David Marsh, Marina Wheeler and Victor Mallet chaired by Stephen Law

Economist and journalist Professor David Marsh, barrister Marina Wheeler and foreign correspondent Victor Mallet ask whether Europe can survive the threats it is facing and whether the UK should build a new partnership with Europe to defend our democracy.

Europe faces grave tests. Brexit has weakened both Britain and Europe. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and shifting US attitudes have also revealed European vulnerabilities. Voters in France and other European countries increasingly express economic grievances, blasting mass immigration, especially of Muslims, and ‘foreign criminals’. Is France, and even Europe, ripe for a far-right take-over? If so, what might be done to turn the tide? Should the UK admit that Europe is central to Britain’s future and work on building a new partnership that will defend our liberties and democracies?

Marsh is one of the foremost writers and commentators on European economics, finance, and politics. Co-founder and chairman of the OMFIF economic research group, he is a former Financial Times European editor and the author of six books, including Can Europe Survive? The Story of a Continent in a Fractured World.

Wheeler is a noted KC, specialising in public and human rights law. She was born in West Berlin and educated in Brussels, at the heart of the European Project. For 25 years she was married to Boris Johnson and was in the room when many of the key Brexit discussions took place. She is author of A More Perfect Union: The Europe We Need.

Mallet is a journalist, commentator and author with more than three decades of experience in Europe, Asia, the Middle East and Africa. He is now a senior editor on the FT’s world desk, and his previous jobs include Paris bureau chief and Asia editor. He is author of Far-Right France: Le Pen, Bardella and the Future of Europe.

Discussions are chaired by Dr Stephen Law, philosopher and academic, and author of bestselling introductions to philosophy for adults and children, including The Philosophy Gym. Law is also the editor of the Royal Institute of Philosophy Journal Think, and the festival’s major projects director.