experience? Out now: a new bonus episode to accompany our Great Political Films series in which David talks to Helen Thompson about Apocalypse Now, the ultimate film about war and madness. Sign up now to PPF+ to get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Looking for Christmas presents? We have a special Xmas gift offer: give a subscription to PPF+ and your recipient will also receive a personally inscribed copy of David’s new book The History of Ideas. Find out more https://www.ppfideas.com/gifts Next time: The History of Bad Ideas: The Silent Majority Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For the last episode in this season of great political films David explores Gillo Pontecorvo’s The Battle of Algiers (1966), which changed the face of political movie-making forever. Filmed to look like archive footage, featuring actual participants in the events it describes, and showing both sides of the vicious contest between insurgents and counter-insurgents, it humanises a horrifying conflict. It also raises the question: where is the line between realism and rage? Coming on Saturday: a new bonus episode to accompany this series in which David talks to Helen Thompson about Apocalypse Now, the ultimate film about war and madness. Sign up now to PPF+ to get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus To get our free fortnightly newsletter with guides, writing and clips exploring the themes of these episodes join our mailing list https://www.ppfideas.com/newsletters Looking for Christmas presents? We have a special Christmas gift offer: give a subscription to PPF+ and your recipient will also receive a personally inscribed copy of David’s new book The History of Ideas. Find out more https://www.ppfideas.com/gifts Next time: Gary Gerstle on the 2024 Presidential Election Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This episode is about two great films on the same dark theme: David talks to American historian Jill Lepore about Stanley Kubrick’s Dr Strangelove and Sidney Lumet’s Fail Safe, which appeared within a few months of each other in 1964. Both films explore what might happen if America’s nuclear defence system went rogue. One is grimly hilarious; the other is utterly terrifying. Which packs the biggest punch today? Looking for Christmas presents? We have a special Xmas gift offer: give a subscription to PPF+ and your recipient will also receive a personally inscribed copy of David’s new book The History of Ideas. Find out more https://www.ppfideas.com/gifts Next time: The Battle of Algiers Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For today’s great political film David discusses Luchino Visconti’s The Leopard (1963) with the Italian historian of ideas Lucia Rubinelli. How did a communist aristocrat from Milan come to make a film about a Sicilian prince? How did Burt Lancaster get cast in the leading role? Is this a political film or a film against politics? And what is the real meaning of the celebrated line: ‘If we want things to stay as they are, things must change…’? Looking for Christmas presents? We have a special Christmas gift offer: give a subscription to PPF+ and your recipient will also receive a personally inscribed copy of David’s new book The History of Ideas. Find out more https://www.ppfideas.com/gifts Next time: Dr Strangelove & Fail Safe w/ Jill Lepore Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s great political film is John Frankenheimer’s masterpiece of Cold War paranoia The Manchurian Candidate (1962), which came out the week of the Cuban Missile Crisis. It’s a 1960s movie about 1950s fears: brainwashing, the Korean War, McCarthyism, all shot through with Kennedy-era anxieties about sexual potency and psychoanalysis. Who’s a Soviet agent? Who’s a mummy’s boy? And it managed to anticipate what was coming next in American politics: the age of assassination. A new bonus episode to accompany this series is out now: David explores why so many American presidents choose High Noon as their favourite film. Sign up now to PPF+ for just £5 per month or £50 a year and get all our other bonuses plus ad free listening too. https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus To get our free fortnightly newsletter with guides, writing and clips exploring the themes of these episodes join our mailing list https://www.ppfideas.com/newsletters Next time: The Leopard w/ Lucia Rubinelli Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In today’s episode David discusses Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger’s The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943), a great patriotic anti-war film made in the depths of WWII. Why did Churchill want the film’s production stopped and was he right to suspect it was about him? What does the film say about the politics of nostalgia and the illusions of heroism? And how is Blimp’s moustache like Kane’s Rosebud? A new bonus episode to accompany this series is out on Saturday: David explores why so many American presidents choose High Noon as their favourite film. Sign up now to PPF+ for just £5 per