Seventh and final podcast in the series on Race and Racism, theme of BoI charity’s event The Academy, held online in late 2020. 

In this episode we feature two talks that reflect on the emergence of a new elite and the institutionalisation of identity.

Lecturers: 
Inaya Folarin Iman, founder, Equiano Project and presenter, GB News
Frank Furedi, a sociologist, public intellectual and author including ‘Democracy Under Siege’ and ‘Why Borders Matter’

THE ACADEMY ONLINE II: RACE AND RACISM
The Academy II was a half day online event via zoom that took place in November 2020.  

To view the full programme and some suggested background reading to the talks, please visit  https://theboi.co.uk/the-academy-online-ii-race-and-racism 

For this lecture you may wish to read:- 
•	‘The Silent War: Imperialism and the Changing Perception of Race’ by Frank Furedi, Pluto Press, 1998 https://amzn.to/3v0REev   
•	‘We need to abolish race’ by Inaya Folarin Iman; Spiked, 4 August 2020, https://bit.ly/2P4KPt3  

THE ACADEMY
In the context of today’s instrumental approaches to knowledge, The Academy summer school is a modest attempt to demonstrate the value of scholarship, and of the worth of the university as a place of free enquiry dedicated to the pursuit of truth.

DONATING TO THE BOI CHARITY
The BOI charity is committed to continuing to host discussion and debates throughout this period when society is restricted by measures to tackle coronavirus. In order to realise events such as the Academy Online, none of our staff are furloughed and instead remain working. If you can, then please consider a donation, small or large. Visit: https://theboi.co.uk/donate 

IDEAS MATTER PODCAST
Ideas Matter is a podcast that takes the most important issues of our times and explores the ideas and intellectual trends that have shaped where we are today.

You can subscribe and listen to Ideas Matter on iTunes, Podbean, Spotify or SoundCloud. For full details of all episodes, visit the podcast page on our website

Keep up-to-date with Ideas Matter and all the initiatives organised by the Battle of Ideas charity by following us on Twitter (@theboi_uk) and on Facebook (battleofideas).

Ideas Matter: ‘The new elite and the institutionalisation of identity’

From the series ‘The elite: old and new’, theme of the boi charity’s event The Academy, held online in November 2021. 

In recent years, populist movements have thrived on a sense of anger at global elites who have distanced themselves from political control by their own national populations. The coronavirus pandemic has further served to suggest that the global system is extremely fragile. Yet, as betrayed by the likes of COP26 conference on climate change, the appetite for supranational decision-making is as strong as ever. This lecture examines the ‘globalist’ elite and their political culture of supranationalism, and asks what are its prospects are in a post-populist and post-pandemic world.

Lecture by Bruno Waterfield, Brussels correspondent, The Times

THE ACADEMY ONLINE IV: The elite: old and new
To view the full programme and some suggested background reading to the talks, please visit  https://theboi.co.uk/academy-online-iv  

ASSOCIATED READING / LISTENING 
For this lecture you may wish to read:- 
•	READ: Phil Mullan, Beyond Confrontation: Globalists, Nationalists and Their Discontents https://amzn.to/3dCspbF 
•	READ: Hannah Arendt, Truth and Politics, The New Yorker, 1967 https://bit.ly/3GADGpd  

THE ACADEMY
In the context of today’s instrumental approaches to knowledge, The Academy summer school is a modest attempt to demonstrate the value of scholarship, and of the worth of the university as a place of free enquiry dedicated to the pursuit of truth.

DONATING TO THE BOI CHARITY
The BOI charity is committed to continuing to host discussion and debates throughout this period when society is restricted by measures to tackle coronavirus. In order to help us realise events such as the Academy Online, please consider a donation, small or large. Visit: https://theboi.co.uk/donate 

IDEAS MATTER PODCAST
Ideas Matter is a podcast that takes the most important issues of our times and explores the ideas and intellectual trends that have shaped where we are today.

