World Development today is a contested concept, and one that provokes debate across the board. Culture Wars is bringing together reviews of books and the arts, to engage with everything from globalisation to slum cities, from consumerism to international aid.

Questions dealt with throughout these reviews include: following massive economic growth from China and India, are we seeing a new distribution of power on the world stage? How should we respond to the perceived costs of development such as global warming and the erosion of communities? And what are the best models for growth?

The internet: made for Islam?

iMuslims: Rewiring the House of Islam, by Gary R Bunt (Hurst & Company, 2009)

But what of the ostensible contradiction between Islam and modernity? Far from being in antithesis to Islam, the internet is entirely germane to a religion that has always been ‘wiki’ in its nature.

The legacy of Brutalist vitality

The People’s Republic of Hulme, BBC Radio 4 / English Heritage: Romancing the Stone, BBC2

Yet Kermode and many other Hulme residents found something to celebrate in this dystopian existence. A transient and extraordinarily vibrant mix of people descended upon Hulme as the opportunity for cheap or free housing in the very heart of Manchester led to waves of youthful creative energy.

Goods are good

Ferraris for All: In Defence of Economic Growth, by Daniel Ben-Ami (Policy Press, 2010)

The implication of Ferraris is that the incessant focus on limits of all kinds today is about the idea of, the necessity for, limits per se rather than specific limits themselves. Any attempt to argue that such and such a particular limit – the ‘tyranny of oil’ – can be overcome – with biofuels - will be countered almost immediately with another limit – a claimed shortage of land.

Guilty fantasies

The Tyranny of Guilt, an Essay on Western Masochism, by Pascal Bruckner (Princeton University Press, 2010)

Moreover, it’s noteworthy that for all his shrewd criticism of the way the left projects its fantasies onto the Israel-Palestine conflict, Bruckner himself was a keen supporter of the break up of Yugoslavia and the punishment and demonisation of Serbia during the 1990s. Bruckner failed utterly to understand that the left (and indeed many on the right such as himself) were projecting a fantasy onto the Yugoslav break up and war.

Reactionary, reified, religious and revoltingly inhumane

Requiem for a Species: Why we resist the truth about climate change, by Clive Hamilton (Earthscan, 2010)

Hamilton starts his chapter on ‘denial’ by recounting the tale of the ‘cognitive dissonance’ suffered by a 1950s doomsday cult whose apocalyptic predictions failed to materialise; an ironic choice for a thinker in a tradition which has consistently predicted (as yet unrealised) ecological disaster since the 1790s.

Laduuummaaaaaaaaa!

A short essay on the future of South Africa, and football.

South Africa is ready but there is a long way to go before they achieve their dream goal.

‘Necessary compromise’

The New Old World, by Perry Anderson (Verso, 2009)

Anderson’s account of the EU is at its strongest when he shows how it excludes the possibility of any of kind of politics at all. He remarks that though the EU appears in many respects to function as a forum for managing the relations between independent sovereign states, even here we are witnessing something different from traditional diplomacy.

Long, hot summers

Nagging Doubt, Finsborough Theatre, London

In 1981 Klaff was younger and leaner and apartheid still reigned. A state of emergency had been imposed after the Soweto uprising of 1976 and the anti-apartheid movement was at its height in Britain and elsewhere. Today the ANC rules and the roles have been somewhat reversed. Afrikaners live in fear for their lives.

Keynes, the straw man and this irrational, crazy world

The Economic Crisis and the State of Economics, Eds. Robert Skidelsky and Christian Westerlind Wigstrom. Palgrave Macmillan, 2010

If you have any doubt about the irrelevance of the EMH in the real world then just look at how the world’s leaders responded to the financial crisis. Governments everywhere stepped in with massive subsidies to keep the financial system afloat. Would leaders who were supposedly ideologically wedded to the principles of the free market have acted in such a concerted way to bail out the markets?

Nikolai’s broken cry

The White Guard, National Theatre (Lyttleton), London

The real and true menace is not Communism, nor the new government, but the Future, and it the Future which has its thundering cannons pointed firmly against the sentimental bourgeoisie.

The old one-two punch of history

First as Tragedy, Then As Farce, by Slavoj Žižek (2009)

The sheer vitality of Žižek’s thought usually serves to ensure that his work is an enjoyable read. In First as Tragedy, Then As Farce this effect is amplified by the urgency of his topic and the passion with which he approaches it. It’s perhaps inevitable though that this urgency does not translate easily into prescriptive politics and this is the one aspect of the book’s thesis which disappoints.

Don’t blame it on the Boomers

The Pinch: How the Baby Boomers took their children's future - and why they should give it back, by David Willetts (Atlantic Books)

Can Willetts afford himself the luxury of reticence? This book is not just about a supposed inter-generational conflict. It’s really about the state of the nation. This topic should not invite despair, but nor should it simply breed good - but insubstantial – intentions.

To and of humanity

The Education of a British-Protected Child, by Chinua Achebe (Allen Lane)

A 1988 essay entitled ‘The University and the Leadership Factor in Nigerian Politics’ perhaps surprisingly offers a message directly applicable to the current moment in British politics. ‘Leadership is a sacred trust, like the priesthood in civilised, humane religions’, Achebe writes. His writings should be on a list of required reading for all those thinking of taking up office; perhaps then we might end up with a political class ready to treat the electorate with the respect it is due.

Muslim Cinema: an introduction

With 101 must-see Muslim-themed films

An introduction to Muslim Cinema allows Muslims to take a critical reflection about their own beliefs and culture, as well as providing a window for those who are of other faiths to see who Muslims are. Where does one start?

The Mayor who sets his sights low

Why Londoners should challenge the low horizons of Boris Johnson, and champion the building of skyscrapers

Boris Johnson has used his powers to galvanise the anti-high-rise sentiment into an object of policy. So far, he has gotten away with this unchallenged. But it is incumbent on us, those who welcome the prospect of transforming London’s skyline into an exciting scene that represents the city’s dynamism, to publicly challenge this short-sighted and un-ambitious policy.