Last Friday’s news was dominated by the ‘biggest IT outage in history’, as   a bug in a routine software update cascaded into a global crisis.  Millions of computers were knocked out, thousands of flights  cancelled,  hospital operations  postponed,  television channels went off the air, payments systems  crashed,  supply chains  froze. In  short the digital foundations of our civilisation were  shaken  for hours and in some cases days.

There was no mention that I could see  of  E.M.Forster’s  extraordinarily prescient  novella The Machine Stops. Written in 1906,  it  depicts a humanity wholly dependent on machine-provided services. Then the Machine stops working, little by little at first, then completely. Civilisation comes  to an end,  ‘strangled in the garments [it] has woven’.

In his interesting opinion article (Robots sacked, screenings shut down: a new movement of luddites is rising up against AI, 27 July), Ed Newton-Rex misses one of the most serious concerns about artificial intelligence: its surveillance potential. Governments have always spied on their subjects/citizens: technology multiplies their powers of spying.

In his novel 1984, George Orwell had the authorities install a two-way telescreen system in every party member’s home, and in all workplaces and public spaces. This allowed Big Brother to monitor individuals’ actions and conversations, while he himself remained invisible.

Today’s digital control systems operating through electronic tracking devices and voice and facial recognition systems are simply Big Brother’s control devices

Sir, William Hague poses a false alternative: letting Russia win or allowing Ukraine to fire western-supplied missiles deep in Russian territory. There is better way: a negotiated peace, involving neither a Ukrainian defeat nor military escalation. This requires a recognition that Ukraine has already won its most important victory. Putin expected to be in Kyiv within a week: Ukraine, with our help, has made sure he will never get there. Some sacrifice of territory in return for real, not nominal, independence, would still leave the balance of a compromise peace enormously in Ukraine’s favour.

Readiness for compromise also requires shedding the dangerous delusion that a postponement of negotiations will improve Ukraine’s military position. Ukraine may well be supplied with more and

Russia’s latest military gains in the Donetsk region (Report, July 5) reinforce the case for a negotiated settlement of the war in Ukraine. The US and its allies support Ukraine’s key war aim, which is a return to the 2014 frontiers, ie, Russia’s expulsion from Crimea and Donbas. But all informed analysts agree that short of a serious escalation of war, the likeliest outcome will be continued stalemate on the ground, with a not insignificant chance of a Russian victory.

This conclusion points to the desirability, even urgency, of a negotiated peace, not least for the sake of Ukraine itself. Reluctance by the official west to accept a negotiated peace rests on the belief that anything short of a complete Ukrainian victory would allow Putin to “get away with it”.

But this ignores

Labour’s Economic Plan Lacks Keynesian Ambition

Jul 24, 2024 Robert Skidelsky

Today’s risk-averse economic climate calls for increased public investment to attract reluctant private capital. But British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s insistence on adhering to strict fiscal rules casts doubt on his ability to pull the United Kingdom out of its economic malaise.

LONDON – In a recent speech, the United Kingdom’s new Chancellor of the Exchequer, Rachel Reeves, reiterated her commitment to “fiscal rules.” These rules require that “the current budget must move into balance” and that “the [national] debt must be falling as a share of the economy by [the Labour government’s] fifth year.” This involves reducing the debt-to-GDP ratio from its current level of 100% within five years and

My Lords, I welcome the new Front Bench. I know the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, as an eloquent speaker and a doughty defender of the good fight—if he is allowed to.

I believe the Starmer era will be defined by its handling of foreign affairs. As many noble Lords have pointed out, the world is very dangerous place. There are three powder kegs: in the Far East, in the Middle East and in Ukraine. Each is capable of igniting a world war. I concentrate on Ukraine because it is on the outcome of this conflict that our Government can hope to have their biggest influence.

The gracious Speech says—the noble Lord, Lord Moore, also quoted this—that:

“My Government will continue to give its full support to Ukraine and its people and it will endeavour to play a leading role in providing

23rd July 2021 (Published online)

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May 1 2024 William White is right (Letters, April 29) to say that John Maynard Keynes regarded the rate of interest as “highly conventional”, but he should have quoted the whole sentence from chapter 15 of The General Theory: “The difficulties in the way of [full employment] ensue from the association of a conventional and highly stable rate of interest with a fickle and highly unstable marginal efficiency of capital.” It was for this reason that Keynes advocated an active role for fiscal policy. For as he put it in 1932: “The lender, with his confidence shattered by his experiences, will continue to ask for new enterprise rates of interest which the borrower cannot expect to earn.” The current disabling of fiscal policy has thrown the whole onus of demand management on monetary

Robert was recently interviewed by Martin Burckhardt, the German cultural philosopher, about his new book The Machine Age in Germany. Below is a link to a video of the interview:

Link: https://martinburckhardt.substack.com/p/talking-to-robert-skidelsky

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April 19, 2024 ROBERT SKIDELSKY

George Orwell’s great contribution to dystopian literature was not his depiction of the modern surveillance state, but rather his insight that if everyone used only state-approved language, surveillance would become redundant. The difference today is that Newspeak has emerged from the mechanisms of liberal democracy itself.