You can subscribe and listen to Ideas Matter on iTunes, Podbean, Spotify or SoundCloud. For full details of all episodes, visit the podcast page on our website

Keep up-to-date with Ideas Matter and all the initiatives organised by the Battle of Ideas charity by following us on Twitter (@theboi_uk) and on Facebook (battleofideas).

Ideas Matter: ‘Globalism and the challenge to the international elite’

Ideas Matter: ‘Brideshead Revisited: World wars and the end of the old elite’

From the series ‘The elite: old and new’, theme of the boi charity’s event The Academy, held online in November 2021. 

Published in the weeks after VE day in 1945, just as British voters swept a Labour Government into power, Evelyn Waugh’s Brideshead Revisited was a surprise bestseller in both the UK and America, and captured the imagination of generations of readers. The story follows the life of Captain Charles Ryder and his fateful obsession with the aristocratic Flyte family as they slowly fall from grace and fortune during the interwar years. So how does Waugh make sense of the decline of the British establishment? Is the destruction of the old order, as one character has it, ‘all on account of the war’? What drove Waugh’s attacks on modernism? And what can the decline of the old elite tell us about the elite of today?

Lecture by Helen Searls, chief operating officer, Feature Story News (FSN); founder, Washington Hyenas’ Book Club

THE ACADEMY ONLINE IV: The elite: old and new
To view the full programme and some suggested background reading to the talks, please visit  https://theboi.co.uk/academy-online-iv  

ASSOCIATED READING 
For this lecture you may wish to read:- 
•	READ: Evelyn Waugh, Brideshead Revisited, 1945  https://amzn.to/3pjY4VY  
•	READ: Frank Furedi, First World War: Still No End in Sight, 2013 https://amzn.to/3JaMqV9   

THE ACADEMY
In the context of today’s instrumental approaches to knowledge, The Academy summer school is a modest attempt to demonstrate the value of scholarship, and of the worth of the university as a place of free enquiry dedicated to the pursuit of truth.

DONATING TO THE BOI CHARITY
The BOI charity is committed to continuing to host discussion and debates throughout this period when society is restricted by measures to tackle coronavirus. In order to help us realise events such as the Academy Online, please consider a donation, small or large. Visit: https://theboi.co.uk/donate 

IDEAS MATTER PODCAST
Ideas Matter is a podcast that takes the most important issues of our times and explores the ideas and intellectual trends that have shaped where we are today.

You can subscribe and listen to Ideas Matter on iTunes, Podbean, Spotify or SoundCloud. For full details of all episodes, visit the podcast page on our website

Keep up-to-date with Ideas Matter and all the initiatives organised by the Battle of Ideas charity by following us on Twitter (@theboi_uk) and on Facebook (battleofideas).

Ideas Matter: ‘Brideshead Revisited: World wars and the end of the old elite’

From the series ‘The elite: old and new’, theme of the boi charity’s event The Academy, held online in November 2021. 

The term ‘professional managerial class’ was coined in 1977. Thinkers on both left and right have drawn attention to the rise (and rise) of a seemingly new group in society who neither labour in traditional occupations nor own significant amounts of capital. This group of salaried professionals – in the civil service, education, management, public relations, public health etc. – not only increasingly manage the key institutions of society. They are also said to exert a social and ideological influence, promoting ‘progressive’ campaigns around gender, sexual, racial, and other identity causes. But who are this group? Can it really be said to be a ‘class’, and how do they differ from more familiar elites?

Lecture by Catherine Liu, professor of film and media studies, University of California Irvine, and the author of ‘Virtue Hoarders: the case against the professional managerial class’

THE ACADEMY ONLINE IV: The elite: old and new
To view the full programme and some suggested background reading to the talks, please visit  https://theboi.co.uk/academy-online-iv  

ASSOCIATED READING 
For this lecture you may wish to read:- 
•	READ: Barbara and John Ehrenreich, The Professional Managerial Class in Radical America, Vol 11, No. 2, 1977 (pdf) https://library.brown.edu/pdfs/1125403552886481.pdf  
•	READ: Catherine Liu, Virtue Hoarders: the case against the professional managerial class, 2021 https://amzn.to/3ehMCDS    

THE ACADEMY
In the context of today’s instrumental approaches to knowledge, The Academy summer school is a modest attempt to demonstrate the value of scholarship, and of the worth of the university as a place of free enquiry dedicated to the pursuit of truth.