month or £50 a year and get all our other bonuses plus ad free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus To get our free fortnightly newsletter with guides, writing and clips exploring the themes of these episodes join our mailing list https://www.ppfideas.com/newsletters Next time: The Manchurian Candidate Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Orson Welles’s Citizen Kane (1941) is many people’s favourite film of all time, including Donald Trump’s. Why does Trump love it so? What does he get right and what does he get wrong about the trajectory of the life of Charles Foster Kane? What does the film reveal about the relationship between celebrity, influence and political power? And why is Rosebud not the real mystery at the heart of this story? Like Kane, want more stuff? To get PPF merch – either an ethically-sourced canvas tote bag or a bone china mug – just go to our website https://www.ppfideas.com/merch Next time: The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s great political film is Frank Capra’s Mr Smith Goes to Washington (1939), a much-loved tale of the little guy taking on the corrupt establishment. But there’s far more to it than that, including an origin story that suggests Jefferson Smith (James Stewart) might not be what he seems. From filibusters to fascism, from the New Deal to America First, from Burton K. Wheeler to Harry S. Truman, this is a heart-warming film that still manages to go to the dark heart of American politics. To hear our bonus episode on Philip Roth’s The Plot Against America (in which Burton K. Wheeler becomes America’s Hitler) sign up now to PPF+ for just £5 per month or £50 a year and get all our other bonuses plus ad free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time: Citizen Kane Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For the first episode in our new series David explores Jean Renoir’s La Grande Illusion (1937), a great anti-war film that is also a melancholy meditation on friendship between enemies, love across borders, and the inevitability of loss. What, in the end, is the great illusion: war itself, or the belief that we can escape its baleful consequences? Our bonus episode with Chris Clark on how Europe’s elites sleepwalked into war in 1914 is available on PPF+. Sign up now for just £5 per month or £50 a year to get 24 bonus episodes a year plus ad-free listening https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time: Mr Smith Goes to Washington Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

David talks to author Michael Lewis about SBF and EA: about the man he got to know before, during and after his spectacular fall and about the philosophy with which he was associated. What did Sam Bankman-Fried believe was the purpose of making so much money? How did he manage to get so side-tracked from doing good? Why when it all went wrong did he fail to save himself? A conversation about utilitarianism, risk and human weakness. Going Infinite: The Rise and Fall of a New Tycoon by Michael Lewis is out now in paperback with a new afterword https://bit.ly/3ZXr88u  The second bonus episode to accompany our recent series on Thinking Machines is available now: David and Shannon Vallor talk about where AI is really taking us, sorting the reality from the hype. Sign up to PPF+ for just £5 per month or £50 a year for 24 bonus episodes https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus To get the latest edition of our free fortnightly newsletter (out tomorrow), with lots more on SBF and EA and plenty else besides, sign up here https://www.ppfideas.com/newsletters Next time: The Great Political Films: La Grande Illusion Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

David checks in with Gary Gerstle one more time before November to explore where things now stand with the US presidential election. In a conversation recorded in the immediate aftermath of the Walz/Vance debate, they discuss dead cats, October headwinds, comparisons with 2016 and a president missing in action. Plus, if the result really is too close to call, can the American Republic survive the fallout? There is another bonus episode out now to accompany our recent series on Thinking Machines: David and Shannon Vallor talk about where AI is really taking us, sorting the reality from the hype. Sign up now for just £5 per month or £50 a year for 24 bonus episodes https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus New PPF merch is available on our website: choose from a canvas tote bag or a bone china mug https://www.ppfideas.com/merch Next time: Michael Lewis on Sam Bankman-Fried and Effective Altruism Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For episode four of our series on the history of thinking about thinking machines, David and Shannon discuss a very different sci-fi sensibility: Becky Chambers’ Monk & Robot series (A Psalm for the Wild-Built (2021) and A Prayer for the Crown-Shy (2022)). What would it mean for robots to ‘wake up’? How might robots teach humans about the nature of care and about the care of nature? And where do robots fit into a neurodiverse world? Plus: robots vs octopi.  