Festival of Dangerous Ideas

Our obsession with true crime is everywhere – from news stories and podcasts to the big screen. However in recent decades, rates of almost all crime around the world have declined dramatically, with the notable exception of sexual assault. Meanwhile the number of people in prison has increased alarmingly.  TV and film critic Wenlei Ma, journalist Kate McClymont, and former Executive Director of the NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics Don Weatherburn investigate why the data on crime, the inmate numbers and our obsession with these stories doesn’t add up.

Australia is professed to be the most successful multicultural society in the world. However, with our treatment of multicultural communities throughout the pandemic, a selective immigration progress and fraught ongoing Indigenous relations – Australia continues to deliver some sharp lessons about race. Why is it that some lives are remembered, commemorated and valued more than others?  Delivered in the wake of the Queen’s passing, author and activist Sisonke Msimang explores the preciousness of white life in the precarious face of Black Lives. Sisonke Msimang is an award-winning writer whose long-form writing on money, power and sex has appeared in the New York Times, Foreign Affairs the Washington Post, Lapham’s Quarterly and a range of other publications. She is also a columnist for The Guardian Australia. Currently a fellow at the Wits Institute for Social and Economic Research (WISER), she has fellowships at Yale University and the Aspen Institute, where her work has focussed on the form and content of women’s stories.  She served as the Executive Director of a human rights organisation that provided grant funding and advocacy support to amplify the voices of activists living and working across Southern Africa. Much of that work involved gender justice in conflict and crisis-affected countries, most notably Angola, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Zimbabwe. 

In a world where the internet saturates everything, where does the internet stop and our human selves begin? As we’re nudged and pushed by an endless stream of alerts, notifications and recommendations, our attention and money are pulled in directions that seem to only serve the interests of the platforms.  As we’re inevitably drifting towards automation, NY Times tech columnist and host of the Rabbit Hole podcast Kevin Roose, offers us a digital wellness check up in how we can fight back to preserve our humanity. This session was presented in partnership with UNSW Sydney. Kevin Roose is an award-winning technology columnist for The New York Times and the best-selling author of three books, Futureproof, Young Money, and The Unlikely Disciple. His column, The Shift, examines the intersection of tech, business, culture, and the combined effect they have on society. He is the host of Rabbit Hole, a New York Times-produced narrative audio series about what the internet is doing to us, and a regular guest on The Daily, as well as other leading TV and radio shows. He frequently writes and speaks on topics including automation and A.I., social media, disinformation and cybersecurity, and digital wellness. 

From Russia and China to America, Turkey and beyond, illiberal leaders have used corruption, machismo, disinformation, propaganda and violence to stay in power and expand their influence for decades.   With authoritarianism now governing over 60% of the world’s population, are we witnessing a backslide in democracy and a more efficient model of governance emerging?    Join historian Ruth Ben-Ghiat as she examines the authoritarian playbook, how strongmen think and what drives them.  Historian Ruth Ben-Ghiat is an expert commentator on fascism, authoritarian leaders, and propaganda — and the threats these present to democracies today. Author of the #1 Amazon bestseller Strongmen and over 100 op-eds and essays in CNN, The New Yorker, and The Washington Post, she brings historical perspective to her analyses of current events. Her insight into the authoritarian playbook has made her an expert source for television, radio, podcasts, and online events. Ben-Ghiat is Professor of History and Italian Studies at New York University and an advisor to Protect Democracy.