LONDON – Language shapes our thinking and perception of the world and, consequently, what happens in it. That is why I worry less about the troubling state of the world nowadays than about the words we use to describe it.

For example, we use the word “war” to describe a phenomenon that exists independently of our term for it. But if we consistently describe and perceive the world as hostile, it tends to become so. By the same

March 21, 2024 ROBERT SKIDELSKY

Faced with a choice between parasitic capitalism and emerging neo-fascism, it is no wonder that Western societies are increasingly pessimistic. While pessimism has pervaded previous eras, today’s mood is sustained, and partly defined, by the absence of a redemptive vision.

LONDON – In 2003, the literary critic Fredric Jameson famously observed that “it is easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.” For the first time in two centuries, he noted, capitalism was viewed as both destructive and irreversible. Waning faith in the possibility of a post-capitalist future has nurtured deep pessimism.

This prevailing despair evokes John Maynard Keynes’s 1930 essay “Economic Possibilities for Our Grandchildren,” in which he warned

The Lost Peace by Robert Skidelsky February 2024As the Ukrainian war enters its third year, there has been renewed, if rather limp, talk of a ceasefire followed by negotiations. The premise is that since neither side can ‘win’, it makes sense to start making peace. Few now remember that the war almost ended before it got going. On 24 February 2022, Russia launched ground and air attacks on Ukraine on four fronts. On 28th February 2022, Russian and Ukrainian officials came together to start to negotiate peace. There were seven rounds of talks over the next month before they were called off.The first three rounds took place in Belarus. By 7 March, Kremlin spokesman Dmitri Peskov said Russia would stop its operations ‘in a moment’ if Ukraine enshrined neutrality in its constitution, and

My Lords, it is a rare privilege for us to have the Foreign Secretary wind up a debate on foreign policy in this House. Such are the quirks of politics, I suppose.

I shall concentrate on one topic, and that is economic sanctions. The sanctions regime has emerged as one of the most important tools of British foreign policy. Despite, or perhaps because of their long and tangled history, their rationale remains deeply mysterious. Are they tools of war avoidance or an extension of war by other means? It is a hybrid tool, at best. This ambiguity is fatal to any peacekeeping or peacemaking purposes they may have, because they insert a warlike mentality into what should be efforts at peace—hence the utmost clarity is needed in defining their purpose and assessing their results.

Since

Labour leaders’ decision to abandon their highly publicized Green Prosperity Plan underscores the party’s ongoing failure to articulate a coherent response to Conservative criticism. Instead of focusing on bolstering their fiscal credentials, Labour leaders should reconnect with the party’s Keynesian roots.

LONDON – Following months of speculation and infighting, the United Kingdom’s Labour Party has officially abandoned its pledge to borrow £28 billion ($35 billion) annually to invest in green-energy initiatives if it wins the next general election.

Although the British media quickly dubbed it the “mother of all U-turns,” Labour’s announcement was hardly surprising. The party has been gradually scaling back its Green Prosperity Plan, first unveiled by Shadow Chancellor Rachel

Russian-Ukrainian peace talks, February–March 2022

20th February 2024

As the Ukrainian war approaches its second anniversary, there has been renewed, if rather limp, talk of a cease-fire followed by negotiations. The premise is that since neither side can “win,” it makes sense to start making peace. Few now remember that the war almost ended before it got going. On February 24, 2022, Russia launched ground and air attacks on Ukraine on four fronts. On February 28, 2022, Russian and Ukrainian officials came together in Gomel, Belarus, to start to negotiate peace. Peace talks continued intermittently for a month before being called off.

