Thinking Class

John Gillam

Thinking Class is a weekly long-form interview podcast exploring the cultural, historical, and civilisational forces shaping England, Britain, and the Western world. Hosted by John Gillam, the show brings together historians, philosophers, theologians, economists, and public intellectuals for conversations that go beyond the news cycle by examining the deep roots of the West's present predicament and asking what genuine recovery might require. Guests have included David Starkey, Lord Jonathan Sumption, Lord Nigel Biggar, Robert Tombs, Peter Hitchens, Lionel Shriver, Roy Baumeister, Kathleen Stock, Carl Trueman, and many others. If you value serious conversation about Britain, the West, and the forces shaping our future, then this is the show for you. New episodes every week.

  1. 6 days ago

    #138 - Ricardo Duchesne - The Greatness And Ruin Of Western Civilisation

    Ricardo Duchesne is a Puerto Rican-born Canadian historical sociologist. He studied history at McGill University, received his PhD in Social and Political Thought from York University (awarded the Doctoral Prize for best dissertation of the year), and served as professor of sociology at the University of New Brunswick until his retirement in 2019. His major works include The Uniqueness of Western Civilisation, and Greatness and Ruin.  In this conversation, we think out loud about: — What made the West so continuously innovative across thousands of years — from the Indo-Europeans through Greece and Rome to the modern era — Why the Faustian drive — the relentless urge to create, discover, and push beyond every known boundary — appears unique to European civilisation — The discovery of the thinking self in ancient Greece and why self-consciousness and reason developed differently in the West — Why the very qualities that made the West great — rationalism, individualism, universalism — contain the seeds of its own unravelling — How liberal progressivism evolves logically from John Locke through John Stuart Mill to open borders and multiculturalism — Why capitalism and liberalism together have created a system that structurally resists reform — Whether civilisational recovery is possible — or whether we are witnessing an irreversible decline Find Ricardo Duchesne: X: x.com/dr_duchesne Books: https://link.amazon/B00NSP1LA Related episodes you might enjoy: — Iain McGilchrist — There Is A Great Deal Of Ruin In The Western World And This Is Why: https://youtu.be/yrlmkVl86-0 — Carl Trueman — The West Killed God. Then It Killed Man. Now Something Darker Is Coming: https://youtu.be/zwhbWVc1PgU?si=za3CftJjNxgiKXBd — Jonathan Rose — What The British Working Class Lost And Who Is Responsible: https://youtu.be/OKHcEo2QrJg?si=BR4hwL26sdoMS8_4 — Pierre d'Alancaisez — The Custodians Of Beauty Became Its Gravediggers: https://youtu.be/KXn2z3mfCDk?si=AHSHOEcfvNNKYq7G The Call of England — a documentary series retracing a 1927 journey through England to discover what remains of the national inheritance:  - Watch Episode 1 here: https://youtu.be/muBQWIP6ZQQ?si=T1W7cpepCo-qCwmv - Watch Episode 2 here: https://youtu.be/jbVZfSR3ZF4?si=Sblz4ZW_U2Gh8RWV Thinking Class is a long-form interview podcast on the cultural, historical and civilisational forces shaping England, Britain, the Anglosphere and the wider West. Hosted by John Gillam. ▶ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ThinkingClass ✍ Substack: https://thinkingclass.substack.com 🎧 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/37vvzrlxpo8eORDoTDRtbH 🍎 Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/thinking-class/id1717021615 🐦 X: https://x.com/thinkingclasses New episodes every Thursday at 3pm.

  2. 23 Jul

    #137 - Clement Knox - How Only The British Could Make America Before America Could Make Itself

