04 March 2002
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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
Lord Snooty and his party pals
New Labour began as a clique, and has governed as a clique, excluding those outside a magic circle. That's why so many people hate Byers
Features
Designer babies and other fairy tales
When states ban contraception or second children or fertility treatment, the female body, once a private matter, becomes a public issue
How to make the traffic flow
A C Graylingthinks his scheme for London's cars is better than Ken Livingstone's
How Mugabe resisted arrest
"His face turned ashen." Peter Tatchell recalls his attempt to bring a tyrant to justice
The poor, alas, are still with us
Another big international conference on how to beat poverty starts any day now. But don't hold your breath for results, advises Barbara Gunnell
Take cover: the English are coming!
Japan, whose football fans stay behind after matches to clear away litter, lives in terror of the hooligans expected for this year's World Cup
IDS: rising from the ashes?
"He's done the Carlton Club, he's done the Monday Club," a shadow minister says. Edward Vaizey finds the Tory leader edging towards a more liberal stance
When the dollars run out
Belize keeps selling off its assets to foreign companies. Now the country is bleeding itself dry to pay electricity, telephone and water bills
Essay
The New Statesman Essay - Mad, bad and dangerous
Whether it's the MMR vaccine or GM foods, people distrust what scientists tell them. And they are perfectly right to do so
Culture
The common man
For Studs Terkel, chronicler of everyday life, history is in the people. Matthew Dodd considers the long career of the man who interviewed America
Hard cell
Buildings - Razor Smith gives an insider's view of a glossy account of prison architecture
Self-made man
Art - Sue Hubbard on a man who takes apart conventional models of beauty and humanity
Film
Just a pretty face
Film - Philip Kerr is not impressed by a formulaic story about a mad mathematical genius
Television
One step forward . . .
Television - Andrew Billen finds that black comedy in America is streets ahead
Books
The man who would be king. Noble and insufferable, arrogant and generous, blimp and radical in one person - such is the ambiguous popular reputation of Kipling half a century after his death. By Jan Morris
The Long Recessional: the imperial life of Rudyard Kipling David Gilmour John Murray, 351pp, £22.50 ISBN 0712665188
The mind of a toy
Living Dolls: a magical history of the quest for mechanical life Gaby Wood Faber and Faber, 278pp, £12.99 ISBN 0571178790
Girls on top
Fingersmith Sarah Waters Virago, 416pp, £12.99 ISBN 1860498825
Hurtling towards ruin
Rainbow's End: the crash of 1929 Maury Klein Oxford University Press, 366pp, £22.99 ISBN 0195135164
Wings of desire
The Birds of Heaven: Travels with Cranes Peter Matthiessen Harvill, 350pp, £20 The Snow Geese William Fiennes Picador, 246pp, £14.99
Novel of the week
Address Unknown Kressmann Taylor Souvenir Press, 64pp, £6.99 ISBN 0743412710
Mark of identity
Fingerprints: murder and the race to uncover the science of identity Colin Beavan Fourth Estate, 232pp, £14.99 ISBN 1841157392
A song for Jo
Jo Grimond: Towards the Sound of Gunfire Michael McManus Birlinn, 460pp, £20 ISBN 1902301544
Paperback reader
The Horned Man James Lasdun Jonathan Cape, 195pp, £10.99 ISBN 0224062174
Commentary - Literature in the secret garden
Jason Cowley on "an intimate jewel of a place" where readers meet writers
