The Interview

"There is a public health disaster. There is an education disaster. It all can be traced to the same cause, which is the change technology has made in our kids' childhood."
Amol Rajan speaks to the American social psychologist Jonathan Haidt.
In 2024 his book The Anxious Generation sparked a fierce debate about the impact of social media and technology on young people. Haidt believes it's behind the soaring number of mental health problems but social media companies claim this oversimplifies a deeply complex issue.
Now he says we are at a tipping point in our relationship with technology, with countries moving towards much greater regulation of social media use for children.
Thank you to the Radical team for its help in making this programme.
The Interview brings you conversations with people shaping our world, from all over the world. The best interviews from the BBC, including episodes with Microsoft AI boss Mustafa Suleyman and Annika Wells, the minister in charge of Australia's social media ban for under-16s. You can listen on the BBC World Service on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays at 0800 GMT. Or you can listen to The Interview as a podcast, out three times a week on BBC Sounds or wherever you get your podcasts.
Presenter: Amol Rajan
Producers: Anna Budd and Lucy Sheppard
Editor: Justine Lang
Get in touch with us on email [email protected] and use the hashtag #TheInterviewBBC on social media.
(Image: Jonathan Haidt Credit: Kristina Bumphrey/Variety via Getty Images)

Aleem Maqbool speaks to Dame Sarah Mulally, shortly before being confirmed as Archbishop of Canterbury. She's the first woman ever to lead the Church of England.

It is a tough time for the Church and its leader who has to hold together people with a broad range of opinions across the Anglican Communion, one of the largest Christian communities in the world.

Dame Sarah's election has upset some traditionalists who have threatened to leave the church because they are against the role of women in leadership. And, with her predecessor leaving because of his failings over abuse in the church, her stance on safeguarding, along with reparative justice and the blessings in church of same sex couples, are all in the spotlight.

A former nurse, Dame Sarah rose to become England's chief nursing officer before being ordained. She says that there are strong links between nursing and being a priest - not always finding a cure, she says, but trying to heal.

The Interview brings you conversations with people shaping our world, from all over the world. The best interviews from the BBC, including episodes with Hind Kabawat, Syria's only woman minister, and Nigel Casey, the UK's ambassador to Russia. You can listen on the BBC World Service on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays at 0800 GMT. Or you can listen to The Interview as a podcast, out three times a week on BBC Sounds or wherever you get your podcasts.

Presenter: Aleem Maqbool
Producers: Clare Williamson
Editors: Justine Lang and Damon Rose

Get in touch with us on email [email protected] and use the hashtag #TheInterviewBBC on social media.
(Image: Dame Sarah Mullally Credit: Ray Tang/Getty Images)

'What the regime does to women is even if they don't kill us, when you stop a woman from being herself, stop her from speaking the way she wants to or stop her from connecting, it’s a kind of murder. And so we're fighting for our existence. We're fighting our survival.’
Svetlana Reiter speaks to the Iranian-American writer, Azar Nafisi, about the current instability in the country of her birth as Iranians continue to seek regime change in Tehran.
Born in Tehran in 1956, the story of her life has been greatly shaped by the Iranian Islamic Revolution of 1979, when Nafisi taught English literature at the University of Tehran. She was expelled from the University for not wearing a hijab, and eventually left for the US less than two decades later.
Nafisi is best-known for her New York Times bestseller, Reading Lolita in Tehran, in which she wrote about her experiences under the Islamic regime. The book focuses on a short period before she left Iran in 1997, when she would gather a group of young women at her house one morning every week to read and discuss forbidden works of Western literature.
Thank you to the BBC Russian Service for their help in making this programme.

The Interview brings you conversations with people shaping our world, from all over the world. The best interviews from the BBC, including episodes with Russian punk activist Maria Alyokhina, Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales and author Sir Salman Rushdie. You can listen on the BBC World Service on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays at 0800 GMT. Or you can listen to The Interview as a podcast, out three times a week on BBC Sounds or wherever you get your podcasts.
Presenter: Svetlana Reiter
Producers: Anastasia Soroka and Ben Cooper
Editor: Damon Rose
Get in touch with us on email [email protected] and use the hashtag #TheInterviewBBC on social media.
(Image: Azar Nafisi Credit: Massimo Valicchia/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

“Even though we say we want to be self-sufficient, we don't think global solidarity must be dropped. Because if it gets dropped, the world will be in trouble.”
Mayeni Jones the BBC’s Africa correspondent speaks to Dr Aaron Motsoaledi South Africa’s health minister a year on since the US announced foreign aid cuts. At the time he called the USAID freeze a wake up call for Africa.
Dr Motsoaledi, has been at the centre of South Africa’s public health response for more than a decade. A medical doctor by training, he first took on the health portfolio in 2009, overseeing the world’s largest HIV treatment programme.
In this conversation he explains how the country is filling the aid gap and where progress stands in the fight against HIV and AIDS.

The Interview brings you conversations with people shaping our world, from all over the world. The best interviews from the BBC, including episodes with Syria’s only female cabinet minister, Hind Kabawat, Ugandan human rights lawyer Nicholas Opiyo and Mexican actor, Diego Calva. You can listen on the BBC World Service on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays at 0800 GMT. Or you can listen to The Interview as a podcast, out three times a week on BBC Sounds or wherever you get your podcasts.
Presenter: Mayeni Jones
Producers: Ed Habershon, Farhana Haider
Editor: Justine Lang
Get in touch with us on email [email protected] and use the hashtag #TheInterviewBBC on social media.
(Image: Dr Aaron Motsoaledi Credit: PHILL MAGAKOE/AFP via Getty Images)

“Most Venezuelans are thinking about the future: Will things improve? Will deep changes come? Will we reunite as a people with our history, dreams, and hopes?”
BBC correspondent Norberto Paredes speaks to Henrique Capriles, a Venezuelan opposition leader, about his vision for a new Venezuela.
In the aftermath of President Maduro’s capture by the United States, Henrique Capriles is one of the key political voices emerging - an alternative to the high-profile Maria Corina Machado, Nobel-prize winner and vocal supporter of Trump’s intervention.
Now it is time for Venezuela’s opposition to unite, he says, and bring democracy to the country.
Henrique Capriles narrowly lost out on the presidency in both 2012 and 2013, before being banned from standing for public office for many years. In 2025, he was elected to the National Assembly.
Thank you to the BBC Mundo team for its help in making this programme.

The Interview brings you conversations with people shaping our world, from all over the world. The best interviews from the BBC, including episodes with Colombian President Gustavo Petro, the President of Ecuador Daniel Noboa and President Lula da Silva of Brazil. You can listen on the BBC World Service on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays at 0800 GMT. Or you can listen to The Interview as a podcast, out three times a week on BBC Sounds or wherever you get your podcasts.
Presenter: Norberto Paredes
Producers: Nathalia Passarinho and Lucy Sheppard
Editor: Justine Lang
Get in touch with us on email [email protected] and use the hashtag #TheInterviewBBC on social media.
(Image: Henrique Capriles Credit: REUTERS/Marco Bello)