Robert Tombs: Britain needs a better story

Why has it become a reflex for Britain to emphasise the worst of our history while neglecting the best? This week on The Capitalist, Marc Sidwell speaks with Robert Tombs, emeritus professor of French history at Cambridge and author of The English and Their History, about Our Islands’ Story, the new book he has written with Nigel Biggar. It’s out next week. They discussed why the history of empire and slavery has come to crowd out everything else, why Britain’s part in abolition gets so little attention and what the empire did for global trade. They also covered why he thinks the institutions are now too captured for the free market of ideas to fix things on its own, and why he fears Britain’s precious inheritance of free speech and thought is under threat. Get full access to The CapX Briefing at briefing.capx.co/subscribe