    Clement Knox is a writer and historian. He is the author of The Scramble for America: How the United States Conquered a Continent (William Collins, 2026), and writes at Past Notes on Substack. Two hundred and fifty years ago, the United States was thirteen coastal colonies clinging to the Atlantic seaboard. Within a single lifetime, it became a continental empire stretching from the Atlantic to the Pacific — and the founding generation openly called it exactly that: an empire. This conversation asks how it happened, and who actually did it, because the people who crossed the Appalachians, fought the wars, and settled the frontier were not a random sample of humanity. They were the descendants of specific English and British folkways, and their story tells us a great deal about the inheritance they carried across the ocean. In this conversation we think out loud about: Why the founding generation openly called their own project an empire — and why that fact became invisible to later AmericansFrederick Jackson Turner's argument that America only became culturally distinct once settlers crossed the Appalachians and had to build civilisation anewDavid Hackett Fischer's four British folkways and which of them actually drove the push westwardWhy the Scots-Irish Borderers who settled Appalachia resemble the Bedouin of Arabia more than they resemble the East Coast settlements they left behindThe recurring tension between liberty and order in the Anglo-American character, from the Whiskey Rebellion to the modern dayGeorge Washington as a land speculator and enclosure man who died the richest man in the country — the story behind the mythWhy neither the settlers nor the Native Americans held a monopoly on civilisation or savagery, and what a forensic reading of the primary sources actually showsWhy Clement changed his mind about universalism — and what that means for how the modern world's institutions were builtAnd if you haven't already, go and watch The Call of England — my documentary series retracing H.V. Morton's 1927 journey to find out what's left of the old country. Episode one and two are live now on YouTube: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLCHptEOmbMRzSV7TQqVMJxAVohAEnvLdA&si=VcpwRhAUmrcrWOTm Find Clement Knox: Substack: https://clementknox.substack.comRelated episodes: — Gary Gerstle — The Rise and Fall of the Neoliberal Order: https://youtu.be/KbCyaKcj0E8?si=jtY9S8tX493eqUkz — Michael Lind — Why America & Britain Keep Betraying Their Working Class: https://youtu.be/YN212csIsvU?si=a9BsVmo0sqGI-qoy — David Starkey — Britain as a Disaster Since 1945: https://youtu.be/aI3tBbqMmXY?si=SI9B_qVavRQH-EGb — Katharine Birbalsingh — She Told 4,000 People The West Is Committing Suicide: https://youtu.be/L60dtIoALgA?si=yXhD5G8C-4zEueiR Thinking Class is a long-form interview podcast on the cultural, historical, and moral forces shaping England, Britain, and the wider Western world. Hosted by John Gillam. ▶ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ThinkingClass ✍️ Substack: https://thinkingclass.substack.com 🎧 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/37vvzrlxpo8eORDoTDRtbH 🍎 Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/thinking-class/id1717021615 🐦 X: https://x.com/thinkingclasses New episodes every Thursday at 3pm.

  3. 16 Jul

    #136 - Katharine Birbalsingh - Why Britain Stopped Believing Children Need Discipline

    Katharine Birbalsingh is the headmistress and founder of Michaela Community School in Wembley, and a former UK Social Mobility Commissioner. She built the most successful school in Britain from nothing — in one of London's poorest boroughs — by insisting on the things the educational establishment now treats as radical: discipline, gratitude, knowledge, and the belief that every child is capable of excellence. Her results are extraordinary. Almost nobody in the profession will copy her. In this conversation, we think out loud about: Why Katharine believes children are born naughty rather than good — and why saying so out loud triggered a national media stormWhy the most progressive schools in Britain are often the expensive private ones, not the state schools everyone assumes are failingWhat actually happens inside a school that treats children as capable of excellence rather than victims of circumstanceThe ARC speech that caused a stir — on minoritarian victimhood, institutional shame, and why she thinks a certain group of people in Britain need to simply "take a break"Her real disagreement with Connor Tomlinson — whether ancestry or shared values are what actually holds a nation togetherWhy she believes schools now shape children more powerfully than families do — and what that means for the future of the countryFind Katharine Birbalsingh: - Strictly Education: https://www.youtube.com/@StrictlyEdPod - Michaela School: https://www.michaela.education/ Related episodes: - Lord Tony Sewell — Life At The Bottom In Broken Britain: https://youtu.be/WKf26_Va_yM?si=AjIKvZdCndHSyTx4 - Frank Furedi — In Defence of Populism: https://youtu.be/qTdxAR40T4E?si=MREy9eLow-XGWoS4 Jonathan Rose — What The British Working Class Lost And Who Is Responsible: https://youtu.be/OKHcEo2QrJg?si=cE6cr_Ypgs6geVyh The Call of England — a documentary series retracing a 1927 journey through England to discover what remains of the national inheritance. Watch Episode 1 here: https://youtu.be/muBQWIP6ZQQ?si=y2zHLbn8juRbQidl Thinking Class is a long-form interview podcast on the cultural, historical and civilisational forces shaping England, Britain, the Anglosphere and the wider West. Hosted by John Gillam. ▶ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ThinkingClass ✍ Substack: https://thinkingclass.substack.com 🎧 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/37vvzrlxpo8eORDoTDRtbH 🍎 Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/thinking-class/id1717021615 🐦 X: https://x.com/thinkingclasses New episodes every Thursday at 3pm.