DONATING TO THE BOI CHARITY
The BOI charity is committed to continuing to host discussion and debates throughout this period when society is restricted by measures to tackle coronavirus. In order to help us realise events such as the Academy Online, please consider a donation, small or large. Visit: https://theboi.co.uk/donate 

IDEAS MATTER PODCAST
Ideas Matter is a podcast that takes the most important issues of our times and explores the ideas and intellectual trends that have shaped where we are today.

You can subscribe and listen to Ideas Matter on iTunes, Podbean, Spotify or SoundCloud. For full details of all episodes, visit the podcast page on our website

Keep up-to-date with Ideas Matter and all the initiatives organised by the Battle of Ideas charity by following us on Twitter (@theboi_uk) and on Facebook (battleofideas).

Ideas Matter: ‘What’s wrong with the Professional Managerial Class?’

The theme of this year's The Academy, the weekend residential summer school, is ‘Old Roots of the New Disorder’. The event takes place on 16/17 July. 

In this special podcast, The Academy convenor Jacob Reynolds talks to Professor Frank Furedi, keynote lecturer, about why at a time when the geo-political and economic crisis afflicts all dimensions of human existence, The Academy represents an opportunity to gain clarity about our predicament. 

With the shake-up in geopolitics, we put current events in context through a weekend of lectures and discussions. We’ll look to history, literature and philosophy and feature plenary discussions on the origins and breakdown of the post-Cold War era and fatalism and the challenges to agency today. There will also be discussions on history and literature from the Battle of Marathon and the Hungarian Revolution to Ulysses and the modernist solution to Houellebecq and the misery of post-Modernism.

Bringing together people of all ages and backgrounds, this is an unmissable event for all those who want to get to grips with a changing world.  If you’d like to join us for a weekend of stimulating debate in a beautiful location, book your tickets at https://theboi.co.uk/the-academy-2022-the-old-roots-of-new-normal

Ideas Matter: Old Roots of the New Disorder – Academy 2022 teaser

Initiated in 2015, Debating Matters Beyond Bars is a project which takes DM's schools-debating format inside prisons. Using our acclaimed substance-over-style format, teams of prisoners engage in debate with one another on a whole range of contemporary social, political and cultural topics. The programme aims to inspire them to think about issues beyond their current situation and to look forward to their life ahead – in other words, beyond bars!

In this podcast, Mo Lovatt - DM's national coordinator - and Geoff Kidder sat down with former Beyond Bars competitor Jon Floyd to discuss the impact the programme had on him when he took part in 2015 while he was serving his sentence. We were also joined by Heather Phillips, the chief executive of Beating Time, which runs, amongst other things, Inside Job – an employment programme she set up with Jon in 2020. 

For Jon, taking part in Beyond Bars was the catalyst for starting that programme with Heather as well as a whole range of initiatives he’s been involved with since 2015. As he says in the podcast, Beyond Bars gave him a purposeful activity, helped him change direction and kickstarted his journey of rehabilitation.

The Politics of Desire

Debating Matters Beyond Bars: Jon Floyd and Heather Phillips

Living Freedom Forum in London in April explored Artificial Intelligence and the implications for freedom.  Generative AI like ChatGPT and Midjourney have captured the public imagination and barely a day now passes without claim and counter-claim as to benefits or threats posed by artificial intelligence. But what actually is generative technology? How have we come to realise this new technology? And what are the potential benefits and threats? 

Speaker: Sandy Starr, deputy director of the Progress Educational Trust

To find out more about Living Freedom visit https://livingfreedom.org.uk/

Living Freedom: Artificial Intelligence and implications for freedom

‘Freedom of conscience: 21st century challenges’ recorded at Living Freedom Summer School 2023.   

