Moral Maze

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Are networks the glue of society or the architecture of privilege?

July 28, 2026

Michael Buerk chairs a special debate from the Hay Festival examining the morality of networks.The release of the Epstein files has been a reminder that power often flows not just through formal institutions, but through webs of connection: political friendships, old school ties, and professional circles. There's been focused attention on how influential networks operate, and how access, opportunity and protection can follow. Critics say such cases expose a world where success depends less on...

Are America's founding ideals a reality or a myth?

July 02, 2026

In 1776, Thomas Jefferson wrote that all men are created equal, endowed with unalienable rights... life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. During his lifetime Jefferson owned more than 620 slaves. As America marks 250 years since the Declaration, that contradiction is impossible to look past: a document of universal liberty, written by men who denied it to the women in their households, the people they enslaved, and the nations whose land they were settling.One reading says this was hypo...

Do we care more about the place where we live than about the nation we live in?

June 26, 2026

If Andy Burnham has a four-word philosophy, it is 'the politics of place', a phrase he uses often. Burnham argues that politics must concentrate on meeting local needs, on the devolution of power and on 'levelling up' the places that have been doing badly.While he was winning in Makerfield, the Scottish Conservatives were winning in Aberdeen South, on a promise to revive the North Sea oil and gas industry. That too was the politics of place.Burnham’s philosophical opponents say that 'the poli...