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Turkey's increased economic and political importance makes it a place which outsiders need to understand. Since 2002, the nation has been governed by the AKP, a political party with Islamist roots. The AKP's time in power has coincided with improvements in Turkey's economic management, the rise of its international influence and a dramatic decline amongst its citizens of support for sharia law. Outsiders tend to see Turkey as wrestling with a choice between Islamism and secularism. However the nation seems able to live with - even prosper under - the apparent contradiction of a government with Islamist origins and a secular constitution. Edward Stourton attempts to unravel the complicated reality of Turkish politics and get beyond the usual Western obsession with whether Turkey's loyalties lie with the West or the Islamic world. He investigates the new elites that are shaping the country's future. Will they help Turkey fulfil its dream of becoming a global power and the West's dream of a model Muslim democracy? The featured contributors in the programme are:Firdevs Robinson, an editor and Turkey specialist at the BBC World ServiceZiya Meral, a Turkish academic at Cambridge University Ceren Coskun, a British-Turkish academic at the London School of Economics Professor Henri Barkey from the Canegie Endowment for International PeaceDr Soner Cagaptay from the Washington Institute for Near East Policy Professor Binnaz Toprak, a social scientist at BoğaziÃi University in IstabulProducer: Helen Grady.

The Spirit Level is a book that aims to change the way you see the world.It has impressed politicians on both sides of politics, with David Cameron and Ed Milliband taking note of its message. Packed with scattergrams and statistics, the book argues for more equal societies. The authors, epidemiologists Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett, make the case that countries with higher income inequality tend to have more health and social problems. Equality, they say, is better for everyone.But The Spirit Level has been accused of imbalance itself.Critics from the right have launched a scathing attack, saying the books methods and arguments are flawed.So who is correct? Mukul Devichand examines the evidence.He speaks to: Professors Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett, authors of The Spirit Level; Professor Peter Saunders, author of Beware False Prophets; Professor John Goldthorpe of Nuffield College, Oxford; Professor George Kaplan of Michigan University; Professor Angela Clow, of the University of Westminster.Producer: Ruth Alexander.

Women will be hit disproportionately by the Budget cuts already announced by the government: A new study suggests that they will shoulder nearly three quarters of the burden, because they rely more on the state for benefits and are more likely to work in the public sector than men.The state has reduced women's dependency on men, only to install itself as the new patriarch. If the state shrinks, it will be women who will feel the difference Is this what generations of feminists have fought for? Where is the sisterhood now, marching on the treasury? Jo Fidgen goes in search of modern feminism in the rubble of the economy and asks whether being a woman is no longer a political state.