For many centuries, in religious and secular times alike, societies have wrestled with dilemmas as to how we should live in accordance with our inner-most thoughts and beliefs. What should we understand by the term freedom of conscience, how did it emerge and why is it so important? What are the main threats to conscience-based freedoms today?

LECTURER
Professor Frank Furedi, sociologist and social commentator; author, 100 years of identity crisis and How Fear Works: culture of fear in the 21st century.

READ ON
- 'On Tolerance: A Defence of Moral Independence', Frank Furedi, Continuum, 2011
- 'There is nothing wrong with unconscious bias Don't let them control your thoughts!' Frank Furedi, Roots and Wings, 29 August 2022

LIVING FREEDOM
Living Freedom exists to renew freedom through education and debate, offering young adults the opportunity to explore ideas and debate ideals as they relate to the past, present and future of freedom.  See www.livingfreedom.org.uk and @LivingFreedomUK

IDEAS MATTER PODCAST
Ideas Matter is a podcast that takes the most important issues of our times and explores the ideas and intellectual trends that have shaped where we are today.

Subscribe via Spotify, iTunes, Podbean or SoundCloud. 

Email us at info@ideasmatter.org.uk

Living Freedom: ‘Freedom of conscience - 21st-century challenges’

Features the lecture ‘Freedom in the age of identity politics’ recorded at Living Freedom Summer School 2023. 

Loved or loathed, identity politics is inescapable in contemporary battles over freedom. To some, the political embrace of the personal is a vital tool in the struggle against oppressive institutions and practices. To others, identitarian politics is a divisive force in society and represents the antithesis of liberal ideals. In making the case for the free individual, how do we avoid reducing freedom to a lifestyle or consumer choice? Beyond the culture war of identity politics, how should we seek to construct a sense of ourselves and of freedom today?

LECTURER
Dr Joanna Williams, director, Cieo, columnist, spiked, and author of How Woke Won: The Elitist Movement That Threatens Democracy, Tolerance and Reason

READ ON
Freedom in the age of identity politics, Joanna Williams, CIEO, 2023
How identity politics destroys freedom, Roger Scruton, Acton Institute, September 2021

LIVING FREEDOM
Living Freedom exists to renew freedom through education and debate, offering young adults the opportunity to explore ideas and debate ideals as they relate to the past, present, and future of freedom. See www.livingfreedom.org.uk and @LivingFreedomUK

IDEAS MATTER PODCAST
Ideas Matter is a podcast that takes the most important issues of our times and explores the ideas and intellectual trends that have shaped where we are today. Subscribe via Spotify, iTunes, Podbean or SoundCloud. 

Email us at info@ideasmatter.org.uk

Living Freedom: ‘Freedom in the age of identity politics’

Features the lecture ‘‘Dystopian or dysfunctional? The 21st-century state’ recorded at Living Freedom Summer School 2023. 

In recent years, governments have appeared directionless and often incompetent. Institutions riven with disputes over cultural values seem unsure of what they stand for. Crisis seems to be the word of the year - energy crisis, cost-of-living crisis, climate crisis, housing crisis – meaning a ‘state of emergency’ is now ubiquitous. What is distinct about today’s elites and their attempts to exercise authority? How should we understand the relationship between authority and authoritarian? For those keen to make the case for freedom, what should we be concerned about today and how do we make the case for renewing liberty?

LECTURER
Josie Appleton director, Manifesto Club; author, Officious: Rise of the Busybody state.
READ ON
The emergency addiction Josie Appleton, Notes on Freedom, 21 May 2023
Officious: Rise of the busybody state, Zer0 Books, 2016

LIVING FREEDOM
Living Freedom exists to renew freedom through education and debate, offering young adults the opportunity to explore ideas and debate ideals as they relate to the past, present, and future of freedom. See www.livingfreedom.org.uk and @LivingFreedomUK

IDEAS MATTER PODCAST
Ideas Matter is a podcast that takes the most important issues of our times and explores the ideas and intellectual trends that have shaped where we are today.

