Battle Of Ideas

The Battle of Ideas festival returns to the Barbican following its hugely successful tenth anniversary.

2015 marks a new chapter for the Battle – but with the same commitment to challenging orthodoxies and critically interrogating intellectual trends in the UK and far beyond.

This year’s festival will see 400 world-leading speakers take part in 100 panels with a public audience of over 2,000 on key issues such as: the crisis of liberal values in the age of ISIS; free speech post-Charlie Hebdo; the state of European democracy after Greece; bioethical dilemmas over life and death; and whether artificial intelligence offers a threat to humanity – or a new age of economic renaissance.

Free speech allowed!