While we’ve all watched the rise of the US in our lifetimes, its recent decline has been a hot topic of conversation – with ballooning inequality, military overreach, gun violence and police shootings, the great recession, and a dramatic slide into decadence and division provided by recent politics and structures of power. While the idea of a slightly less-powerful America might be attractive to many countries tired of US dominance, can we reach the conclusion that America has reached a of tipping point into irreversible decline?  One of the BBC's finest foreign correspondents, Nick Bryant has covered some of the most momentous events of our times, the attacks of September 11, the war in Afghanistan, the Asian tsunami, the election of Barack Obama and the presidency of Donald Trump. Historian and author Ruth Ben-Ghiat is an expert commentator on fascism, authoritarian leaders, and propaganda — and the threats these present to democracies today. Author of the #1 Amazon bestseller Strongmen and over 100 op-eds and essays in CNN, The New Yorker, and The Washington Post, she brings historical perspective to her analyses of current events.  Geraldine Doogue is an Australian journalist and radio and television presenter, best known for her work with ABC RN Saturday Extra which specialises in foreign policy, regional issues and agenda-changing commentators. Prize-winning historian, writer and economic commentator, Adam Tooze combines deep historical expertise with up to date economic analysis to answer questions about current and future political power and economical shifts that could be used to navigate in our dynamic contemporary world.

The 21st century was supposed to be better than this.  As we confront the impacts of climate change, wars old and new, the pandemic and its aftermath, and a dangerously fragile global financial system, it’s time to ask ‘Why can’t we get our act together and solve the issues that matter?’ As we find ourselves dealing with a multitude of challenges that we predicted would arrive, but seem unable to prevent, acclaimed historian Adam Tooze looks back to see a better future. Prize-winning historian, writer and economic commentator, Adam Tooze combines deep historical expertise with up to date economic analysis to answer questions about current and future political power and economical shifts that could be used to navigate in our dynamic contemporary world. Tooze teaches at Columbia University where he is the Kathryn and Shelby Cullom Davis Professor of History and the Director of the European Institute.

Known as one of the most fierce and outspoken politicians in the country, Jacqui Lambie does not hold back. Not with her opinion, her work ethic, or her convictions. And she’s done the unthinkable, for a politician, she’s changed her mind and admitted to it. Rising to public office with the Palmer United Party in 2013, she quickly struck out on her own in 2014 as an independent for Tasmania in the Senate. Lambie, an Aboriginal Tasmanian who served in the Australian Army, has fought hard for welfare recipients, veterans and families affected by ice addiction, speaking compellingly on these issues from personal experience. Senator Lambie is anything but predictable and has come dangerously close many times to bursting the Canberra bubble. Expect candid frankness on Australia’s socio-political landscape and where Lambie sees us heading in this opening address for FODI 2022.

It’s been over 30 years since the fall of the Berlin Wall and the dissolution of the Soviet Union and 22 years since Vladimir Putin came to power. Now in the throes of a Ukraine invasion, the Russian regime combats any conflict with an utter disregard for internal opposition and external western pressure.  From the inside, fighting Putin is the only option for Russian activists. From the outside, what are the strategic options for western countries against this authoritarian superpower? Do military action or economic sanctions work? Or do we need to consider less orthodox approaches?    In this talk from 2014, in the wake of Russia’s annexation of Crimea and the shooting down of MH17, Russian journalist & activist Masha Gessen and foreign policy analyst Tom Switzer test different ideas on how to deal with Putin.

We may not want to admit it, but there is a spectrum of perversion along which we all sit. Whether it’s voyeurism, exhibitionism, or your run-of-the-mill foot fetish, we all possess a suite of sexual tastes as unique as our fingerprints—and as secret as the rest of the skeletons we’ve hidden in our closets.   In his 2012 talk Jesse Bering humanises so-called deviants while at the same time asking serious questions about the differences between thought and action. He presents us with a challenge: to understand that our best hope of solving some of the most troubling problems of our age hinges entirely on the amoral study of sex.  Jesse Michael Bering is an American psychologist, writer, and academic.

A playerless piano performs a repeating piece of music in which every note of a scale is played on every beat of the bar. The melody is absorbed into chaos, as the words of Noami Klein and Waleed Aly speak of our interconnectedness and entanglements. Produced by The Festival of Dangerous Ideas, The Ethics Centre and Audiocraft.