Nobel Laureate Professor Amartya Sen addressed a full UCL Bloomsbury Theatre on the theme of violence in society on 2 June as the climax of the 2009 UCL Global Citizenship series. Professor Sen gave a stimulating and challenging lecture, which explored ideas around ‘organised violence’ (war, genocide, terrorism) and violence against the individual. Highlighting the inadequacies of some of the widely accepted explanations for violence as a phenomenon - including the idea that the world is experiencing a ‘clash of civilisations’ - Professor Sen made a plea for a global, multilateral debate...