21 January 2008
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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
Art attack
Banksy attracts the press attention, but around him is an increasingly influential movement of political artists operating outside the mainstream
Features
Interview: David Miliband
The foreign secretary explains he has identified four great progressive causes for the world.
I had no choice but to leak
In the wake of having his case thrown out at the Old Bailey, Derek Pasquill reveals the story behind his whistleblowing
The curse of South Africa
Mineral wealth has distorted the economy for generations. Moeletsi Mbeki, brother of South Africa's president on why people want jobs not handouts
Shattered lives
Last year, 26 people, mostly young men, were killed in gang-related shootings in London. Each death wrecks a family and tears the heart out of a community
Regulars
The Politics Column
My questions for Ken
London's mayor must be open to legitimate scrutiny writes NS political editor Martin Bright who has been conducting an investigation for Dispatches
Commons Confidential
Gobby, Sticky or Monksy for Labour?
All the gossip from the Westminster Village
Tender truth about my sheep
After the past fortnight of heavy-duty TV food terrorism, even more of us will worry about where our next meal is coming from
Crystal-ball gazing No 4010
Set by John O'Byrne "For me 2007 has been the year of the historians," wrote David Marquand in the NS. We asked you to fast-forward 12 months to 2009 and provide a TV historian's take on 2008
Culture
Culture of destruction
McGovern has chronicled life in working-class areas of Britain for television. Now he is fighting to save Edge Lane in Liverpool from demolition.
At home with a Viking
Philip Glass recalls a tumultuous year sharing his house in New York with the maverick composer Moondog
Performance
The Big Gig begins
If our city really has risen again, why do we need to keep being told so?
Film
Welcome to the fight club
The Coen brothers' critique of violence seems hypocritical, given all the carnage
Books
Touched by genius
A Madman Dreams of Turing Machines Janna Levin, Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 240pp, £14.99
The road to wisdom
Nicholas Maxwell on why a new kind of learning is needed to better our lives
Publish and be damned
The literary journal Granta started as an act of rebellion, and ended up as the Establishment. It must shake things up again if it is to survive in the 21st century
Land of the blessed
The Geography of Bliss: One Grump's Search for the Happiest Places in the World Eric Weiner Twelve, 329pp, $25.99
Talking to the enemy
North Korea on the Brink: Struggle for Survival Glyn Ford and Soyoung Kwon Pluto Press, 256pp, £18.99
The great escape
The Happiest Man in the World Alec Wilkinson Vintage, 301pp, £8.99
Mark Oliver Everett
Everett, aka “E”, is lead singer in the rock group Eels. His memoir, “Things the Grandchildren Should Know”, is out now (Little, Brown, £14.99)
Observations
Obama can win the race
In Britain, we fail to understand how deep the fissures around race in America can be. Before the end of this election, all efforts will be used to discredit Obama
