Francis Fukuyama

Francis Fukuyama is a philosopher and political economist who has always possessed a powerful ability to capture the imagination of the wider public. He made his name with the provocatively titled 'The End of History and the Last Man', in which he argued that the stability and fairness offered by liberal capitalism had effectively brought to an end the conflicts and political upheavals that are the meat and potatoes of history.

Fukuyama has traditionally been a supporter of American neoconservatism and called for the overthrow of Saddam Hussein after 9/11. But 2006 has been a revisionary year for Fukuyama. 'The End of History' was reprinted with a new Afterword, and his latest book 'After the NeoCons: America at the Crossroads' is highly critical of the war in Iraq and the Bush administration.

Fukuyama is undoubtedly one of the most influential thinkers in the world today, but he is also a highly controversial figure, and audiences in Edinburgh will be able to decide for themselves whether he is a brilliant and flexible freethinker or a hindsight-blessed philosophical chameleon.