There is another bonus episode to accompany this series available from Saturday on PPF+: David and Shannon talk about where AI is really taking us, sorting the reality from the hype. Sign up now for just £5 per month or £50 a year for 24 bonus episodes. https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus New PPF merch is available on our website: choose from a canvas tote bag or a bone china mug https://www.ppfideas.com/merch Next time: Gary Gerstle on the current state of the American election. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode in our series on the history of thinking about thinking machines explores the novel that inspired Blade Runner: Philip K. Dick’s Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (1968). David talks to Shannon Vallor about what the book has that the film lacks and how it comprehensively messes with the line between human and machine, the natural and the artificial. What is the meaning of the electric sheep? To hear a bonus episode on Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein to accompany this series sign up now to PPF+ and get ad-free listening and all our other bonuses too: £5 per month or £50 a year for 24 bonus episodes. https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus PPF merch is now available on our website: choose from a canvas tote bag or a bone china mug https://www.ppfideas.com/merch Next time: Becky Chambers’ Monk & Robot series. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In today’s episode in our series on the history of thinking about thinking machines, David and Shannon discuss Isaac Asimov’s 1955 short story ‘Franchise’, which imagines the American presidential election of 2008 as decided by one voter and a giant computer. Part prophecy, part parody: have either its predictions or its warnings about democracy come true? How does the power of technology shape contemporary politics? And why was Asimov’s vision of the future so reactionary? To hear a bonus episode on Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein to accompany this series sign up now to PPF+ and get ad-free listening and all our other bonuses too: £5 per month or £50 a year for 24 bonus episodes. https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus The latest edition of our free newsletter is out tomorrow with guides, clips and links for this series: join our mailing list https://www.ppfideas.com/newsletters  Next time: Philip K. Dick’s Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For the first episode in our new series on the history of thinking about thinking machines, David talks to philosopher Shannon Vallor about Fritz Lang’s Metropolis (1927). The last great silent film is the most futuristic: a vision of robots and artificial life, it is also about where the human heart fits into an increasingly mechanised world. Is it prophetic? Is it monstrous? And who are the winners and losers when war is declared on the machines? To hear a bonus episode on Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein to accompany this series sign up now to PPF+ and get ad-free listening and all our other bonuses too: £5 per month or £50 a year for 24 bonus episodes. https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time: Isaac Asimov’s ‘Franchise’  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For our last episode in this series of historical counterfactuals, David talks to the historian Ben Jackson about what might have happened if the 2014 Scottish Independence referendum had gone the other way. How close was the vote and what could have swung it differently? Were the dark warnings about the consequences of independence likely to have been borne out? And what would an independent Scotland mean for the world today? To hear the second part of David’s conversation with Chris Clark about the fateful origins of the First World War sign up now to PPF+ and get ad-free listening and all our other bonuses too: £5 per month or £50 a year for 24 bonus episodes https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Coming next: a new series on the history of thinking about thinking machines, from films to novels to short stories, with Shannon Vallor, author of The AI Mirror. First up: Metropolis.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Our counterfactuals series moves forward to 1989: David talks to Lea Ypi about what might have happened if the Berlin Wall hadn’t fallen when it did. Was the night it came down really just one big accident? How long could the East German regime have lasted? And what does the fate of non-European communist states tell us about how it could have gone very differently?  To hear the second part of David’s conversation with Chris Clark about the fateful origins of the First World War sign up now to PPF+ and get ad-free listening and all our other bonuses too: £5 per month or £50 a year for 24 bonus episodes https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Sign up here for our free fortnightly newsletter: the new edition is out now to go with our latest counterfactual episodes https://www.ppfideas.com/newsletters Next time: What If… Scotland Had Voted For Independence in 2014?  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