Subscribe via Spotify, iTunes, Podbean or SoundCloud. 
Email us at info@ideasmatter.org.uk

Living Freedom: ‘Dystopian or dysfunctional? The 21st-century state’

Features the discussion ‘The dangers of progress?’ recorded at Living Freedom Summer School 2023. 

Historically, the quest for freedom was often understood to be bound up with the ideal of progress, but today, society seems less certain of the benefits of progress.

Key features of modernity such as urbanisation, mobility, secularism and affluence are often deemed counterproductive to liberty. How should we define ‘progress’ and how do we account for collapsing belief in its benefits?  Are progress and tradition necessarily in direct and bloody competition or can we make the case for a creative tension worth celebrating for social benefits? From industry to the internet, cars to contraceptive pills, has progress gone too far and become a threat to contemporary freedoms?

LECTURERS
Nina Power writer and philosopher; senior editor, Compact 
Ralph Schoellhammer political theorist, Webster Vienna Private University

READ ON
Socialism or Barbie-ism, Nina Power, Compact, 24 July 2023
Degrowth is a suicidal ideology, Ralph Schoellhammer, 30 May 2023

LIVING FREEDOM
Living Freedom exists to renew freedom through education and debate, offering young adults the opportunity to explore ideas and debate ideals as they relate to the past, present, and future of freedom. See www.livingfreedom.org.uk and @LivingFreedomUK

IDEAS MATTER PODCAST
Ideas Matter is a podcast that takes the most important issues of our times and explores the ideas and intellectual trends that have shaped where we are today.
Subscribe via Spotify, iTunes, Podbean or SoundCloud. 
Email us at info@ideasmatter.org.uk

Living Freedom: ‘The dangers of progress?’

This is the introductory podcast to the series 'Culture Wars: then and now', recorded in 2019 at the summer school The Academy.

The series explores the emergence and evolution of the culture wars. Lecturers explore the intellectual, cultural, social and political ideas that shape the culture wars.  

LECTURER 
Angus Kennedy, convenor, The Academy; author, Being Cultured: in defence of discrimination; co-editor, From Self to Selfie: a critique of contemporary alienation

Talking Points in this podcast
•	The Academy, and why we should value of scholarship, and the pursuit of truth
•	What is meant by culture, the role for cultural judgement, and the rise of non-judgmentalism as a ruling principle in society 
•	An overview of lectures within the series Culture Wars: then and now

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Being Cultured: In Defence of Discrimination, Angus Kennedy, Societas, 2014

Culture Counts: Faith and Feeling in a World Besieged, Roger Scruton, Brief Encounters, 2007

THE ACADEMY 2019
In the context of today’s instrumental approaches to knowledge, The Academy summer school is a modest attempt to demonstrate the value of scholarship, and of the worth of the university as a place of free enquiry dedicated to the pursuit of truth. Find out more: https://theboi.co.uk/the-academy

IDEAS MATTER PODCAST
Ideas Matter podcast takes the most important issues of our times and explores the ideas and intellectual trends that have shaped where we are today. Subscribe and listen to Ideas Matter on iTunes, Podbean or SoundCloud.  

Keep up-to-date with Ideas Matter and all the initiatives organised by the Battle of Ideas charity by following us on Twitter (https://twitter.com/theboi_uk) and on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/battleofideas/)

Email us at info@theboi.co.uk

Ideas Matter: Culture Wars, then and now, ep 1: 'On culture'

The debate surrounding Parkfield school in Birmingham and wider discussion on the role of sex and relationship classes  within educational programmes, are just the latest incidences of schools becoming a battlefield for the culture wars.  

