Natasha Proietto

Switzerland: Mountains and minarets

Switzerland’s recent vote to ban the building of minarets drew widespread criticism. Natasha Proietto looks at the historical background to that decision, the result of a typically Swiss mixture of conservatism and democracy.

Published June 9 2010

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Lords of the Northern Forest

The Hudson's Bay Company was one of the central forces moulding the development of the vast tracts of land that today are Canada - but as Barry Gough explains here, the circumstances of its launch in 1670 also reveal much about the commercial forces, personalities and rivalries of Restoration England.