This introduction argues that the central role played by the corporation is of crucial importance to the dynamics of the climate crisis and the ecocide that the planet faces. The corporation is a major threat to us, yet it is a threat that we are not taking seriously enough. The evidence set out in this chapter indicates that we have a problem that cannot simplistically be dismissed as the fault of a few "rogue" or "bad apple" corporations. In each of the examples discussed here - fossil fuels, tobacco, asbestos, synthetic chemicals and the car industry - all of the corporate executives who were in charge of making deadly products knew exactly what they were doing. They were fully aware of the consequences, but did it anyway. This introduction therefore poses a key question that sets up the rest of the book: if all of the industrial processes that are threatening the end of the species are financed, manufactured and distributed under the control of profit-making corporations, and they have chosen time and time again to sweep the problem under the carpet, then why are corporations not seen as central to the planet's problems?

The Image of Irelande, with a Discoverie of Woodkarne was published by John Derricke in 1581, following his time in Ireland in the employ of Sir Henry Sidney, the then lord deputy of Ireland. The book defends Sidney’s record and details the military victories he achieved over the native Irish. Included in the publication were twelve double-page woodcuts which Derricke stated were ‘Made and devised by him’. These depict various scenes of life in late Tudor Ireland, some of which Derricke may have witnessed himself. Two of these illustrate Sidney in Dublin, one a scene in which the lord deputy emerges through the main gate of Dublin Castle in a procession of horse-mounted troops. Notwithstanding certain licence on Derricke’s part, this image of Dublin Castle and its environs still provides a valuable commentary on the nature of the built environment in late sixteenth-century Dublin, the nature of which is only partially understood from documentary sources and archaeological remains. This chapter discusses the value of Derricke’s Image for archaeologists and architectural historians in reconstructing certain aspects of architecture in late Tudor Dublin.

As in the United States, British popular music also developed in collaboration with the broadcasting and film industries. This chapter undertakes an analysis of the British contribution to popular music and moving image culture through an examination of British film musicals from the 1930s to the 1960s. The relationship between British and American popular culture is shown to be both competitive and complex. British rock'n'roll singers initially modelled themselves on the American stars, with Bill Haley and the Comets leading the way. Haley's popularity was greater and longer-lasting in Britain than it was in the United States, and his music was central to the development of a new youth-orientated phase in British popular music. The chapter examines the reasons for serious and unjustified neglect of British musicals within the overall context of British film production and the influence of class-based social attitudes towards popular culture.

While his move into visual media represented a clear change of direction for Kureishi, there are nonetheless many continuities between the first two phases of his career. Perhaps unsurprisingly, My Beautiful Laundrette, his first film script, was initially developed like a play. Kureishi's drama is repeatedly raided for motifs, themes and character types for his films. Most obviously, Kureishi's films attempt to make Asian Britain the subject of representation, redressing an obvious lacuna in post-war British cinema. The first two films, in particular, are remarkable for the restricted number and nature of the roles given to white British characters. In these respects, Kureishi's films look back not just to 'fringe', but to a long TV tradition of imaginative social investigation. The engagement of Kureishi's films with 'Heritage' cinema is even more extensive than is the case with 'Raj Revival' work.

At the launch of Love in a Blue Time in April 1997, Kureishi commented that he had no plans to return to writing drama. The rapid expansion of 'fringe' theatre, which generally favoured limited runs of short new plays, meant unprecedented opportunities for aspiring authors like Kureishi. 'Fringe' also sought to revolutionise theatre as a social and cultural institution at the point of consumption by extending the cultural franchise to constituencies which conventional theatre did not customarily address or appeal to. The time scheme of Outskirts demarcates the temporal boundaries of the plays, extending from 1969 to 1981. This was a time of particular turbulence and difficulty in contemporary British history which, from a Left-liberal perspective at least, began with quasi-revolutionary optimism and ended in deep reaction. Kureishi' s plays testify to an unstable and eclectic range of dramaturgical influences.

In focusing primarily on providing an overview and critical evaluation of Kureishi's treatment of issues of ethnicity and diaspora, national identity and cultural belonging, this concluding chapter can be no more than an interim report on his output to date. Kureishi criticism ranges from fairly traditional kinds of content and formal analysis, through various cultural-historical contextualisations to sometimes highly theorised discussions grounded in the conceptual frameworks of cultural studies, gender studies, film studies, postmodernism and minoritarian/postcolonial theory. As his best critics have recognised, Kureishi's representation and treatment of 'hybridity' is itself hybrid and ambivalent. In large measure, such instability reflects his sometimes unconsolingly honest perception of the uneven, often contradictory and sometimes highly conflictual nature of inter-cultural relations in the contemporary world. Nobody can underestimate the importance of the fact that Kureishi has helped to render Asian Britain visible as a subject of cultural representation.

The introduction of television and video technology have had a profound impact on popular music and the music industry. This chapter looks at the relationship between popular music and television and charts the development of rock and pop on both British and American television from the 1950s onwards. In Britain, television emerged from within the BBC and its public service monopoly of radio broadcasting, and was subject to policies and cultural attitudes which had prevailed within that context. Like Hollywood, American television's response to rock'n'roll and to the evident growth of the teenage market was often clothed in the discourse of controversy which characterized debate about young people and their lifestyle. The growing convergence between the record industry and television, the place of television in youth culture and the power of televisual images to determine the meanings of popular music, are examined through consideration of a number of specific programmes.

The conclusion draws together the overall themes of the book, looking at individual experiences of inequality, the problem of shared experiences that obscure structural inequalities, and the long-term and long-standing nature of inequalities.The conclusion defends the book’s project of making inequalities visible in order to tailor appropriate solutions. Making inequality visible suggests the need to develop appropriate theories of inequality and culture. The book concludes by thinking through what strong and weak theories of culture and inequality might look like, and what solutions they might suggest to the problems we have made visible in our analysis.Ultimately the conclusion restates the value of culture, and the need to challenge inequality so that everyone can experience the way that culture is good for you.

The aim of this chapter is to set the debate about the future of the British House of Lords in the wider context of a discussion about the principle and practice of bicameralism around the world. The American Senate is today the example par excellence of a powerful second chamber. It is a model that has been followed elsewhere in terms of its structure, but it remains unique. Two myths about second chambers must be dispelled. One is to say that they are on the way out, that there is a trend towards unicameralism in the modern world. The second myth is that where they do exist second chambers are becoming weaker and ever more marginal bodies. There has been a tendency simply to look at second chambers as if they are appendages to first chambers. Second chambers can add depth to representation within parliament.

This chapter focuses on the role of France and Germany in the EU. Both states have often exercised dominance at key moments and have collaborated to drive the integration project forward. Converging Europe has been a story about how these two national giants determined the extent to which their core interests could be reconciled with advancing the European project. Konrad Adenauer had never been an enthusiastic German in the political sense even before the disastrous advent of Hitler. From Charles de Gaulle to Jacques Chirac and Nicolas Sarkozy, French strategy towards the European Union was too often based exclusively on ways of extracting national advantage from Europe or else promoting the personal agenda of a head of state enjoying semi-regal powers. The blows directed against the cause of building an EU with strong economic and political authority by France were harder ones than those mounted by any Eurosceptics.