1Assembling a diverse group of commentators, activists and academics, this book answers the following questions: who gets to exercise free speech and who does not? What happens when powerful voices think they have been silenced? Why do some issues become sites of free speech battles and what are the consequences of this? How do the spaces and structures of 'speech' - mass media, the internet, the lecture theatre, the public event, the political rally - shape this debate? Ultimately, the book argues that free speech is invoked by actors right across the political spectrum, but that in reality very few of the debates have a clear or coherent idea of what is meant by the concept of 'free speech'.