Iran: The Next War in the Middle East?

Contributor(s): Professor Mick Cox | Professor Mick Cox is one of Europe’s leading commentators on the United States. He holds a Chair in International Relations and is also Co-Director of IDEAS, a Centre for the Study of Diplomacy and Strategy at LSE. He is the author, editor and co-editor of over twenty books. His most recent books include a major popular text on US Foreign Policy published by Oxford University Press, and a study on US Presidents and Democracy Promotion. He is a regular visitor to the United States and China and holds Visiting Professorships in Rome, Milan and Melbourne.

Contributor(s): Pankaj Mishra | The Victorian period, viewed in the West as a time of self-confident progress, was experienced by Asians as a catastrophe, with foreign soldiers and merchants tearing apart the great empires which had once formed the heart of civilization. In his new book From the Ruins of Empire: The Revolt Against the West and the Remaking of Asia, which he will discuss in this event Pankaj Mishra allows the reader to see foreign imperialism anew, through the eyes of the journalists, poets, radicals and charismatics who criss-crossed Europe and Asia – and through their thoughts and writings to understand how China, India and the Muslim World are remaking the world we know – in their own image, not that of the West. Pankaj Mishra is the author of Temptations of the West, An End to Suffering, The Romantics and Butter Chicken in Ludhiana. He writes regularly for The Guardian, New York Times, New York Review of Books and New Statesman.

Contributor(s): Sir Stephen Wall, George Eustice MP, Roger Helmer MEP, Mark Reckless MP, Dr Helen Szamuely | With the crisis continuing in the eurozone, recent polls suggest that the vast majority of the British electorate would be in favour of a referendum on Britain’s membership of the European Union. In the current climate the voices of those in favour of the European project have been noticeable by their absence. Today programme presenter Evan Davis chairs this debate on the motion "Britain should stay in the European Union." Tony Blair's former EU adviser Sir Stephen Wall will defend the proposition against a panel that are opposed to Britain remaining in the EU in its current guise. Sir Stephen Wall worked closely with five British Foreign Secretaries and was Foreign Policy Adviser to Prime Minister John Major. He was British Ambassador to Portugal from 1993 to 1995, Permanent Representative to the European Union from 1995 to 2000 and Head of the European Secretariat in the Cabinet Office and EU adviser to the Prime Minister from 2000 to 2004. From 2004 to 2005 he was the Principal Adviser to the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Westminster. Sir Stephen is Chair of the Council of University College, London, Chair of the Federal Trust, Chair of Trustees at Cumberland Lodge, Member of the Council of Wilton Park, Member of the Board of Trustees of the Thomson Foundation, Trustee of the Franco-British Council and Honorary Fellow of Selwyn College Cambridge. He is also on the Council of the European Council on Foreign Relations. George Eustice is the Conservative MP for Camborne, Redruth and Hayle. George was born and brought up in Cornwall. After a time working in the family farming business, he gained nine years political campaign experience, first for the anti-euro 'No Campaign' as its Campaign Director between 1999 and 2003 and then as the Conservative Party's Head of Press under Michael Howard between 2003 and the 2005 General Election. He was David Cameron's Press Secretary from June 2005 until the end of 2007 and was part of his campaign team during the leadership contest. Roger Helmer was first elected to the European parliament in 1999 for the East Midlands region, subsequently being re-elected in 2004 and 2009. He defected from the Conservative Party to UKIP (United Kingdom Independence Party) in March 2012. Roger won a State Scholarship to Churchill College, Cambridge, where he read mathematics, graduating in 1965 with a B.A. and subsequently an M.A. He started his business career in 1965 with Procter & Gamble in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, going on to hold senior marketing and general management appointments in a range of companies, including well-known multinationals like Readers Digest, National Semiconductor, Coats Viyella and the whisky firm United Distillers, now part of the drinks conglomerate Diageo. Mark Reckless is the Conservative member of parliament for Rochester and Strood, having been elected in 2010. He serves on the Home Affairs Select Committee. Mark graduated in Philosophy, Politics and Economics from Oxford University and has an MBA from Columbia Business School. More recently he has trained as a barrister, gaining an LLB from the College of Law and being called to the Bar in 2007. Dr Helen Szamuely is head of research for the Bruges Group and blogger on Your Freedom and Ours. She was a founder member of the EU Referendum blog and is a researcher in the House of Lords. Evan Davis joined the presenter team on Today in April 2008 following a six-and-a-half year stint as the BBC's economics editor. He also presents The Bottom Line, Radio 4's business discussion programme and Dragons' Den, the BBC Two business reality show. Before his promotion to editor, Evan worked for BBC Two's Newsnight from 1997 to 2001 and as a general economics correspondent from 1993.

Contributor(s): William Jefferson Clinton | William Jefferson Clinton is the Founder of the William J. Clinton Foundation| and 42nd President of the United States. He was the first Democratic president in six decades to be elected twice — first in 1992 and then in 1996. After leaving the White House, President Clinton established the William J. Clinton Foundation with the mission to improve global health, strengthen economies, promote healthier childhoods, and protect the environment by fostering partnerships among governments, businesses, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), and private citizens to turn good intentions into measurable results. Today the Foundation has staff and volunteers around the world working to improve lives through several initiatives, including the Clinton Health Access Initiative (formerly the Clinton HIV/AIDS Initiative) which is helping more than 4 million people living with HIV/AIDS access lifesaving drugs. Other initiatives – including the Clinton Climate Initiative, the Clinton Development Initiative, and the Clinton Giustra Sustainable Growth Initiative – are applying a business-oriented approach worldwide to fight climate change and develop sustainable economic growth in Africa and Latin America. Established in 2005, the Clinton Global Initiative brings together global leaders to devise and implement innovative solutions to some of the world’s most pressing issues. In the U.S., the Foundation is working to combat the alarming rise in childhood obesity through the Alliance for a Healthier Generation, and is helping individuals and families succeed and small businesses grow. Celebrated actress and humanitarian Ashley Judd has served on the Board of Directors for PSI since 2004, after serving as Global Ambassador for PSI’s HIV education and prevention program, YouthAIDS, since 2002. Ms Judd has visited legislators on Capitol Hill, addressed the General Assembly of the UN, spoken at the National Press Club, testified before the Senate Foreign Relations and at the Condé Nast World Savers Congress, and served as an expert panellist at the Clinton Global Initiative. In addition to her role with PSI, Ms Judd serves on the Board of Directors of Defenders of Wildlife and the Advisory Councils of the International Center for Research on Women, Demand Abolition, and Apne Aap Worldwide. Most recently, she released her first book, a memoir entitled All that is Bitter and Sweet which speaks to her deep commitment for global health.

Contributor(s): Professor Danny Quah | Danny Quah is Professor of Economics and Kuwait Professor at LSE. He is Senior Fellow at LSE IDEAS, and had previously served as LSE’s Head of Department for Economics (2006-2009) and Council Member on Malaysia’s National Economic Advisory Council (2009-2011). Quah is also Tan Chin Tuan Visiting Professor at the National University of Singapore, and lectures regularly at Peking University. He holds degrees from Princeton and Harvard, and was Assistant Professor in the Economics Department at MIT before joining LSE. In 2011 Quah gave the Inaugural LSE Big Questions Lecture, on East Beats West. His current research focuses on the shifting global economy and the rise of the east.

Contributor(s): Dr Ernestina Coast, Gary Darmstadt, Karl Hofmann, Ashley Judd, Nina Muita | On July 11, the UK Government and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation will launch the London Summit on Family Planning. The unprecedented event will bring world leaders together to catalyze political and financial commitments to reach the needs of an additional 120 million women who lack access to modern, voluntary family planning methods. One day prior on July 10, LSE Health and PSI (Population Services International) will co-host a public discussion about the summit's relevance to health, economic, and environmental challenges facing every country - and why everyone, in every sector, has a critical role to play.

Contributor(s): Professor Hamid Dabashi | Will the dispute over Iran's potential nuclear proliferation lead to war? Hamid Dabashi is the Hagop Kevorkian Professor of Iranian Studies and Comparative Literature at Columbia University.

Contributor(s): Professor Lord Robert Skidelsky, Dr Maurice Glasman | Why do we work almost as hard as we did 40 years ago, despite being on average twice as rich? Robert Skidelsky suggests an escape from the work and consumption treadmill. This event marks the publication of Robert and Edward Skidelsky's new book How Much is Enough? The Economics of the Good Life. Dr Maurice Glasman is a reader in political theory at London Metropolitan University, author of Unnecessary Suffering and a Labour Peer. Robert Skidelsky is Emeritus Professor of Political Economy at the University of Warwick. His three-volume biography of the economist John Maynard Keynes (1983, 1992, 2000) received numerous prizes, and he recently published Keynes: The Return of the Master.

Contributor(s): Andrew Blum | The internet is not some abstract "cloud" of connectivity - it exists in tubes - on the ground and under the sea. Andrew Blum explains how the internet exists in the real world and makes the case for why we all need to understand this. This event celebrates the publication of Tubes: Behind the Scenes at the Internet. Andrew Blum is a correspondent at Wired (U.S.) magazine whose work has appeared in numerous publications, including the New Yorker, The Atlantic, and The New York Times.

Contributor(s): Professor Joseph E Stiglitz | In his new book, The Price of Inequality, which he will discuss in this lecture Joseph Stiglitz considers the causes of inequality, why is it growing so rapidly and what are its economic impacts? He explains that markets are neither efficient nor stable and will tend to accumulate money in the hands of the few rather than engender competition and considers our political system that frequently shapes markets in ways that advantage the richest over the rest. He shows how moving money from the middle and bottom of society to the top, far from stimulating entrepreneurship actually produces slower growth and lower GDP with even more instability. Redistributing wealth from the very rich would produce far greater gains overall in our economies than the rich would lose. Joseph Stiglitz was Chief Economist at the World Bank until January 2000. He is currently University Professor of the Columbia Business School and Chair of the Management Board and Director of Graduate Summer Programs, Brooks World Poverty Institute, University of Manchester. He won the Nobel Prize for Economics in 2001 and is the best-selling author of Globalization and Its Discontents, The Roaring Nineties, Making Globalization Work and Freefall, all published by Penguin. Professor Stiglitz will also be in discussion with Professor Amartya Sen on Thursday 28 June at 6.30pm. Details of this event: A Lecture by Joseph E Stiglitz.