A Tory reckoning
Rishi Sunak’s continual changes of strategy have only deepened his party’s malaise.
ByThe Magazine
In this week’s issue
The Rotten State
Letter of the week: Pride and pedagogy
Write to letters@newstatesman.co.uk to have your thoughts voiced in the New Statesman magazine.
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The dirty half-dozen: Tory right divides to rule, again
Your weekly dose of gossip from around Westminster.
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The danger of deepfakes goes far beyond Taylor Swift
Why has it taken an attack on a global star for politicians and regulators to get serious about protecting…
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Why Barbie wasn’t snubbed
Also this week: Paul Giamatti’s struggling writers, and bad behaviour at the theatre.
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Daniel Freeman: “Psychosis is seen as scary. It’s the last taboo”
“Professor Paranoia” on what works in psychiatry, and why he’s asking patients to put on virtual reality headsets.
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Keir Starmer has conquered his party. Now what?
Within Labour, the leader is “lord of all he surveys”. But he still needs to define what that is…
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Joe Biden’s border problem
A former hotel in New York holds the clue to what might end the incumbent’s presidency.
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How to stop the far right in Europe
The rise of anti-migrant populism is a metric for the EU’s policy failures. Address these, and it can be…
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British steel’s apocalyptic future
Port Talbot’s steelworks closure reveals the potential human cost of a badly-built green economy.
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My nephew has changed how I feel about children
I still don’t want kids of my own, but aspects of motherhood that once seemed repellent to me now…
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The rotten state
How corruption and chumocracy are pulling Britain apart.
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The conservative paradox
The Tories face electoral oblivion, having failed to grasp that voters look to government for a shield against insecurity.…
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The sexual revolution that failed
Crystal Hefner on life inside the Playboy mansion and surviving the “trauma” of her marriage to the notorious libertine.
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Ripping up the Iron Curtain
How a mass picnic party broke open Hungary’s Austrian border and foreshadowed the fall of the Berlin Wall.
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Sheila Heti’s book of life
The Canadian novelist’s Alphabetical Diaries find a new way to capture the rhythms of human consciousness.
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Can Zelensky survive the stalemate?
Once feted for his showmanship, Ukraine’s president has become plagued by corruption scandals and military failures.
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Lessons from The World of Yesterday
Stefan Zweig’s 1942 portrait of the late Austro-Hungarian empire remains a stark warning against taking national security for granted.
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From Adam Phillips to Kate Manne: new books reviewed in short
Also featuring Pity by Andrew McMillan and Breaking Through by Katalin Karikó.
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The politics of Generation Grime
British rappers such as Stormzy and Dave have ideologies forged in a time of austerity and protest.
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The Zone of Interest is a Holocaust film like no other
Jonathan Glazer’s astonishing adaptation of Martin Amis’s novel is the antidote to Schindler’s List.
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The human failings of the miners’ strike
Tom Barrow’s film, which marks 40 years since the strike, is as richly mournful as a good funeral –…
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The journalist vs the trolls
In Marianna Spring’s series Why Do You Hate Me?, the BBC social media correspondent finds fellowship and reconciliation amid…
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The Rhapsody in Blue revolution
First performed 100 years ago, George Gershwin’s great experiment defined the jazz age and took popular music in a…
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Forget secateurs. A vivid imagination is a gardener’s most important tool
To garden is to live in anticipation of the seasons yet to come, to build endless versions of the…
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Why a 99 per cent mortgage means a high proportion of trouble
Buyers who take up the offer may well find themselves stuck with higher repayments – and unable to switch…
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Feminism has always been complicated – just ask the women of the Seventies
A short film at Tate Britain is a reminder of the glorious energy and contradictions of the women’s liberation…
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The reward for looking after my mother? A dose of norovirus
I am floored by GI problems – which is what we people who have doctors in the family call…
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This England: In the bag
This column – which, though named after a line in Shakespeare’s “Richard II”, refers to the whole of Britain…
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Subscriber of the week: Peter Phillips
Please email zuzanna.lachendro@newstatesman.co.uk if you would like to be featured.
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Marcus du Sautoy Q&A: “As a child, I planned to marry Top Cat”
The mathematician and author on his love of symmetry, classical music and board games.
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