26 February 2007
Become a subscriber and save £££
Subscribe to the New Statesman for just £82 and receive a free copy of Roy Hattersley’s In Search of England(Hardcover)
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
Secrets, lies and diplomats
We know next to nothing of how our overseas embassy staff operate in our name. In an astonishing exposé, a former high-flying official reveals the vanity, elitism and lack of moral purpose in Britain's diplomatic service
Features
Come back, euro - all is forgiven
In one area, David Cameron refuses to budge from old certainties - the single currency. Here, a Tory moderniser announces his own conversion, and urges his party to think again
Interview: Alan Johnson
The one-time postman became the Labour darling of the Tory press as he contemplated the top job. But what would he be like as Brown's number two?
Our failure in Afghanistan
Western leaders have not been realistic about what "winning" means. On the ground, it's clear that any progress will be slow and very fragile
The price of being fair
Consumers are keen to buy fairly traded goods and the higher prices we are prepared to pay can be a force in reducing poverty. But Fairtrade's success may put farmers at risk
North Korea: survival means slavery
Many North Koreans are so desperate to escape the country that they are prepared to risk their lives. For women the choice is stark: to die of hunger or be sold as brides in China.
Time Out with Nick Cohen
Nick Cohen meets Simon Baron-Cohen, Cambridge professor of developmental psychopathology.
Regulars
Commons Confidential
Don't kiss the ring
Team Benn shares initials with a fatal disease. Worse still, it shares them with the PM
Looking for truth among the lies
Trying to find some reality among all the strong emotions that the issues of Israel and Palestine throw up
Omid's week
In Sheffield, I was served chicken shish by an Iranian man who was also called Omid Djalili. Bizarre
The isms fight back No 3966
The Archbishop of York recently criticised what he referred to as "aggressive secularism". We asked for a clear definition of this or other isms, saying what harm they could do to society. Set by Dipak Ghosh
Culture
Fraud
Gilbert and George's work is seen to be gritty and provocative. But in fact it owes its international reputation to the sycophancy of the art world
African dreams
The continent must express itself on film, Danny Glover and Abderrahmane Sissako tell Vanessa Walters
Theatre
A taste of the high life
Classy Sixties farce delivers laughter with manicured precision Boeing-Boeing Comedy Theatre, London SW1
Film
Sit down, and I'll tell you a story
A spectacularly intense fantasy is the pick of the Berlin festival crop 57th Berlin International Film Festival, 8-18 February 2007
Television
Breathing life into dead poets
Melvyn Bragg may deprive ITV of its reputation as the stupid channel The South Bank Show ITV1
Books
Voice of the Middle East?
Alaa Al Aswany's controversial novel The Yacoubian Building has taken the Arab world by storm. He talks to Rachel Aspden.
Culture industry
Chuck Klosterman IV: a decade of curious people and dangerous ideas Chuck Klosterman Faber & Faber, 260pp, £12.99 ISBN 0571233996
Anatomy of a life
Digging up the Dead: uncovering the life and times of an extraordinary surgeon Druin Burch Chatto & Windus, 288pp, £20 ISBN 0701179856
Our friends in the north
Pies and Prejudice: in search of the north Stuart Maconie Ebury, 338pp, £11.99 ISBN 0091910226
Power politics
The Great Man: Sir Robert Walpole - scoundrel, genius and Britain's first prime minister Edward Pearce Jonathan Cape, 496pp, £25 ISBN 0224071815
Village of the damned
Animal's People Indra Sinha Simon & Schuster, 374pp, £11.99 ISBN 0743259203
Don't forget to write
John Sutherland on a charming farewell from O J Simpson's publisher
Losing the plot
The Peacock Throne Sujit Saraf Sceptre, 768pp, £12.99 ISBN 0340899697
A family affair
Dynasties: fortune and misfortune in the world's great family businesses David Landes Viking, 400pp, £25 ISBN 0670885312