Knowledge of these talks has been steadily leaking ever since President Putin waved a “peace agreement” before Russian TV cameras on June 17,

My new book, The Machine Age, was published by Allen Lane on the 2nd November 2023. It’s available to buy on Amazon. Launch events were held at the Royal Society of Arts on the 6th November 2023 and UnHerd Club on the 28th November 2023. Links to the videos of each launch event are below:

Royal Society of Arts: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JX1m1RNmjd8

UnHerd Club: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p3XM1WB88Ls

The following is a 23 page summary of the book:

Preface

This book tells three stories about the impact of machines on the human condition: on the way we work, on the way we live and on our possible future. The stories follow in order, since they relate the growing intrusion of machines into our lives over time; but they are linked together by both history and

My new book, The Machine Age, was published by Allen Lane on the 2nd November 2023. It’s available to buy on Amazon. Launch events were held at the Royal Society of Arts on the 6th November 2023 and UnHerd Club on the 28th November 2023. Links to the videos of each launch event are below:

Royal Society of Arts: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JX1m1RNmjd8

UnHerd Club: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p3XM1WB88Ls

The following is a 23 page summary of the book:

Preface

This book tells three stories about the impact of machines on the human condition: on the way we work, on the way we live and on our possible future. The stories follow in order, since they relate the growing intrusion of machines into our lives over time; but they are linked together by both history and

They will see the promise—it is incumbent on us to alert them to the threat, or humanity will perish

14th November 2023

My new book, The Machine Age, is an ambitious—possibly overambitious—attempt to understand the human condition at this moment in time, through the prism of our relationship with machinery. 

The book is structured around three stories: the relationship of machines to jobs, to freedom and to survival. Of course, when I talk about the relationship between humans and machines I am using a figure of speech. It’s not the machines which promise heaven or threaten hell. It’s those who turn on the switches. The danger is that sooner rather than later they will lose control of what they have created, like Frankenstein and his Monster. 

The job displacement story is

Rachel Reeves needs a new economic narrative to break the fear of deficits and debt

24th November 2023

To observe the basic thinking behind Jeremy Hunt’s Autumn Statement on 22 November, and how Rachel Reeves will respond, is to find that the Chancellor and his shadow inhabit the same mental universe. They both aim to lift the British economy out of the doldrums, and they agree that doing so depends on improving the efficiency of the supply side of the economy – the way capital and labour are used. But they disagree about how this can be done: there is a Conservative supply-side story and a Labour supply-side story. The political challenge facing both politicians is to persuade voters – and the markets – that their version offers the best hope for Britain’s future.

The

January 18, 2024 ROBERT SKIDELSKY

The wrongful prosecution and conviction of more than 900 postmasters highlights the erosion of the systems designed to uphold institutional accountability in the United Kingdom. It also underscores the growing threat of a legal paradigm in which individuals are presumed guilty until proven innocent.

LONDON – A new TV drama has brought to light one of the greatest injustices in the history of the United Kingdom, prompting a long-overdue public reckoning and raising hopes for much-needed institutional accountability.

The Post Office Scandal, as it is known in the UK, involves the wrongful prosecution and conviction of more than 900 postal workers for theft and fraud between 1999 and 2015, owing to faulty software. Although the British government

December 19, 2023 ROBERT SKIDELSKY

While techno-optimists celebrate AI’s potential to reshape the world, we must mitigate the risks these new tools pose to communities and to humanity. To prevent the rich and powerful from monopolizing the fruits of technological innovation, we must ensure that the benefits of increased productivity are distributed equitably.

LONDON – A little over a year ago, the San Francisco-based OpenAI released its chatbot, ChatGPT, triggering an artificial-intelligence gold rush and reigniting the age-old debate about the effects of automation on human welfare.

The fear of displacement by machines can be traced back to the nineteenth-century Industrial Revolution, when groups of English handloom weavers, known as Luddites, began destroying the power

November 20, 2023 ROBERT SKIDELSKY

Between 1815 and 1914, the Concert of Europe served as a crucial peacekeeping mechanism, enabling the continent to avoid a major war. Drawing the right lessons from its successes and eventual failure can help us strive to recreate the conditions that led to an imperfect but durable peace.

LONDON – The world was a relatively peaceful place during the nineteenth century. Aside from the American Civil War and China’s Taiping Rebellion, there were few prolonged conflicts anywhere between the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815 and the outbreak of World War I in 1914. This raises a fundamental question: How did Europe largely avoid major wars for 100 years amid what Hedley Bull called “international anarchy”?

The prevailing view is that the Concert

October 24, 2023 ROBERT SKIDELSKY

As the world grapples with multiple, compounding economic and political crises, Western intellectuals provide little cause for optimism. Two new books paint a bleak picture of a disintegrating liberal international order and a future shaped by warring powers and digital serfdom.

