Hinterland Festival 2018

Ireland’s lockdowns were harsher and longer than almost anywhere else in the developed world. The existential threat from the pandemic led to an unprecedented mass mobilisation of the institutions of the state. Boasting unrivalled access to the key decision-makers and drawing of a vast range of documents and hundreds of hours of  interviews Jack Horgan-Jones and Hugh O’Connell reveal the moves, the power-plays and the—at times jaw-dropping—tactics of a government with the health of a nation in its hands. The authors will be in conversation with Gerry Foley.

When Luke Harding accepted our invitation to return to Hinterland he was based in Ukraine. He has continued to report from that beleaguered and isolated country in the interim and has got a close up view of how Mr. Putin wages war.  His two most recent works are Collusion: Secret Meetings, Dirty Money, and How Russia Helped Donald Trump Win (2017) and Shadow State: Murder, Mayhem and Russia’s Remaking of the West (2020). So, for most of 2022 Luke has been describing the outcome of the facilitation of the Putin regime that he highlighted in both those books. Luke will be in conversation with Myles Dungan.