David talks to historian Margaret MacMillan, author of the prize-winning Peacemakers, about whether the 1919 Paris Peace Conference deserves its reputation as a missed opportunity and the harbinger of another war. Could the peace have been fairer to the Germans? Could the League of Nations have been given real teeth? Could the Bolsheviks have been involved? Or did the peacemakers make the best of a bad job? To hear the second part of David’s conversation with Chris Clark about the fateful origins of the First World War, sign up now to PPF+ and get ad-free listening and all our other bonuses too: £5 per month or £50 a year for 24 bonus episodes: https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Sign up here for our free fortnightly newsletter: the new edition is out tomorrow to go with our latest counterfactual episodes: https://www.ppfideas.com/newsletters Next time: What If… The Berlin Wall Hadn’t Fallen?  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode is another big early twentieth-century counterfactual: David talks to the historian of Russia Edward Acton about how the Russian Revolution might have unfolded if the Left SRs and not the Bolsheviks had come out on top. Could Lenin have been sidelined? Might the Terror have been avoided? And what would it have meant to the wider world if revolutionary socialism had been liberated from Marxist communism? To hear the second part of David’s conversation with Chris Clark about the fateful origins of the First World War sign up now to PPF+ and get ad-free listening and all our other bonuses too: £5 per month or £50 a year for 24 bonus episodes https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Next time: What if… The 1919 Paris Peace Conference Had Actually Kept the Peace? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We return to our series on historical counterfactuals with the big one: how might WWI have been avoided? David talks to Chris Clark, author of The Sleepwalkers, the definitive history of the July crisis of 1914, to explore how it might have turned out differently. What would have happened if Franz Ferdinand had survived the assassination attempt in Sarajevo? Why did his death spark the greatest European conflict of them all? To hear the second part of this conversation – where David and Chris discuss how the great powers responded to the assassination – sign up now to PPF+ and get ad-free listening and all our other bonus episodes https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus Part 2 with Chris Clark will be out on PPF+ tomorrow.  Next time: What if… The Russian Revolution Hadn’t Been Bolshevik? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Our Great Political Fictions re-release concludes with a musical: Lin-Manuel Miranda’s wildly popular and increasingly controversial Hamilton (2015). What does it get right and what does it get wrong about America’s founding fathers? How fair is it to judge a Broadway musical by the standards of academic history? And why does a product of the Obama era still resonate so powerfully in the age of Trump and Biden? Find out more about Past Present Future on our new website www.ppfideas.com where you can also join PPF+ to get bonus episodes and ad-free listening. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The penultimate episode in our Great Political Fictions re-release is about Curtis Sittenfeld’s American Wife (2008), which re-imagines the life of First Lady Laura Bush.One of the great novels about the intimacy of power and the accidents of politics, it sticks to the historical record while radically retelling it. What does the standard version leave out about the Bush presidency? How does an ordinary life become an extraordinary one? And where is the line between fact and fiction? Tomorrow: Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Hamilton Find out more about Past Present Future on our new website www.ppfideas.com where you can also join PPF+ to get bonus episodes and ad-free listening. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s Great Political Fiction is Alan Hollinghurst’s The Line of Beauty (2004), which is set between Thatcher’s two dominant general election victories of 1983 and 1987. A novel about the intersection between gay life and Tory life, high politics and low conduct, beauty and betrayal, it explores the price of power and the risks of liberation. It also contains perhaps the greatest of all fictional portrayals of a real-life prime minster: Thatcher dancing the night away. Tomorrow: Curtis Sittingfield’s American Wife Find out more about Past Present Future on our new website www.ppfideas.com where you can also join PPF+ to get bonus episodes and ad-free listening. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For the twelfth episode in our Great Political Fictions re-release, David discusses Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale (1985), her unforgettable dystopian vision of a future American patriarchy. Where is Gilead? When is Gilead? How did it happen? How can it be stopped? From puritanism and slavery to Iran and Romania, from demography and racism to Playboy and Scrabble, this novel takes the familiar and the known and makes them hauntingly and terrifyingly new. Tomorrow: Alan Hollinghurst’s The Line of Beauty Find out more about Past Present Future on our new website www.ppfideas.com where you can also join PPF+ to get bonus episodes and ad-free listening. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In today’s Great Political Fiction David explores Salman Rushdie’s 1981 masterpiece Midnight’s Children, the great novel about the life and death of Indian democracy. How can one boy stand in for the whole of India? How can a nation as diverse as India ever have a single politics? And how is a jar of pickle the answer to these questions? Plus, how does Rushdie’s story read today, in the age of Modi? Tomorrow: Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale Find out more about Past Present Future on our new website www.ppfideas.com where you can also join PPF+ to get bonus episodes and ad-free listening. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In today’s episode David discusses Ayn Rand’s insanely long and insanely influential Atlas Shrugged (1957), the bible of free-market entrepreneurialism and source book to this day for vicious anti-socialist polemics. Why is this novel so adored by Silicon Valley tech titans? How can something so bad have so much lasting power? And what did Rand have against her arch-villain Robert Oppenheimer? Tomorrow: Salman Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children Find out more about Past Present Future on our new website www.ppfideas.com where you can also join PPF+ to get bonus episodes and ad-free listening. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Our ninth Great Political Fiction is Bertolt Brecht’s classic anti-war play, written in 1939 at the start of one terrible European war but set in the time of another: the Thirty Years’ War of the 17th century. How did Brecht think a three-hundred-year gap could help us to understand our own capacity for violence and cruelty? Why did he make Mother Courage such an unlovable character? Why do we feel for her plight anyway? And what can we do about it? Tomorrow: Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged Find out more about Past Present Future on our new website www.ppfideas.com where you can also join PPF+ to get bonus episodes and ad-free listening. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Our eighth Great Political Fiction is H. G. Wells’ The Time Machine (1895) which isn’t just a book about time travel. It’s also full of late-19th century fear and paranoia about what evolution and progress might do to human beings in the long run. Why will the class struggle turn into savagery and human sacrifice? Who will end up on top? And how will the world ultimately end? Tomorrow: Bertolt Brecht’s Mother Courage & Her Children Find out more about Past Present Future on our new website www.ppfideas.com where you can also join PPF+ to get bonus episodes and ad-free listening. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s Great Political Fiction is Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1886) - a story that it’s easy to know without really knowing it at all. David explores all the ways that Robert Louis Stevenson’s tale confounds our expectations about good and evil. What does Dr Jekyll really want? What are all the men in the book trying to hide? And what has any of this got to do with Q-Anon and Hillary Clinton? Tomorrow: H. G. Wells’ The Time Machine Find out more about Past Present Future on our new website www.ppfideas.com where you can also join PPF+ to get bonus episodes and ad-free listening. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The sixth Great Political Fiction in our summer re-release is Anthony Trollope’s Phineas Redux (1874), his lightly and luridly fictionalised account of parliamentary polarisation in the age of Gladstone and Disraeli. A tale of political and personal melodrama, it explores what happens when political parties steal each other’s clothes and politicians find themselves hung out to dry by their colleagues. A story of integrity and hypocrisy and how hard it is to tell them apart. Tomorrow: Robert Louis Stevenson’s Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde Find out more about Past Present Future on our new website www.ppfideas.com where you can also join PPF+ to get bonus episodes and ad-free listening. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This second episode about George Eliot’s masterpiece explores questions of politics and religion, reputation and deception, truth and public opinion. What is the relationship between personal power and faith in a higher power? Is it ever possible to escape from the gossip of your friends once it turns against you? Who can rescue the ambitious when their ambitions are their undoing? Tomorrow: Anthony Trollope’s Phineas Redux Find out more about Past Present Future on our new website www.ppfideas.com where you can also join PPF+ to get bonus episodes and ad-free listening. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s Great Political Fiction is George Eliot’s Middlemarch (1872), which has so much going on that it needs two episodes to unpack it. In this episode David discusses the significance of the book being set in 1829-32 and the reasons why Nietzsche was so wrong to characterise it as a moralistic tale. Plus he explains why a book about personal relationships is also a deeply political novel. Also today: Middlemarch Part 2 Tomorrow: Anthony Trollope’s Phineas Redux Find out more about Past Present Future on our new website www.ppfideas.com where you can also join PPF+ to get bonus episodes and ad-free listening. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Our fourth Great Political Fiction is Ivan Turgenev’s Fathers and Sons (1862), the definitive novel about the politics – and emotions – of intergenerational conflict. How did Turgenev manage to write a wistful novel about nihilism? What made Russian politics in the early 1860s so chock-full of frustration? Why did Turgenev’s book infuriate his contemporaries – including Dostoyevsky? Tomorrow: George Eliot’s Middlemarch Parts 1 & 2 Find out more about Past Present Future on our new website www.ppfideas.com where you can also join PPF+ to get bonus episodes and ad-free listening. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Our third Great Political Fiction is Friedrich Schiller’s monumental play Mary Stuart (1800), which lays bare the impossible choices faced by two queens – Elizabeth I of England and Mary Queen of Scots – in a world of men. Schiller imagines a meeting between them that never took place and unpicks its fearsome consequences. Why does it do such damage to them both? How does the powerless Mary maintain her hold over the imperious Elizabeth? Who suffers most in the end and what is that suffering really worth? Tomorrow: Ivan Turgenev’s Fathers and Sons Find out more about Past Present Future on our new website www.ppfideas.com where you can also join PPF+ to get bonus episodes and ad-free listening. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode on the Great Political Fictions is about Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels (1726) – part adventure story, part satire of early-eighteenth-century party politics, but above all a coruscating reflection on the failures of human perspective and self-knowledge. Why do we find it so hard to see ourselves for who we really are? What makes us so vulnerable to mindless feuds and wild conspiracy theories? And what could we learn from the talking horses? Tomorrow: Friedrich Schiller’s Mary Stuart Find out more about Past Present Future on our new website www.ppfideas.com where you can also join PPF+ to get bonus episodes and ad-free listening. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In the first episode of the summer daily re-release of our series on the Great Political Fictions, David talks about Shakespeare’s Coriolanus (1608-9), the last of his tragedies and perhaps his most politically contentious play. Why has Coriolanus been subject to so many wildly different political interpretations? Is pride really the tragic flaw of the military monster at its heart? What does it say about the struggle between elite power and popular resistance and about the limits of political argument? Tomorrow: Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels Find out more about Past Present Future on our new website www.ppfideas.com where you can also join PPF+ to get bonus episodes and ad-free listening. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What If… The Vietnam War Had Ended in 1964? For our latest counterfactual David talks to historian Thant Myint-U about his grandfather U Thant, UN Secretary General for most of the 1960s and the man who might have ended the Vietnam War before it really got started. How close did U Thant get to bringing LBJ and the Vietcong to the negotiating table in 1964? What ultimately scuppered his chances? And how differently might the Cold War have turned out if he had succeeded? Sign up now to PPF+ to get ad-free listening and all our bonus episodes: available now a new bonus on Michel Houellebecq’s explosive political fiction Submission www.ppfideas.com  Coming soon: More What Ifs… on WWI, the Russian Revolution and the Fall of the Berlin Wall. Up next: Fifteen Fiction for Summer from Coriolanus to Hamilton   Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today’s episode explores one of the big counterfactuals of twentieth-century American politics: David talks to historian Benn Steil about how close the ultraliberal Henry Wallace came to being FDR’s running mate in 1944 and successor as president in 1945. How near did Wallace get to making it onto the ticket at the 1944 Democratic National Convention? Who or what stopped him? What would his presidency have meant for the Cold War and the nuclear arms race? Was getting President Truman instead a missed opportunity or a lucky escape? Sign up now to PPF+ to get ad-free listening and all our bonus episodes: coming very soon a new bonus on Michel Houellebecq’s explosive political fiction Submission www.ppfideas.com  Next time: What if… the Vietnam War had ended in 1964? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For our second episode on big historical counterfactuals, David talks to world historian Ayse Zarakol about how the East might well have risen to global dominance before the West. What if the key revolutions of the modern world – political and industrial – had happened in Asia first? What if there had been an Iranian Napoleon? And how much of our understanding of modern history is based on the biases of hindsight? Sign up now to PPF+ to get ad-free listening and all our bonus episodes: 24 bonuses per year for just £5 a month or a £50 annual subscription www.ppfideas.com  Next time: What if… Henry Wallace had become American President in 1945? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

To kick off our new series on counterfactual histories David talks to the geneticist and science writer Adam Rutherford about whether ‘What Ifs’ make sense in science. If one person doesn’t make the big discovery, will someone else do it? Are scientific breakthroughs the product of genius or of wealth and power? And how might the world have been a completely different place if the Haber-Bosch process had not been developed in Germany in 1913? Sign up now to PPF+ to get ad-free listening and all our bonus episodes: 24 bonuses per year for just £5 a month or a £50 annual subscription www.ppfideas.com  Next time: What if… the French Revolution had happened in China? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Something different for our last episode on the Great Political Fictions as this time David talks to the person who wrote it: Tim Rice, the lyricist of the epic musical about the life of Eva Peron, Evita (co-written with Andrew Lloyd-Webber). Where did the idea for such an unlikely subject come from? Why has it struck a chord with politicians from Thatcher to Trump? What does it say about the relationship between celebrity, populism and power? Sign up now to PPF+ to get ad-free listening and all our bonus episodes – including a new bonus episode on Philip Roth’s The Plot Against America www.ppfideas.com  Next time: Adam Rutherford on counterfactual science to kick off our new series on ‘What Ifs…’ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

David talks to the writer and broadcaster Helen Lewis about Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird (1960), one of the most widely read and best-loved novels of the twentieth century, and in the twenty-first century increasingly one of the most controversial. Is the book an attack on or an apology for Southern racism? How does its view of race relate to the picture it paints of class and caste in 1930s Alabama? And what on earth are we to make of the recently published prequel/sequel Go Set A Watchman? Plus we discuss Demon Copperhead, JD Vance, and more. Sign up now to PPF+ to get ad-free listening and all our bonus episodes – including a new bonus episode on Philip Roth’s The Plot Against America www.ppfideas.com  Our free fortnightly newsletter will be out tomorrow, including more to read, watch and listen to about To Kill A Mockingbird – just sign up here https://linktr.ee/ppfideas Next time: Tim Rice talks about Evita Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The writer and political philosopher Lea Ypi talks about the impact on her of Henrik Ibsen’s The Wild Duck (1884), which she first read when she was eight – thinking it was a children’s book (it isn’t!) – and has been returning to ever since. A play about family and betrayal, idealism and disappointment, temptation and self-destruction, is it also a parable about the illusions of politics? And how might it shake a person’s faith? Sign up now to PPF+ to get ad-free listening and all our bonus episodes – coming soon a special bonus episode on Philip Roth’s The Plot Against America www.ppfideas.com   Next time: Helen Lewis on To Kill A Mockingbird Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

David talks to Mark Ford and Seamus Perry, hosts of the LRB’s Close Readings poetry podcast, about what makes a great political poem. Can great poetry be ideological? How much does context matter? And is it possible to tell political truths in verse? From Yeats’s ‘Easter 1916’ to Owen’s ‘Strange Meeting’ to Auden’s ‘Spain 1937’: a conversation about political conviction and poetic ambiguity. To find out more about Close Readings and how to subscribe, just visit the LRB’s website https://www.lrb.co.uk/podcasts-and-videos/podcasts/close-readings Sign up now to PPF+ to get ad-free listening and all our bonus episodes – including bonuses on the Great Political Fictions www.ppfideas.com Next time: Lea Ypi on Ibsen’s The Wild Duck Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week we check back in with Gary Gerstle to discuss what’s been happening in American