LONDON – Reading this fall’s selection of new nonfiction books, one cannot help but recall W.B. Yeats’ prescient lines from The Second Coming: “The falcon cannot hear the falconer; things fall apart; the center cannot hold.” As the liberal international order is beset by domestic and global challenges, the values that have shaped the West’s socioeconomic landscape since the Enlightenment appear to be in decline. The somber tone of Western intellectuals suggests that we

September 22, 2023 ROBERT SKIDELSKY

In his new book, former Conservative MP Rory Stewart sharply critiques the British political class. Analyzing the degradation of the United Kingdom’s public services, he highlights two potential culprits: a ruling class preoccupied with political maneuvering and a civil service excessively focused on bureaucracy.

LONDON – Anthony Sampson’s Anatomy of Britain, published in 1962, was a profound and scholarly work that appeared at a time when the perception that the United Kingdom was in decline was undermining confidence in British institutions. Though the former Conservative minister Rory Stewart’s new memoir, Politics On the Edge, is far more personal and narrower in scope, it similarly provides an opportunity to reflect on the state of the

August 21, 2023 ROBERT SKIDELSKY

The economic shocks of the past two decades were not freak occurrences but rather the product of a profoundly flawed and corrupt system. But narrowing the policy discussion to a binary choice between market fundamentalism and protectionism overlooks the potential for constructive leadership.

SALZBURG – In 2009, while the world economy was still reeling from the global financial crisis, Nobel laureate economist Robert Lucas observed that “everyone is a Keynesian in the foxhole.” The implication was that, when an economy is faced with a severe economic shock, conventional fiscal policy norms must take a backseat to stabilization.

Imagine a scenario where the global economy plunges into an economic crisis akin to the Great Depression of 1929-32,

July 20, 2023 ROBERT SKIDELSKY

Brexiteer Nigel Farage’s recent claim that he had been designated a “politically exposed person” and blacklisted by financial institutions, if true, represents a dangerous violation of people’s rights. This unchecked overreach, driven by regulatory zeal, is neither rational nor prudent.

LONDON – Nigel Farage, the former leader of the UK Independence Party (UKIP) and the driving force behind the campaign for the United Kingdom’s exit from the European Union, recently caused an uproar when he revealed that his bank accounts were closed two months earlier, allegedly because of his political views.

Farage claimed that he tried to open new accounts with seven other banks, all of which turned him down. His original bank, Coutts – a subsidiary of

June 19, 2023 ROBERT SKIDELSKY

Geopolitics, which originated during the run-up to World War I, represents an inherently pessimistic view of international relations as a perpetual power struggle. But as the world’s military and policy establishments prepare for prolonged conflict, we must resist the allure of the zero-sum mindset.

LONDON – One of the regrettable consequences of Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species was the advent of the pseudoscience known as geopolitics. Drawing inspiration from Darwin’s concepts of “natural selection” and “survival of the fittest,” the progenitors of geopolitics argued that all of history was shaped by a competitive “struggle of nations.” This approach, which stood in stark contrast to the harmonious view of international relations

Lord Skidelsky 

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Purvis, made an important point about the importance of thinking about a post-Putin future. I have never thought that Putin either can or deserves to survive this adventure on which he has embarked, but I am interested in what is meant by such phrases as

“withdraw his troops and end this bloodshed now”,

and a remark from the Labour Front Bench about the importance of “winning the war”. What exactly do these things mean? It seems to me that the black box here is Crimea. Is it assumed that winning the war and withdrawing Russian forces means going back to 2014 frontiers and that that is the purpose of winning the war? If that is the case, what legitimacy do the Government expect a post-Putin Government to have in Russia? In

May 25, 2023 ROBERT SKIDELSKY

Amid the growing excitement about generative AI, there are also mounting concerns about its potential contribution to the erosion of civil liberties. The convergence of state intelligence agencies and surveillance capitalism underscores the threat that artificial intelligence poses to the future of democracy.

LONDON – With investors pouring billions of dollars into artificial intelligence-related startups, the generative AI frenzy is beginning to look like a speculative bubble akin to the Dutch tulip mania of the 1630s and the South Sea Bubble of the early eighteenth century. And, much like those episodes, the AI boom appears headed for an inevitable bust. Instead of creating new assets, it threatens to leave behind only mountains of debt.

April 19, 2023, Central European University

LONDON – In Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus, scientist Victor Frankenstein famously uses dead body parts to create a hyperintelligent “superhuman” monster that – driven mad by human cruelty and isolation – ultimately turns on its creator. Since its publication in 1818, Shelley’s story of scientific research gone wrong has come to be seen as a metaphor for the danger (and folly) of trying to endow machines with human-like intelligence.

Shelley’s tale has taken on new resonance with the rapid emergence of generative artificial intelligence. On March 22, the Future of Life Institute issued an open letter signed by hundreds of tech leaders, including Tesla CEO Elon Musk and Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, calling