Appearing fifteen years after Ernest Gellner's death, John A. Hall's Ernest Gellner: An Intellectual Biography is the first ever biography dedicated to this great twentieth-century figure, and the book has been quick to attract review attention.

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By Clara Heyworth / 30 July 2010 / post comment

In the wake of the WikiLeaks scandal, Tariq Ali comments on Pakistan's role in the war in Afghanistan for the Guardian:

It's hardly a secret that Pakistan never totally abandoned the Taliban after 9/11. How could they? It was Islamabad that had organised the Taliban's retreat from Kabul so that the US and its allies could take the country without a fight. The Pakistani generals advised their Afghan friends to bide their time.

Visit the Guardian to read the article in full.

By Clara Heyworth / 30 July 2010 / 1 comment

Brian Dillon reviews Slavoj Žižek's Living in the End Times for the Daily Telegraph:

Slavoj Žižek may well be the last great thinker of our time. In an era when lighting on one half-formed notion—"the end of history", "the third way", "Islamo-fascism"—is enough to get one hailed as a public intellectual to rival Russell or Sartre, the Slovenian philosopher puts all conceptual comers to shame...

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By Sarah Shin / 30 July 2010 / post comment

In this RSA Animate, based on First as Tragedy, Then as Farce, Slavoj Žižek investigates the surprising ethical implications of charitable giving.

By Sarah Shin / 29 July 2010 / post comment

In April 2010 Erik Olin Wright presented a lecture on Envisioning Real Utopias as part of the West Coast Poverty Center's seminar series on poverty and policy. The slides used during the lecture can be downloaded by visiting the West Coast Poverty Center website.

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By Clara Heyworth / 29 July 2010 / post comment