  4. 9 Jul

    #135 - Pierre d'Alancaisez - 'I Helped Build The Cult Of Contemporary Art And Then I Walked Away'

    Pierre d’Alancaisez is a writer, curator, and researcher working with the multiple politics of the arts. He is the resident art critic for the English magazine The Critic, and his writing has appeared in outlets such as ArtReview, The Spectator, and Compact.  *NOTE: If you downloaded this before 11th July, there are sync issues on the audio, therefore please re-download for a better listening experience*. In 2024, he co-founded Verdurin, a space for experimentation in aesthetics, learning, and the difficult conversations which drive today’s culture. Pierre previously directed waterside contemporary, a gallery that tested social and political questions in the art market. He curated exhibitions with artists who included Turner Prize nominee Oreet Ashery and has commissioned works with artists such as Mirza and Butler which traveled to Artes Mundi and Sydney Biennale. Having trained in the sciences before coming to artistic practice, Pierre also worked on cultural exchange and engagement strategies in higher education and the charity sector and has held senior positions in publishing and financial services. Pierre writes for The Critic and runs Verdurin, a London-based salon, publisher, and events series. Listen on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and all major platforms. Find Pierre D'Alancaisez: Personal website: https://petitpoi.net/Verdurin website: https://verdur.in/Substack: https://verdurin.substack.com/profile/notesX: https://x.com/verdur_inYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@verdurinRelated episodes: — #127 Jonathan Rose — What The British Working Class Lost And Who Is Responsible: https://youtu.be/OKHcEo2QrJg?si=DY2XKBvRopuluvM- — #106 Carl Trueman— The West Killed God. Then It Killed Man. Now Something Darker Is Coming: https://youtu.be/zwhbWVc1PgU?si=xGJ4g5784J9qGcZd — #130 Iain McGilchrist— There Is A Great Deal Of Ruin In The Western World And This Is Why: https://youtu.be/yrlmkVl86-0?si=k6egq2NGvyo1mnxU Thinking Class is a long-form interview podcast on the cultural, historical, and moral forces shaping England, Britain, and the wider Western world. Hosted by John Gillam. ▶ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ThinkingClass ✍️ Substack: https://thinkingclass.substack.com 🎧 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/37vvzrlxpo8eORDoTDRtbH 🍎 Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/thinking-class/id1717021615 🐦 X: https://x.com/thinkingclasses New episodes every Thursday at 3pm.

  5. 2 Jul

    #134 - Frank Furedi - The West Is Crushing Democracy In The Name Of Defending It

    Frank is Emeritus Professor of Sociology at the University of Kent and the author of twenty-eight books on the cultural forces shaping Western societies, including his most recent, In Defence of Populism. Frank is also a Senior Fellow at the Mathias Corvinus Collegium in Brussels. In this conversation Frank and I think out loud about:  the spirit of populism, why the credentialized class fears ithow anti-populists restrict democracy while claiming to defend itwhy fascism and populism are not just different but oppositewhy nostalgia underpins cultural continuitywhy 60% of the crisis starts in the schoolswhether assimilation is possible in a normless societyand why to be a real conservative you must be very radical.Thinking Class is a long-form interview podcast on the cultural, historical, and moral forces shaping England, Britain, and the wider Western world. Hosted by John Gillam. ▶ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ThinkingClass ✍️ Substack: https://thinkingclass.substack.com 🎧 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/37vvzrlxpo8eORDoTDRtbH 🍎 Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/thinking-class/id1717021615 🐦 X: https://x.com/thinkingclasses New episodes every Thursday at 3pm.