Starting with developments in the 1870s when the state intervention in schooling in England & Wales became more pronounced, James Tooley explores the impact of the ethos of state control over education right up to today’s controversies over Relationship and Sex Education

LECTURER

James Tooley, professor of educational entrepreneurship and policy, University of Buckingham; author, The Beautiful Tree

TALKING POINTS IN THIS PODCAST

* In the 1870s, private non-profit and private for-profit schools made up nearly all the educational establishments, educating 95 per cent of children.
* State intervention in education reflected a desire to push forward a particular set of values, creating an early instance of the education culture wars.
* Schools were used to also keep the working class in their own station as opposed to increasing their social mobility.
* An affordable grassroots private school movement that would create schools of high quality at half the cost of state education is possible.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

The Beautiful Tree: a personal journey into how the world’s poorest people are educating themselves, James Tooley, Cato Institute, 2013

Education and the State: A Study in Political Economy, Edwin G West, 3rd revised edition, 1994

THE ACADEMY 2019

In the context of today’s instrumental approaches to knowledge, The Academy summer school is a modest attempt to demonstrate the value of scholarship, and of the worth of the university as a place of free enquiry dedicated to the pursuit of truth.

IDEAS MATTER PODCAST

Ideas Matter is a podcast that takes the most important issues of our times and explores the ideas and intellectual trends that have shaped where we are today.

You can subscribe and listen to Ideas Matter on iTunes, Podbean or SoundCloud.  For full details of all episodes, visit the podcast page on our website  

Keep up-to-date with Ideas Matter and all the initiatives organised by the Battle of Ideas charity by following us on Twitter and on Facebook.

Email us at info@theboi.co.uk

State and Education

Ideas Matter: Culture Wars, then and now, ep 3: ‘The role of the state in education culture wars’

From the archives of The Academy, this lecture ‘Freud: The unconscious and the repressive society’ is a taster and some useful context for this year’s Academy Online event ‘Psychology and Democracy’ on 20 June 2020 (details below).

Lecturer, Dr Michael Fitzpatrick reflects on the work of Sigmund Freud, including ‘Civilisation and its Discontents’ which was published in 1929 and signals a shift in Freuds work from a focus on the individual psyche to how some of those ideas could be applied at the wider level of society and culture.  

THE ACADEMY 2020: PSYCHOLOGY AND DEMOCRACY
Due to the coronavirus pandemic measures, this year The Academy will take place as half day online event via zoom. The programme for The Academy Online: Psychology and Democracy - a mixture of lectures and seminars –offers an opportunity to all those who attend to place contemporary events in a historical and philosophical context.

To register and view the full programme and some suggested background reading, please visit theboi.co.uk/the-academy-online…logy-and-democracy

THE ACADEMY
In the context of today’s instrumental approaches to knowledge, The Academy summer school is a modest attempt to demonstrate the value of scholarship, and of the worth of the university as a place of free enquiry dedicated to the pursuit of truth.

DONATING TO THE BOI CHARITY
The BOI charity is committed to continuing to host discussion and debates throughout this period when society is restricted by measures to tackle coronavirus. In order to realise events such as the Academy Online, none of our staff are furloughed and instead remain working. If you can, then please consider a donation, small or large.
Visit: theboi.co.uk/donate

IDEAS MATTER PODCAST
Ideas Matter is a podcast that takes the most important issues of our times and explores the ideas and intellectual trends that have shaped where we are today.

You can subscribe and listen to Ideas Matter on iTunes, Podbean, Spotify or SoundCloud. For full details of all episodes, visit the podcast page on our website

Keep up-to-date with Ideas Matter and all the initiatives organised by the Battle of Ideas charity by following us on Twitter (@theboi_uk) and on Facebook (battleofideas).

Ideas Matter: Freud - the unconscious and the repressive society

Ideas Matter was established in 2018 to advance education, particularly by providing forums for discussion and debate through the organisation of public debates, festivals and summer schools involving academics, thinkers and experts that deepen and enrich the knowledge and understanding of all participants; and to advance good citizenship, particularly through the promotion of ideas of tolerance, open debate and participation in democracy through the organisation of live events, and in print and online.

Ideas Matter

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