Politics & Society

In August 1979, Timothy Knatchbull and his family went out in a boat off the coast of Ireland. Neither his grandparents or his twin brother would return from the IRA bomb attack that shocked Britain and the world. Here he talks about books that helped him better understand 'the Troubles,' and his own book, From a Clear Blue Sky, about his own journey to come to terms with that happened that bank holiday weekend.

The Hoover Institution scholar explores five books that he believes teach us something about how we are "failing to understand, appreciate and defend our liberty"

Modern conservatism is being driven by an historically unlikely coalition of libertarians and traditionalists, says the vice-president for research at the Cato Institute.

The CNN columnist and former speechwriter for George W Bush, David Frum, recommends five conservative books that transformed the way we think about fundamental problems.

Global security consultant says sending armed forces into another country based on purely moral, gut feelings of good and evil is a dangerous policy-making premise. He chooses books on Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran and Al Qaeda

The Dutch army captain whose unit secured Tuzla airbase for the incoming UN aid in 1994 talks about the books he kept with him in Bosnia, and the inspiration for his Yugoslav novel, King of Tuzla

Duke University professor choose fives books on war and foreign policy and says that neoconservative veneration of nationalism leads to a foreign policy of perpetual war overseas

The author of Torture and Democracy gives a harrowing interview on the effects of violence, torture and trauma on the human being, 'torture has a slippery slope and once you authorise it, it rapidly runs out of control'

The leading Conservative strategist and Head of Americans for Tax Reform argues that liberals actively undermine what makes America great. He chooses five books to better understand conservative America

The Founder and Editor of National Affairs Magazine speculates how the founding fathers of Conservatism might have been nervous about Sarah Palin and the Tea Party movement