Let the Battle continue...

Our annual festival in London was a roaring success - but the battle for free speech doesn't end there.

The Battle of Ideas festival weekend is over for another year - and what a weekend it was. We ended up selling out on Saturday, with Sunday being almost as full. The corridors of Church House were teeming with Battlers on their way to sessions, and the atmosphere across the festival was electric. There are so many people to thank, it takes an army to make the Battle run - I managed to remember most of them in my final speech during our drinks reception on the Sunday night:

Our motto this year was ‘conversations for the public, with the public, in public’. I’m delighted that we achieved that. The festival was a fantastic exchange of ideas, often passionately, but always with civility and a willingness to listen to those we disagreed with. If you were there, your contributions were vital to that. We truly mean it when we say that, for the Battle of Ideas, the audience IS the festival. There were some fantastic speeches and amazing performances on our panels – follow #BattleFest on X/Twitter to see our attendees highlights on social media. 

We have filmed most of the festival and our videos will start appearing soon on YouTube, so do subscribe to our channel to keep up to date. Moreover, we’ll have audio recordings of everything on our podcast channel, which can also subscribe to our here. Some are already out there - including Andrew Doyle’s Free Speech Nation on GB News and The Spiked Podcast, both filmed live at the festival:

For us, the most encouraging thing about the festival was that there was so much energy for a different kind of politics: one that takes ideas, debate and free speech seriously. I spoke to so many people in, around and after sessions that wanted to know: What next? Where do we go from here?

NEXT YEAR’S FESTIVAL

First and foremost, get next year’s dates in your diary.

Battle of Ideas festival 2025 will take place on 18 & 19 October at Church House.

You can buy Early Bird tickets right now, via Eventbrite.

FESTIVAL 2024 CONTINUES 

The festival is not over, thanks to our programme of satellite events. They continue on Wednesday 23 October in Leeds with Denise Fahmy introducing the discussion on Fighting censorship: Freedom in the Arts. 

The satellite programme continues with the launch of the Classical Philosophy Reading Group (on Sunday 3 November, via Zoom), Rob Lyons discussing the big food panics today (Tuesday 5 November, Newcastle) and a ‘double-header’ of debates in Berlin on Wednesday 6 November on two aspects of civilisation – industrial society and sporting achievement.

On Saturday 9 November we have an afternoon of three debates in Dublin, covering misinformation, literary freedom and the impact of EDI. Find out more here.

We conclude with a night of free-speech comedy in London at Comedy Unleashed on Tuesday 12 November, Timandra Harkness introducing From social media to AI: a tech moral panic? in Stockholm on Wednesday 13 November and Andrew Calcutt leading a debate on Riots and the role of culturalism on Thursday 14 November in Derby.

SUPPORT OUR WORK ON SUBSTACK

Our Substack is the most effective way to stay up to date everything we do at Academy of Ideas to defend free speech, extend the public square and democracy, and beat the culture war. We have essays on everything from education to AI, privacy to day-to-day politics, and what’s happening with my work in the House of Lords. We also feature our ongoing series, Letters on Liberty.

But more than simply staying up to date with our news and views, you can become a paid subscriber and make a vital contribution to our work. We genuinely run the Academy of Ideas on a shoestring budget and it is only thanks to the support of people like you that we can put on events like the Battle of Ideas festival. If you want to see more of these events, become a paid subscriber (where you’ll also get discounts to future events and regular copies of Letters on Liberty) or simply make a donation to the Academy of Ideas. 

Finally, and obviously, you should follow us on Twitter/X, on Facebook, on Instagram and on YouTube, and also subscribe to our podcast. That way, you’ll be the first to know about future events, and about the release of audio and video from this year’s festival.