A Point of View

As the Tory leadership election highlights questions of social mobility, David Goodhart looks at why some people seem to have more luck than others. To what extent can we create our own opportunities, regardless of background? What role does personality play? And is it really possible to engineer and cultivate our own luck by being open to chance encounters? Producer: Adele Armstrong Sound: Peter Bosher Production coordinator: Gemma Ashman Editor: Richard Fenton-Smith

'We're witnessing a major change in British politics,' writes John Gray. 'But to what?' With Boris Johnson on the way out, many Conservatives, he says, believe the party needs a new 'big idea'. But that is a fundamental error, he believes. 'What the party needs is not another new philosophy but a healthy dose of pragmatism...new thinking, but not some grand new theory'.Producer: Adele Armstrong Sound: Peter Bosher Production coordinator: Gemma Ashman Editor: Penny Murphy

Zoe Strimpel argues that wealth creation should be the bedrock of politics. She says that while she loathes the arrogance sometimes displayed by the super rich - especially in the present climate where millions are sinking into poverty - it's not billionaires who are the problem. 'My view is that we need not fewer billionaires but more, the richer the better,' she writes. 'In fact, the more rich people the better'. Hatred of billionaires, she believes, is perplexing at a time when government can't, or won't, fill huge gaps in funding. Producer: Adele Armstrong Sound: Peter Bosher Production coordinator: Gemma Ashman Editor: Richard Fenton-Smith.

Sarah Dunant relives a road trip she took 50 years ago, travelling across the USA at a time when Roe v Wade was the talk of America, and revolution was in the air.'I can only imagine what it must be like to be a woman living in America this week, she writes in the aftermath of the decision by the US Supreme Court - a decision which almost instantly makes abortion illegal in more than 20 US states. She takes us back to 1972 and her travels across America in a beat-up car, when radical lawyers were honing their arguments to first present the case to the country's highest court.'America's post-war abundance and energy, its style, its movies and its music saturated our youth', she says. 'We had the time of our lives - even the bad bits were good, we were living the dream'. And, fifty years on, she reflects on what has happened to 'the fabric of this extraordinary country'.Producer: Adele Armstrong Sound: Peter Bosher Production coordinator: Iona Hammond Editor: Richard Fenton-Smith

'It's time to acknowledge', writes Will Self, 'that we don't really feel nostalgia at all - only something far more worrying and debilitating: a condition I've named no-stalgia'.Will argues that the West is particularly in thrall to rose-tinted nostalgia and looks to Japan - and its concept of 'mono no aware' - as an alternative and healthier way of thinking about the past. Producer: Adele Armstrong Sound: Peter Bosher Production Coordinator: Iona Hammond Editor: Richard Fenton-Smith

Howard Jacobson reflects on his upcoming 'significant birthday' and why he's become a willing participant in the ways of personal trainers. 'I say trainer but I am past training,' writes Howard. 'He's more my stretcher. My wife's stretcher, actually, but she doesn't want to be stretched while I shrink. I refused to have him at first. But I capitulated. It was either that or watch my wife by stretched to twice my length'. So down on the floor he goes, 'hoping someone - anyone - will think I'm a weekend younger than I actually am'.Producer: Adele Armstrong Sound: Peter Bosher Production coordinator: Gemma Ashman Editor: Richard Fenton-Smith.

Adam Gopnik grew up in Canada, where he saw the Queen age gracefully on the country's bank notes - though he says the royal connection often felt vague. Arriving in London this week amid union flags and flowers, Adam reflects on the constancy of the Queen's reign. "What lasts for seventy years," he writes, "and never takes a turn into indecency or becomes cruel or sordid in any of the obvious ways has my vote. Well, not my vote, obviously....my allegiance. Well, okay, not my allegiance... my admiration."Producer: Adele Armstrong Sound: Nigel Appleton Production coordinator: Gemma Ashman Editor: Richard Fenton-Smith

After recently discovering the secret of her local meadow, which hides the ruins of World War Two, Rebecca Stott reflects on how we rebuild lives and landscapes, from 6th Century Britain to post-war Berlin to Beirut. She reflects on the damage currently being inflicted on Ukraine, and highlights recent discussions held by the Mayor of Kharkiv to plan the rebuilding of his city. 'It struck me as remarkable that despite the war, despite seeing his city in ruins... the mayor had the capacity to start thinking about the future.' Producer: Adele Armstrong Sound: Peter Bosher Production Coordinator: Gemma Ashman Editor: Richard Fenton-Smith.

'Over the centuries', writes Michael Morpurgo, 'we have been a safe haven to so many, and they have helped make us the people we are today - at our best, a deeply humanitarian people. I fear we are not at our best today'. Michael argues that, although we need to address the issue of people smuggling and deaths from dangerous Channel crossings, we must not lose our capacity for kindness and 'generosity of spirit' towards those who need our help. Producer: Adele Armstrong Sound: Peter Bosher Production Coordinator: Gemma Ashman Editor: Hugh Levinson

'We must never underestimate the power of words to shape public opinion and politics', writes Bernardine Evaristo. This comes in the aftermath of a call from a school authority in South Dakota for the banning of her novel, 'Girl, Woman, Other' on the grounds that it - and four other novels - are unsuitable for seventeen and eighteen-year-olds. Bernardine argues that we should avoid vocabulary that fosters outrage and try instead to find words that convey our exact, and reasoned, argument. Producer: Adele Armstrong Sound: Peter Bosher Production coordinator: Gemma Ashman Editor: Richard Fenton-Smith