bigideas

Recent Big Ideas events have come back again and again to the (lack of) possibility for individuals to influence the society in which they live. Jamie Oliver’s School Dinners campaign was a bizarre case in point: was he a citizen who saw something wrong and successfully put it right, or was he an over-priviliged, ego-centric TV personality doing more harm than good?

The following is a rough write-up of my notes from the intro to our August 2008 event. We had a really interesting and wide-ranging discussion, which I haven’t attempted to summarise, so please feel free to add what you remember from the night in the comments.

What criteria apply to an institution or individual to make them English? Does it involve a love of tea and fair play, an general feeling that Scots’ grievances are largely baseless or just English parentage? Is it ever possible to nail this stuff down?

Recently the nature and practice of history, heritage and identity have all featured as Big Ideas topics of discussion. Jon E Wilson’s article in this month’s Prospect brings all of these themes together in an insightful piece on the attempt to find a British national story.