  6. 25 Jun

    #133 - Max Klinger - The British Establishment Re-Racialised Britain And Now It Can't Control What It Created

    Max Klinger is a lawyer and political analyst. He writes at Max Klinger's Newsletter on Substack and his work has appeared in The Spectator. Britain's progressive establishment spent a decade re-racialising public life. It racialised Brexit, policing, and every institution in the name of anti-racism. Now the wider British public has adopted the same lens and applied it in the opposite direction, and the establishment is horrified.  In this conversation we think out loud about: In what specific ways the British establishment has gone off at the deep endThe real-life impact of anti-racist and DEI policies on the British publicHow the progressive left re-racialised British public life — and is now horrified that the wider public has adopted the same lensAsh Sarkar, Novara Media, and the hypocrisy of racialising everything until the racialisation turns against youTwo-tier policing, two-tier sentencing, and the cases of Valdo Calocane and Henry NovakThe Islamisation of Britain — jihadism, blasphemy law by stealth, and the demographic projectionsThe future of British Jews and whether the trajectory is recoverableWhether the English, Scottish, Welsh, and Irish are allowed an ethnic identity in the same way as every other groupThe emergence of English national identity and why suppressing it is the most dangerous thing the establishment can doFind Max Klinger: Substack: https://maxthinks.substack.comX: @MaxE2ReviewRelated episodes: — #102 David Betz — What Britain Will Look And Feel Like When Things Get Nasty: https://youtu.be/gUtltMklkcM?si=Hz7qNjqOh-7WaYTz — #106 Driss Ghali — France's Identity Crisis: Violence, Islamism & The Risk Of Social Fracture: https://youtu.be/Y2hS_7WkkDA?si=h1FvChJjhLL20hty — #129 Andrew Hussey — France Is Fracturing: https://youtu.be/U5aKUYgHL8M?si=hph--ETBQjeVpJAW Thinking Class is a long-form interview podcast on the cultural, historical, and moral forces shaping England, Britain, and the wider Western world. Hosted by John Gillam. ▶ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ThinkingClass ✍️ Substack: https://thinkingclass.substack.com 🎧 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/37vvzrlxpo8eORDoTDRtbH 🍎 Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/thinking-class/id1717021615 🐦 X: https://x.com/thinkingclasses New episodes every Thursday at 3pm.

  7. 18 Jun

    #132 - Andrew Hussey - France Is Fracturing Along Ethnic And Religious Lines

    Professor Andrew Hussey OBE is Dean of the University of London Institute in Paris and Director of the Centre for Post-Colonial Studies at the University of London's School of Advanced Study. Born in Liverpool, educated at the University of Manchester and Jean Moulin University Lyon 3, he is the author of The French Intifada (Faber, 2014), Paris: The Secret History (Penguin, 2006), The Game of War: The Life and Death of Guy Debord (Jonathan Cape, 2001), and Fractured France. He was awarded an OBE for services to cultural relations between the United Kingdom and France. He writes for the Observer, the Guardian, and the New Statesman. His forthcoming book, The White In-Between Sea, explores the real life of the South of France from Corsica to the Spanish border. In this conversation, Andrew and I think out loud about:  Why France is fracturing into fragments that do not speak to each otherThe three Frances: the citadels, the banlieues, and the forgotten white working-class peripheryHow French prisons became the engine room of radicalisationThe difference between Maliki Islam and Wahhabi puritanism and why it mattersWhy the French Republic's promise to make everyone a Frenchman is being tested to destructionThe RN rallies: Hussey spent time with the supporters and found not fascists but ordinary peopleWhether the progressive left's grievance politics has made integration permanently impossibleThe Charlie Hebdo demonstration and the moment Hussey converted to French RepublicanismNaboukh la France: what the ancient curse really means and why it mattersWhat all of this tells Britain about what is comingFind Professor Hussey's work: The French Intifada: The Long War Between France and Its Arabs - https://amzn.to/4vOVW84Fractured France: https://amzn.to/4aG8g2jRelated episodes: #077 Driss Ghali — How France Was Colonised: https://youtu.be/NycF1IiVcnQ?si=DbynKwta-eU671iQ#106 Driss Ghali — France's Identity Crisis: Violence, Islamism & The Risk Of Social Fracture: https://youtu.be/Y2hS_7WkkDA?si=AWgwO8VbKnV0U40w#102 David Betz — What Britain Will Look And Feel Like When Things Get Nasty: https://youtu.be/gUtltMklkcM?si=bObsQUD8C1-77RLaThinking Class is a long-form interview podcast on the cultural, historical, and moral forces shaping England, Britain, and the wider Western world. Hosted by John Gillam. ▶️ Subscribe on YouTube 🎧 Follow on Spotify 📰 Read on Substack 🐦 Follow on X New episodes every Thursday at 3pm.

