18 April 2010 | Interview with Grant Thornton

The defects of business models

New ways of fleecing customers are no substitute for the hard graft of research, development and successful technological innovation

7 April 2010 | Proof

Letter from India

Sights and insights from Mumbai and Kerala 1.3MB

11 March 2010 | spiked

How the state is a roadblock to progress in innovation

Obsessed with red tape, visionless governments are holding back the kind of big and risky developments society needs

7 July 2009 | spiked

The green man’s burden

Why is Greenpeace calling on the UK to set an example to nations like China, when the Chinese are cleaning up faster than us?

29 June 2009 | spiked

Let’s go back to the Moon – and beyond

As the 40th anniversary of the first manned moon landing approaches, backward attitudes here on Earth have tainted our view of lunar exploration

15 June 2009 | spiked

Risk-taking, R&D and the recession

The woeful level of Western investment in R&D reveals much about the capitalists’ state of mind

1 May 2009 | spiked

The myth that New Labour is pro-nuclear

Everyone from big business to greens imagines that British government policy favours nuclear energy. It doesn’t

7 April 2009 | spiked

A Fu Manchu of the dot com age?

Claims that Chinese cyber-spies are plotting world domination through the World Wide Web are greatly exaggerated

30 March 2009 | Special to Woudhuysen.com

Political writing: long live the cliche

Andrew Rawnsley, one of Britain's leading political commentators, offers an excellent – if inadvertent – lesson in how to repeat tired old images and mangle metaphors, too. I've counted more than 30 lame phrases, and have highlighted them in yellow 76kB

24 March 2009 | New Civil Engineer

Science, engineering and the two Cabinets

How many of our leaders in New Labour and the Conservatives have any background in technology or business?

19 March 2009 | spiked

The recession and the Politics of Fumbling

The consistent incompetence of politicians does not come by chance: it's a symptom of their lack of a cohering ideology

February 2009 | spiked

Praise for Energise!

A top sociologist has kind words for what is in fact a searing polemic

15 January 2009 | New Civil Engineer

The Severn Barrage: calling greens' bluff

Green objections to the Severn Barrage reveal little more than a phobia of major projects

12 January 2009 | spiked

The CFLs are on, but nobody’s home

The mad green war on light bulbs won’t save much electricity - it’s about enforcing moral rectitude in the home

8 January 2009 | BBC Breakfast

Lights: Behind the controversy on compact fluorescents vs incandescents

Keeping the lights on is more vital than improving the energy efficiency of lighting products