266 | Helen's History of Ideas

David talks with Helen to get her take on the history of ideas - both what's there and what's missing.  Why start with Hobbes?  What can we learn from the Federalist Papers?  Where's Nietzsche?  Plus we talk about whether understanding where political ideas come from is liberating or limiting and we ask how many of them were just rationalisations for power.

245 | Europe Blows Up

How does a judgement of the German constitutional court threaten to explode the European project?  David talk to Helen Thompson, Adam Tooze and Shahin Vallee about what the court's decision might mean for
the Euro, for the response to the pandemic, for Franco-German relations and for the future of central banks.  Can the great European fudge continue?  And what happens if it can't?

Plus a bonus chat with Ed Miliband and Geoff Lloyd from the ‘Reasons to be Cheerful Podcast’ https://www.cheerfulpodcast.com/

186 | Adam Tooze on the Global Slowdown

Helen Thompson and Adam Tooze take us beyond Brexit to look at the global situation and the bigger threats we face. Italy, Germany, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Argentina, Russia, Trump vs. the Fed, the US vs. China, Hong Kong, the dollar, the euro, climate change, oil: an amazingly wide-ranging conversation that somehow manages to connect it all up.

38 | Michael Gove

We catch up with Michael Gove, one of the leaders of the Brexit campaign, to ask how he feels about the future of Europe now. What difference will a Macron presidency make?  Will Theresa May have more of a mandate than any other European leader when it comes to the Brexit negotiations?  And how does he feel today about his notorious remark that 'the people of this country have had enough of experts'?