Can a centrist agenda be radical? Looking at both the UK and the US, John Gray argues that standard liberal and conservative policy mixes are inadequate responses to some of the central issues faced by both countries. In areas such as the proper scope and limits of the market, drugs, energy policy and the war against terrorism, policy and debate remain fixated in ideological positions that have become irrelevant and harmful.

John Gray is a professor of European thought at the London School of Economics and one of the most prominent political philosophers of our time. He is a regular contributor to the Guardian and the Times Literary Supplement, and his books include Isaiah Berlin, Enlightenment's Wake, and Voltaire and Enlightenment.