Shirley Williams

The Rt Hon. Professor Shirley Williams presents 'The 20th Century: The Century Of Violence'.

Rt. Hon. Professor Shirley Williams, politician and academic, presents a talk and Q&A evening. After graduating from Oxford she worked as a journalist for several years before becoming an MP in 1964. She co-founded the Liberal Democrats and has been a member of the House of Lords since 1993, where she was spokesperson on Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs from 1998 to 2001 and Leader of the party in that House from 2001 to 2004.

An MP for nearly twenty years, she was a member of the Cabinet for five years. She is Professor Emeritus of Elective Politics at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University with whom she has had a close relationship for many years. She was adviser to Gordon Brown on issues of nuclear proliferation, and until recently a member of the International Commission on Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament.