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FEARLESS, INDEPENDENT JOURNALISM ON CULTURE, POLITICS AND TECH

WEEKEND EDITION

Teargas, memes and bin barricades: France’s angry students have revived the ghosts of ’68

Oct 9, 2026

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5 min read

Teargas, memes and bin barricades: France’s angry students have revived the ghosts of ’68

The youth uprising against pest-ridden and overcrowded schools has split political and social opinion in the country even as it drifts towards the far right, writes Phineas Rueckert from Paris

Phineas Rueckert
Phineas Rueckert
Yuval Noah Harari on the threat of AI: ‘Fascism isn’t the worst-case scenario. Fascism is still human’

Oct 9, 2026

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8 min read

Yuval Noah Harari on the threat of AI: ‘Fascism isn’t the worst-case scenario. Fascism is still human’

The bestselling author joined Nobel-winning journalist Maria Ressa and the Nerve’s Carole Cadwalladr for an in-depth and sometimes alarming conversation about humanity’s near future

‘We have a $1tn company acting desperate’: Frances Haugen on The Social Reckoning, Zuckerberg, and Facebook's growing fragility

Oct 6, 2026

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12 min read

‘We have a $1tn company acting desperate’: Frances Haugen on The Social Reckoning, Zuckerberg, and Facebook's growing fragility

The whistleblower whose explosive revelations about her employer inspired Aaron Sorkin’s new film tells Carole Cadwalladr that, despite Silicon Valley’s power, ‘we have the ability to change a lot of things’

Carole Cadwalladr
Carole Cadwalladr
John Cooper Clarke: ‘I could go to six funerals a week. But no man can live on vol au vents alone’

Oct 9, 2026

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8 min read

John Cooper Clarke: ‘I could go to six funerals a week. But no man can live on vol au vents alone’

The Bard of Salford, who is publishing his latest poetry collection at 77, talks to Ursula Kenny about getting older, wrestling with technology and the joys of cycling on very flat roads

Review of the Week: The 90s: Art and Fashion

Oct 9, 2026

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6 min read

Review of the Week: The 90s: Art and Fashion

We were due a rigorous cultural appraisal of an increasingly mythologised decade. Sadly, Tate Britain's jarring clash of modern masterpieces and glossy-mag photoshoots is not it, writes Nerve art critic Ben Luke. Plus, he picks five shows to see during Frieze month in London

‘When you feel something, that’s what fuels you’: how a new generation of performers is reviving the theatre of protest

Oct 9, 2026

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5 min read

‘When you feel something, that’s what fuels you’: how a new generation of performers is reviving the theatre of protest

On stages across the UK this autumn, theatre companies are fighting social issues head-on, using clowns, choreography and even food donations from the audience. Maddy Costa reports

Deborah Frances-White: It’s not just Cornell: rape culture spreads from frat houses to business, politics and even boys’ phones

Oct 6, 2026

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8 min read

Deborah Frances-White: It’s not just Cornell: rape culture spreads from frat houses to business, politics and even boys’ phones

College fraternities are notoriously unsafe places for women. But it’s worse than that: they are also where the most powerful men in the world learn to be misogynistic, writes the Guilty Feminist

Weekend Dish: Ali Stoner’s Cullen skink bake

Oct 9, 2026

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3 min read

Weekend Dish: Ali Stoner’s Cullen skink bake

The home cook and former Masterchef Australia contestant shares a new twist on an old Scottish favourite from her debut recipe book

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THE HARBORNE receipts


Follow the money: the Farage funding timeline

Aug 7, 2026

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14 min read

Follow the money: the Farage funding timeline

As the revelations around donations to Reform and its leader multiply, we’re keeping the receipts. Carole Cadwalladr introduces a master timeline of our investigation into Farage’s biggest funder, cryptobillionaire Christopher Harborne, and argues that Farage is a symptom, not a cause, of forces reshaping politics across the world

Carole Cadwalladr
Carole Cadwalladr
Crypto, peerages, or political self-sacrifice – why did Farage gift Boris the 2019 election?

Jun 12, 2026

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15 min read

Crypto, peerages, or political self-sacrifice – why did Farage gift Boris the 2019 election?

Part two of the Harborne Receipts, the Nerve’s investigation into the billionaire's influence on UK politics brings us to the 2019 election – which took the UK out of Europe while dumping 300 Brexit party candidates, leaving a wound on the far right still raw today. By Carole Cadwalladr and Lucia Osborne-Crowley

Chequers gatherings, Johnson's diary and a new jet fighter... how billionaire Christopher Harborne became a big player in defence

Jul 5, 2026

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11 min read

Chequers gatherings, Johnson's diary and a new jet fighter... how billionaire Christopher Harborne became a big player in defence

Soon after the Ukraine war broke out, the investor emerged as a highly favoured backer of the Tory government – and then a major shareholder in privatised defence lab QinetiQ at a transformative moment for its fortunes. By Carole Cadwalladr and Charlie Young

CULTURE


‘I’m surprised we came through it so well’: Salman Rushdie and Rachel Eliza Griffiths on surviving assassination

Oct 2, 2026

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7 min read

‘I’m surprised we came through it so well’: Salman Rushdie and Rachel Eliza Griffiths on surviving assassination

As a new documentary remembers the three-decade fatwa against the novelist that led to his near-fatal knife attack in 2022, he and his wife discuss hope, history and how his life was saved by the courage of strangers

Dorian Lynskey
Dorian Lynskey
The Nerve Hotlist

Oct 6, 2026

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5 min read

The Nerve Hotlist

The best culture to enjoy this week – from Salman Toor’s richly imagined queer worlds to AK Blakemore’s dazzling novel of a 19th-century English revolt – as chosen by our editors and writers

Laurie Anderson: ‘I learned a lot through blunders. I’m not trying to live a perfect life’

Sep 25, 2026

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5 min read

Laurie Anderson: ‘I learned a lot through blunders. I’m not trying to live a perfect life’

The pioneering artist answers the Nerve Q&A about Trump’s threat to culture, how she finds inspiration – and her forthcoming first-ever show in Wales. Interview by Jude Rogers

Jude Rogers
Jude Rogers

POLITICS & INVESTIGATIONS


Sleepless in Slough: the residents who fear for their failing health in Europe’s data centre capital

Sep 29, 2026

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7 min read

Sleepless in Slough: the residents who fear for their failing health in Europe’s data centre capital

With an estimated 40 facilities packed tightly together in the town, local people say their quality of life is being ruined by strange and unsettling noise pollution. Brenna Spain reports

Brenna Spain
Brenna Spain
‘He was doing something amazing’: Jason Arday, by the friend who’s known him since childhood

Aug 25, 2026

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11 min read

‘He was doing something amazing’: Jason Arday, by the friend who’s known him since childhood

In the relentless culture war surrounding the professor, the voices of those closest to him were absent. Here, his longstanding friend Sam Clark talks to the Nerve about the kind, warm and remarkable man he remembers

From celebrity intellectual to anti-woke outlaw: how Steven Pinker lost his way

Sep 18, 2026

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7 min read

From celebrity intellectual to anti-woke outlaw: how Steven Pinker lost his way

The pop psychologist’s new book seems to betray a lurking fear of others’ criticism – about his Epstein links, his manosphere admirers and his discredited former field of study, writes Virginia Heffernan

Virginia Heffernan
Virginia Heffernan
Charisma, cruelty, greed: John Sweeney on the ‘dark genius’ of Nigel Farage

Sep 1, 2026

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16 min read

Charisma, cruelty, greed: John Sweeney on the ‘dark genius’ of Nigel Farage

In an exclusive extract from his new book, the Nerve’s Reform correspondent explores the career of ‘a leader who never seems to suffer the consequences of his actions’ – and asks if he should ever be allowed near power

John Sweeney
John Sweeney

SPOTLIGHT ON PALANTIR


Revealed: Britain's contracts with Palantir hit £1bn

Oct 2, 2026

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9 min read

Revealed: Britain's contracts with Palantir hit £1bn

Newly surfaced disclosures reveal the government has spent or agreed to spend at least £992m with Peter Thiel’s controversial AI company – as pressure mounts on Andy Burnham to block them. Max Colbert reports

Max Colbert
Max Colbert
'We’re watching you’: MP Clive Lewis reveals Tom Watson has warned him over criticising Palantir

Sep 29, 2026

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4 min read

'We’re watching you’: MP Clive Lewis reveals Tom Watson has warned him over criticising Palantir

In a letter to his former Labour colleague, the peer, who joined Peter Thiel’s AI company this month, writes: ‘You have made the case against the company more or less continuously’. By Carole Cadwalladr

Carole Cadwalladr
Carole Cadwalladr
The Palantir pipeline: how Peter Thiel's surveillance firm hired more than 30 senior UK officials

Apr 24, 2026

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8 min read

The Palantir pipeline: how Peter Thiel's surveillance firm hired more than 30 senior UK officials

The AI company holds £670m in UK government contracts. It has also hired dozens of senior officials from the departments awarding them – raising what transparency experts call an 'acute' corruption risk, write Charlie Young, Carole Cadwalladr and Ian Tucker

Charlie Young
Ian Tucker
Carole Cadwalladr
Charlie Young, +2

THE NERVE WEEKEND DISH


Jeremy Lee’s celery and lemon risotto

Sep 25, 2026

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2 min read

Jeremy Lee’s celery and lemon risotto

The acclaimed Soho restaurateur shares a fresh seasonal recipe celebrating a perennially overlooked vegetable

Smash burger tacos by Poppy Cooks

Sep 18, 2026

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2 min read

Smash burger tacos by Poppy Cooks

The social media star shares a fast-food-inspired mash-up that’s super simple and perfect for students to rustle up

Anissa Helou’s spicy fish wrap

Aug 21, 2026

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4 min read

Anissa Helou’s spicy fish wrap

The acclaimed cookbook writer shares a zingy Lebanese recipe from the land of her childhood

Ed Smith’s roast Thai-ish chicken thighs with hot and sour salad

Aug 7, 2026

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2 min read

Ed Smith’s roast Thai-ish chicken thighs with hot and sour salad

The food blogger and author behind Rocket & Squash shares a fresh, gai-yang-inspired meal from his new book

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