politics after a tumultuous week. What does it say about Trump’s electoral strategy that he picked J.D. Vance as his running mate? How would the Republican party have coped if the assassin’s bullet hadn’t missed? Who might replace Biden at the top of the Democratic ticket and how? Plus, what fate lies in store for Bidenomics if Trump plasters his name all over it? Our free fortnightly newsletter is out now, including reflections on Biden’s and America’s looming choices – just sign up here https://linktr.ee/ppfideas And sign up to PPF+ to get all our bonus episodes along with ad-free listening: available now for PPF+ subscribers, Robert Saunders on his favourite political novel, George Eliot’s Felix Holt Next time: The Great Political Poems Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Our series concludes with a musical: Lin-Manuel Miranda’s wildly popular and increasingly controversial Hamilton (2015). What does it get right and what does it get wrong about America’s founding fathers? How fair is it to judge a Broadway musical by the standards of academic history? And why does a product of the Obama era still resonate so powerfully in the age of Trump and Biden? The latest edition of our free fortnightly newsletter - which accompanies the last three episodes in this Fictions series including Hamilton - is out tomorrow, with lots of extra info, clips and reflections – just sign up here: https://linktr.ee/ppfideas And sign up now to PPF+ to get all our bonus episodes along with ad-free listening: coming very soon for PPF+ subscribers Robert Saunders on his favourite political novel plus a special episode on Evita: www.ppfideas.com Next time: Gary Gerstle on the Republican National Convention Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The penultimate episode in our fictions series is about Curtis Sittenfeld’s American Wife (2008), which re-imagines the life of First Lady Laura Bush. One of the great novels about the intimacy of power and the accidents of politics, it sticks to the historical record while radically retelling it. What does the standard version leave out about the Bush presidency? How does an ordinary life become an extraordinary one? And where is the line between fact and fiction? Sign up now to PPF+ to get all our bonus episodes along with ad-free listening: coming soon for PPF+ subscribers Robert Saunders on his favourite political novel plus a special episode on Evita: www.ppfideas.com Next time: Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Hamilton Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Our political fictions series returns with Alan Hollinghurst’s The Line of Beauty (2004), which is set between Thatcher’s two dominant general election victories of 1983 and 1987. A novel about the intersection between gay life and Tory life, high politics and low conduct, beauty and betrayal, it explores the price of power and the risks of liberation. It also contains perhaps the greatest of all fictional portrayals of a real-life prime minster: Thatcher dancing the night away. Sign up now to PPF+ to get all our bonus episodes along with ad-free listening: coming soon for PPF+ subscribers Robert Saunders on his favourite political novel plus a special episode on Evita: www.ppfideas.com Next time: Curtis Sittenfeld re-imagines Laura Bush in American Wife Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

To wrap up our series David and Robert attempt some instant history on the election result that’s just happened: in some ways predictable, in others utterly remarkable. What does such a big win for Labour on such a relatively small vote mean? What’s happening in Scotland? Where next for the Tories? And is the UK now an outlier in a world of increasing political turmoil, or is the turmoil just under the surface here too? Our free fortnightly newsletter to accompany this series is out now, with fact, figures, clips and reflections on all these elections and more – just sign up here: https://linktr.ee/ppfideas To hear our bonus episode on the epochal election of 1924 sign up now to PPF+ and you’ll get ad-free listening plus all past, present and future bonuses too: www.ppfideas.com Coming Up: More Great Political Fictions Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For election day, David and Robert discuss the previous general election in December 2019, which saw Boris Johnson win a decisive victory under the slogan ‘Get Brexit Done’. How did he (or Dominic Cummings) do it? Was Corbyn to blame for Labour’s defeat? And how the hell did the Tories get from that resounding victory to their current disarray in just 4½ years? To get our free fortnightly newsletter to accompany this series, with fact, figures, clips and reflections on all these elections and more, just sign up via the Newsletter button here: https://linktr.ee/ppfideas To hear our bonus episode on the epochal election of 1924 sign up now to PPF+ and you’ll get ad-free listening plus all past, present and future bonuses too: www.ppfideas.com Coming next: 2024 – What Happened? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices