Nigel Biggar on Deconstructing Decolonisation, and In Conversation with Kemi Badenoch and Ali Ansari

Professor Nigel Biggar, CBE, is Regius Professor Emeritus of Moral Theology and Director of the McDonald Centre for Theology, Ethics, and Public Life at the University of Oxford. Described as “one of the leading living Western ethicists” (John Gray, New Statesman, 25 November 2020), he is the author of In Defence of War (Oxford, 2013) and What’s Wrong with Rights? (Oxford, 2020). William Collins will publish his next book, Colonialism: A Moral Reckoning, in February 2023.

The Rt Hon Kemi Badenoch is the MP for Saffron Walden and Secretary of State for International Trade and President of the Board of Trade. She was formerly Minister of State at the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities and Minister of State for Equalities.

Professor Ali Ansari FRSE is Professor in Modern and Iranian History and Founding Director of the Institute for Iranian Studies at the University of St Andrews. He is also a Senior Associate Fellow at the Royal United Services Institute, President of the British Institute of Persian Studies and Director of the Westphalia for the Middle East project at the Centre for Geopolitics at Cambridge. He is the author of eight books including Iran: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford, 2014) and Iran, Islam and Democracy: The Politics of Managing Change (3rd Edition, Gingko/Chatham House, 2019).

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Peter Hitchens on After Conservatism, and In Conversation with Daniel Hannan and Noel Malcolm

Peter Hitchens is one of Britain's most accomplished journalists, debaters and conservative thinkers. He currently writes for The Mail on Sunday, contributes regularly to most major British newspapers, is a former foreign correspondent for the Daily Express, and has won the Orwell Prize for his political journalism. He is the author of numerous books, including The Abolition of Britain: From Winston Churchill To Theresa May (Bloomsbury, 2018) and The Phoney Victory: The World War II Illusion (I.B. Tauris, 2018).

Daniel Hannan, Lord Hannan of Kingsclere, is a celebrated journalist, author and Conservative politician. Formerly a Member of the European Parliament, he was a leading figure in the campaign to leave the European Union. He serves on the UK Board of Trade, is a Vice-Chairman of the Conservative Party responsible for its international relations, and teaches at the University of Buckingham and the University of Francisco Marroquín.

Professor Sir Noel Malcolm is a Senior Research Fellow at All Souls College, Oxford where he specialises in early modern intellectual history and relations between Western Europe and the Ottoman/Islamic world in the early modern period. He is a distinguished journalist and the author of many acclaimed books including Agents of Empire: Knights, Corsairs, Jesuits and Spies in the Late Sixteenth-Century Mediterranean World (Allen Lane, 2015) and Useful Enemies: Islam and The Ottoman Empire in Western Political Thought, 1450-1750 (Oxford, 2019).

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Andrew Roberts on History and Statesmanship, and In Conversation with Robert Tombs

Professor Andrew Roberts is one of Britain's most distinguished historians, journalists and broadcasters. He is the author of nineteen books, the most recent of which are his world-renowned biographies of Winston Churchill, Churchill: Walking With Destiny (Allen Lane, 2018) and King George III, George III: The Life and Reign of Britain's Most Misunderstood Monarch (Allen Lane, 2021). He is presently the Roger and Martha Mertz Visiting Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, a Visiting Professor at the War Studies Department at King’s College, London, and the Lehrman Institute Lecturer at the New-York Historical Society.

Professor Robert Tombs is Professor Emeritus of French History at the University of Cambridge and the author of the bestselling books, The English and Their History (Penguin, 2014) and This Sovereign Isle (Penguin, 2021).

This lecture will be introduced by Professor Dame Louise Richardson, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Oxford, the next president of the Carnegie Corporation of New York, and an eminent political scientist specialising in the study of terrorism.

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Katharine Birbalsingh on Education, Race & Conservatism, and In Conversation with Helena Morrissey and Marie Daouda

Katharine Birbalsingh CBE is the Chair of the Social Mobility Commission and Headmistress and co-founder of Michaela Community School in Wembley, London. She has a lifetime of distinguished service in the UK education system, is a celebrated author and broadcaster, and is often referred to as 'Britain's strictest headteacher'.

Baroness Helena Morrissey is a Fellow (Governor) of Eton College and was Lead Non-Executive Director of the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office from 2020-22. She has over three decades of experience in the financial services sector and founded the 30% Club, a business-led campaign for better gender-balanced boards.

Dr Marie Daouda is a distinguished literary scholar and Stipendiary Lecturer in French at Oriel College, Oxford where she teaches both literature and language.

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