  8. 11 Jun

    #131 - Gregory Clark - Why Everything The West Believes About Social Mobility Is Wrong

    Professor Gregory Clark is a British-born economic historian at the University of California, Davis and holds a DNRF Chair at the Danish National Research Foundation and a professor at the Historical Economics and Development Group (HEDG) at the Department of Economics, SDU. Furthermore, he is a Visiting Professor at London School of Economics (LSE) and a Distinguished Professor Emeritus at UC Davis. He is the author of A Farewell to Alms: A Brief Economic History of the World and The Son Also Rises: Surnames and the History of Social Mobility. In this conversation Greg and I think out loud about: Why some societies became rich while others remained poor — and why it has little to do with institutionsWhy Indian cotton mills in the 1920s could not match Lancashire despite identical technologyWhat Clark discovered from studying more than 422,000 English people across four centuriesWhy social mobility appears largely unchanged since the Middle AgesWhy Denmark and Britain have almost identical mobility rates despite radically different welfare statesWhy family size, birth order, and the death of a father have no measurable effect on life outcomesWhy the upper classes decline at the same rate the lower classes rise — and what that symmetry meansWhether England has been a meritocracy since 1300Why governments may be attempting to solve problems that are largely resistant to policyClark's forthcoming book — and why it is proving difficult to publishFind Professor Clark's work: A Farewell to Alms: https://amzn.to/4vak59qThe Son Also Rises: https://amzn.to/4okonIxLondon School of Economics: https://www.lse.ac.uk/people/greg-clarkRelated episodes: #130 Iain McGilchrist — There Is A Great Deal Of Ruin In The Western World: https://www.buzzsprout.com/2277944/episodes/19292333#034 Garett Jones - Why Migrants Make Countries Like The Ones They Left: https://www.buzzsprout.com/2277944/episodes/15347853#127 Jonathan Rose — What The British Working Class Lost And Who Is Responsible: https://www.buzzsprout.com/2277944/episodes/19175544Thinking Class is a long-form interview podcast on the cultural, historical, and moral forces shaping England, Britain, and the wider Western world. Hosted by John Gillam. ▶ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ThinkingClass ✍️ Substack: https://thinkingclass.substack.com 🎧 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/37vvzrlxpo8eORDoTDRtbH 🍎 Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/thinking-class/id1717021615 🐦 X: https://x.com/thinkingclasses New episodes every Thursday at 3pm.

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About

Thinking Class is a weekly long-form interview podcast exploring the cultural, historical, and civilisational forces shaping England, Britain, and the Western world. Hosted by John Gillam, the show brings together historians, philosophers, theologians, economists, and public intellectuals for conversations that go beyond the news cycle by examining the deep roots of the West's present predicament and asking what genuine recovery might require. Guests have included David Starkey, Lord Jonathan Sumption, Lord Nigel Biggar, Robert Tombs, Peter Hitchens, Lionel Shriver, Roy Baumeister, Kathleen Stock, Carl Trueman, and many others. If you value serious conversation about Britain, the West, and the forces shaping our future, then this is the show for you. New episodes every week.

Information

  • Creator
    John Gillam
  • Years Active
    2023 - 2026
  • Episodes
    137
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2026 Thinking Class
  • Show Website
    Thinking Class

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