Guardian
All-fours study links gene to upright gait
Scientists claim to have discovered a gene that helps humans walk upright, after studying families with a rare condition that causes some of their members to walk on all fours.

Prof Nicholas Humphrey, a psychologist at the London School of Economics, said more genes were likely to be involved in the disorder. Tests on families in Iraq and Brazil found different genes causing the syndrome, in each case. People affected have poor balance but can often walk upright with a walking frame.

According to Humphrey, the condition could shed light on our evolutionary history and overturn the widely held belief that our ancestors were knuckle walkers like modern-day apes. ‘What's intriguing is how easily these people seem to take to this alternative gait when they can't walk properly. It raises the question of whether this was how our ancestors walked.’
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2008/jun/02/genetics.medicalresearch
Also in
• The Hindu
All-fours study links gene to upright gait
http://www.thehindu.com/holnus/008200806020941.htm

Guardian
Letters - Spreading the blame for youth offenders
Letter to the editor from Professor David Downes, professor emeritus of social policy at LSE.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2008/jun/02/childprotection.youthjustice

Daily Telegraph
The Bank of England must be brave and raise interest rates
Article by Professor Willem Buiter, Chair of European Political Economy at LSE.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2008/06/02
/ccom102.xml

MPC founder Willem Buiter calls for interest rate rise
The Bank of England should raise borrowing costs to 5.25pc at its meeting this week, says one of its leading former policy-makers.

Willem Buiter, a founding member of the Monetary Policy Committee and a professor at the London School of Economics, said the Bank needed to raise the cost of borrowing in order to keep inflation under control - despite the pain higher rates would inflict on the economy.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2008/06/
02/cnmpc102.xml

Wall Street Journal
UK Economy Puts Brown in Tight Spot
Article includes comments by Professor Willem Buiter, Chair of European Political Economy at LSE.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121235548890836049.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

Associated Press
Food aid saves millions but world hunger lingers
Congressional investigators said last week that African-bound food aid, particularly from the United States, has increasingly been sent for short-term emergencies rather than to help long-term agricultural development.

‘We tend to deal with what is happening now, today, tomorrow or next week, and insufficient attention is given to more fundamental processes such as population growth, or the need to invest in agriculture research for people living in difficult environments,’ said Timothy Dyson, an expert in agriculture and famine issues at the London School of Economics.
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5hpEaP7QTv7smvMBsab-O8
vTFsGigD911Q3186

Business Times, Singapore
Fix things before fuel subsidies are cut
So critical has the situation become that it has reached a tipping point, which could swell the country's budget deficit to 8-10 per cent of gross domestic product from about 3 per cent currently.

This latest warning was delivered courtesy of Danny Quah, professor of economics and head of the Department of Economics at the London School of Economics (LSE) on a visit to the country last week.
(Source: Lexis)

ABC
O historiador Paul Preston, convidado polo Club de Prensa Falará dos correspondentes na Guerra Civil
Article features Profesor Paul Preston, professor of contemporary Spanish studies at LSE.
(Source: Lexis)

Scotsman
Farm shops top supermarkets for growth
Consumerism analyst Dr Alain Samson, formerly of the London School of Economics, said: ‘People are moving away from the big players in favour of organic foods and ethical consumption. It may be that there is a greater trend to shop in smaller stores like we did 100 years ago.’
http://news.scotsman.com/scotland/Farm-shops-top--supermarkets.
4140379.jp

Sunday 1 June

BBC News Online
Quadruped families evolution clue
Professor Tayfun Ozcelik, who led the research, said: ‘Whereas normal infants make the transition to walking on two legs in a relatively short period, these individuals continued to move on their palms and feet and never walked upright.

However, Professor Nicholas Humphrey from the London School of Economics, who has also examined the families, said that while genetic defects might well be responsible for the symptoms, it was not by influencing directly the shift from quadrupedality to bipedality.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/7427525.stm

Sunday Observer, Sri Lanka
EU to forge new strategic partnership with Russia
Professor Margot Light of the London School of Economics said: ‘Russian officials believe these values are determined exclusively in the EU and are simply proclaimed by EU officials for Russia to adopt.’ Now Russia prefers the concept of sharing interests, which entails a new level of partnership.
http://www.sundayobserver.lk/2008/06/01/wld02.asp

Canberra Times, Australia
Crises leave trail of death by gender
A 2006 study by London School of Economics and Political Science geographer Professor Eric Neumayer and University of Essex political scientist Thomas Plumper found more women were killed as a direct or indirect result of natural disasters in countries with very low social and economic rights for women.
(Source: Lexis)

Times
Prufrock
We hear grumblings from those with the leather elbow patches at the London School of Economics and other cathedrals of knowledge. It’s not the economy per se that they’re carping about, but one of its commentators: LSE director and former FSA chairman Sir Howard Davies.

Davies, it seems, has been only too happy to give his tuppence worth on the credit crisis to anybody who will listen. He told a bleary-eyed nation on the Today programme that the country’s chances of avoiding recession were ‘pretty slight’. In another lecture on the economy he warned that ‘credit will be restricted for some time with serious consequences for the US economy’.
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/columnists/article4039170.ece

Saturday 31 May

Le Figaro, France
La descente aux enfers du New Labour
‘Le gouvernement est également victime de son propre succès: les Britanniques n'ont plus connu de ralentissement économique depuis quinze ans’, analyse Patrick Dunleavy, politologue à la London School of Economics.
http://www.lefigaro.fr/international/2008/05/31/01003-20080531ARTFIG00018-
la-descente-aux-enfers-du-new-labour-.php

Globe and Mail
Don't write off religion just yet
Book review by Emeritus Professor John Gray, Government Department, LSE.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20080531.BKBERL31
/TPStory/Entertainment

Late-edition headlines

THE
The week in books (29 May)
Global Financial Regulation: The Essential Guide by Howard Davies, director, London School of Economics, and David Green. ‘Howard Davies and David Green offer a superb account of the international regulatory system, together with a set of proposals for its reform that are highly relevant ... Their account of the workings of the system contains many insights even informed observers may have missed. I had not realised, for example, that the European Central Bank turned up uninvited at the first meeting of the Financial Stability Forum, a by-product of the Asian financial crisis, and has never been shown the door.’ John Plender, Financial Times
http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/story.asp?sectioncode=26&storycode=402203

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