22 March 2004
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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
After Madrid, does urban life have a future?
Cities soon bounced back from 9/11 and, despite repeated warnings of terror attacks, are now said to be enjoying a renaissance. Eric Klinenberg asks if they will survive this latest shock
Features
Iraq has made the Chancellor timid
Brown is moving reluctantly towards Blair's position on income tax: for a third election, pledges of no rise in the basic or top rates. The war has made it hard to set a radical agenda on redistribution
Serious television? If only . . .
David Cox finds that when the BBC tackles weighty subjects, it still ends up with triviality
The return of the Taliban
Liberated women? The chief justice wants to ban women from driving. That's not the only way in which the reality in Afghanistan falls short of US claims
Essay
NS Essay - 'There will never be any other industry that can employ as many people as farming'
By 2050, six billion people will live in cities - as many as now live on the whole earth. At least a billion of them will live in slums. Cities aren't coping and we should accept that the future is mainly agrarian
Regulars
John Pilger on terror in Palestine
No front pages in the west mourn victims of the enduring bloodbath in occupied Palestine, the equivalent of the Madrid horror week after week, month after month
Darcus Howe warnds against the white vampires
Beware of whites who think that we are savages incapable of organising ourselves
Competition
Win vouchers to spend at any Tesco store
Culture
Guest editor Estelle Morris, Minister for the Arts
No one pulls their punches in a unique debate between luminaries of the arts world and the minister in charge of supporting them
State of the arts
The "Ministry of Fun" was hailed as one of John Major's "big ideas", offering "a fundamental vision of the kind of society that he wants Britain to be". Twelve years, two governments and six secretaries of state later, how has it fared?
Held to account
Is the Arts Council an unwieldy bureaucracy or an effective vehicle for funding cultural diversity? Its new head, Christopher Frayling, presents the case for its defence against the scathing prosecution of the cultural critic Norman Lebrecht
Whitehall's best-kept secret
What hangs on the walls of No 10? Hunting prints and portraits of 18th-century politicians have been replaced by Damien Hirst and a painting of Darcey Bussell. Richard Cork visits the Government Art Collection
Supporting roles
Serving in Dunkin' Donuts, working at a post office, selling dodgy cars, stuffing chickens or eating fire - many of our creative stars have a much less glamorous past than you might think
Gateway to England
With its stunning buildings and cosmopolitan character, Liverpool deserves the title of European Capital of Culture 2008. Loyd Grossman celebrates the rebirth of a great city
Estelle Morris's ten unanswerable questions in the arts
Here, in no particular order - and with tongue partly in cheek - are my ten unanswerable questions in the arts. Nothing at all to do with the quality of the work - as arts minister, I resist commenting on individual productions or works of art, however strong the temptation. These are all about the experience of enjoying the arts
Theatre
Michael Portillo - The sky's the limit
Theatre - The most spectacular show this year - and the stars are schoolchildren writes Michael Portillo Safahr: telling tales of a journey Hippodrome, Birmingham B5
Television
Andrew Billen - Skin deep
Television - Black people are finally aesthetically acceptable in fashion and the arts, writes Andrew Billen When Black Became Beautiful (BBC2)
The Fan
The fan - Hunter Davies on Chealsea's latest recruit, aged eight
Miles has a contract and a transfer value of £2,000. He's aged eight
Books
The secret of success. Status, which costs nothing in cash, is just as important as profit and pay to the modern worker. This requires the left to think again about its approach to bourgeois false consciousness, argues Andrew Roberts
Status Anxiety Alain de Botton Hamish Hamilton, 320pp, £16.99 ISBN 0241142393
Out of focus
Bill Brandt: a life Paul Delany Jonathan Cape, 335pp, £35 ISBN 0804750033
The real thing
Pop: truth and power at the Coca-Cola company Constance Hays Hutchinson, 398pp, £18.99 ISBN 0091799686
Fiction - A world of tricks
Cloud Atlas David Mitchell Sceptre, 544pp, £16.99 ISBN 0375507256
