22 November 1999
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From the Editor…
Welcome to the New Statesman website. Whether you are a new reader or an existing one - online or via the magazine - I hope you'll enjoy the great writing, fresh ideas and provocative debate that make the New Statesman Britain's award-winning current affairs weekly
Cover story
Post-politics - It's not the economy, stupid!
The nineties - Fox-hunting, GM food, the environment - the political parties have not kept up with public values
Features
Rudy to Ken: come out fighting
London's mayoral hopefuls should study New York, where Mayor Giuliani has made a career out of populist contrariness
Behind the great plastic duck panic
Greenpeace says toys and garden hoses are bad for you. Nonsense, arguesJames Le Fanu
Get online for the first e-Christmas
Helen Wilkinson argues that, for the sake of the economy, we need more women on the net
Why our beef troubles the French soul
David Lawdaydoes his best to explain a nation that fusses over food but flocks to McDonald's
Blair's MPs: sheep who can bark
This PLP is one of the least rebellious ever. But it's not spineless, reveals Philip Cowley
There's a food fight in Seattle
The demands of American agribusiness are controlling the agenda at this month's meeting of the world's trade ministers
Worth more than two tins of beans
British literacy levels are low, but innumeracy is what really holds us back. ByRichard Layard
Tears - No longer a crying shame
The nineties - Gazza kicked off a trend that saw presidents and prime ministers weeping publicly
The Simpsons - Better than a Booker any time
The nineties - High art is no good, but a popular cartoon has originality, wit, truth and technical brilliance
The web - Nothing will ever be the same again. Or will it?
The nineties - The web's impact is supposed to be as great as that of the Industrial Revolution. But Tom Hollandis not yet convinced
Celebrity - Worshippers at the shrine of St Tara of Klosters
The nineties - Fame looks like the new religion. But, argues Suzanne Moore, we pick and choose famous people like any other consumer products
Formula fun - Relaxation? Such hard work!
The nineties - Recreation has never been so complicated, or leisure so carefully scheduled, complains Stephen Bayley
The wimp - It's been tough for the boys
The nineties - Men feel undervalued, but they should thank feminists for bringing them out of their shells, argues Nicci French
A bitter pill for the Tartan Army
New Statesman Scotland
Too many lives of quiet desperation
New Statesman Scotland - The suicide rate among young men has soared in the past 20 years, and is still growing. A case for joined-up thinking, argues Claire Walker
From Anchor Close to cyberspace
New Statesman Scotland - The Encyclopaedia Britannica is now free on the Internet. But it started in Edinburgh in 1768 and Peter Clarke asks why the city doesn't celebrate it
This Alba
New Statesman Scotland
Grassroots
New Statesman Scotland
Primary Tartan
New Statesman Scotland
Arts & Culture
Common as muck
The French cattle-feed scandal is just the latest calamity to befall agriculture in Europe. Colin Tudge thinks it's high time we rewrote the farming rulebook
Hands on
Classical - Dermot Clinch watches the great pianists on film
Lester leaves town
Jazz - Richard Cook on the recorded legacy of a tragic genius
Slice of life
Design - Hugh Aldersey-Williams on the cold and spiritual shape of the century
Books
News of the world. The best verse in English over the past 100 years has, as with fiction, been by writers from beyond these shores. Lavinia Greenlaw maps the poetic century
The Harvill Book of Twentieth-Century Poetry in English
Michael Schmidt (editor) Harvill, 728pp, £20
ISBN 1860463517
Scanning the Century: The Penguin Book of the Twentieth Century in Poetry
Peter Forbes (editor) Penguin, 596pp, £20
I travel
On Holiday: A History of Vacationing
Orvar Lofgren University of California Press, 370pp, £18.50
ISBN 0520217675
Favourite monarch
King Arthur and the Lost Kingdoms
Alistair Moffat Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 282pp, £20
ISBN 029764324X
Unnecessary war
Crimea: The Great Crimean War 1854-1856
Trevor Royle Little, Brown, 564pp, £22.50
ISBN 0316648493
Rackety life
Thackeray
D J Taylor Chatto & Windus, 494pp, £25
ISBN 0701162317
Novel of the week
Angelica's Grotto
Russell Hoban Bloomsbury, 271pp, £10
ISBN 0747546118
Tall stories
The Real James Herriot: The Authorised Biography
Jim Wight Michael Joseph, 371pp, £20
ISBN 071814290X
Observations
Letters to the Editor
New Statesman readers give their views - see what they said and find out how to contribute yourself by going to our letters pages
