When the institutional capacity for rigorous journalism and critical public scrutiny is fast eroding and facing brutal attacks, it’s time to return to a classic.

🗣️ Matt Foot, Co-Director: “Reducing jury trials will inevitably increase miscarriages of justice. Prisons are overcrowded — and the backlog is caused by underfunding and overcharging, not juries.” 📖 Read our full response to the Leveson review: 👉 appeal.org.uk/levesons-out...

Strikes me both are symptomatic of one variant of Labourism or another

The only Legitimate Concerns about asylum seekers are concerns for their well being and safety. For a rich country like ours to incessantly whine about these people as if we are their victims is perhaps the single most pathetic spectacle in British politics over the past quarter century.

A leader capable of inspiring with critical nuance—and a theory of art’s heteronymy on which a defence of its freedom can be built without a crude political reduction (also shared with Benedict to be fair). Complete contrast to the political & media class’s using crude economism to destroy the arts.

Do you believe the justice system can make society fairer & want to help make this happen? If you’re a budding professional, join NextGen JUSTICE60, a new network for future leaders advancing justice through giving, mentoring & collaboration. Learn more: justice.org.uk/get-involved...

Pluribus is a dark satire of society as resonance or mimetic contagion—a critique fit for our times of pseudo-totality as manipulated seriality Theorists of sonic materialism take note!

Those of us who actually wanted democratic socialism already knew by the time he made his leadership bid in January 2020 that Starmer was incompetent and uninspired. Let’s not forget which fractions of the party (and media class) swung behind him and which opposed him.

The alienation of young people can be blamed on Covid, phones and much else. But those are exacerbations. The real cause is rent exploitation in all its forms. It is neoliberalism that is destroying the lives of young people. And that is why it has to go. www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2025/11...

Very good commentary from Tom eschewing reduction to the palace coup framing without dodging the issues of who has the power to determine accountability.

Signup sheet for the last seminar session I’m teaching this term: I might be taking this whole “case of Wagner” thing a bit seriously…

Who knew that The Morning Show is the news? 😂

This—what the public listens to impacts polarization and the quality of public reason

Overjoyed to have been awarded an AHRC LUCIA grant to continue work with @justicehq.bsky.social, United Borders & members of @artnotevidence.bsky.social to increase awareness of rap’s aesthetic & socio-cultural value to combat criminalization & racial disparities in the criminal justice system.

There are many problems with the 1st Amendment regime: e.g. time, place & manner restrictions are readily deployed to silence marginalized voices and dissent. There is arguably much to commend the more nuanced jurisprudence and hierarchy of protection under the ECHR for being more egalitarian.

Zohran's campaign was his determination to make New York a city everyone can afford to live in. Huge congratulations! His success will resonate throughout the world. A story where no one is left behind. It's time to write that story across England & Wales too.

Congratulations, NYC!

Important report on by-and-for organizations’ role in making audible the often marginalized voices of affected communities: “There are things that you can’t do as an individual but once you are an organisation, you can easily get your voice heard”—Ruth Ngwata, Coventry Empowered African Women Group

Let’s stop dignifying propagandists without an ounce of rigour or integrity with the term “activist.” Or maybe my much loved colleagues in political science might gently be encouraged not to expend anymore outrage on someone who is nowhere near in Faiza’s league as an activist or intellectual.

It's increasingly obvious that Labour's strategy - call it Starmerism, Blue Labour, whatever - has got it badly wrong. It has alienated the party's core vote while failing to win over those leaning to Reform. There was no shortage of people warning them they were getting it wrong either.

When you have senior figures at the major UK research funding bodies saying universities should do less research and that cross-subsidy from international fees is required because they’ve doing too much research, you see how anti-intellectualism is setting in at policy levels.

This is why “listening” isn’t reducible to something like “resonance” or even “sympathy.” The necessary conditions for feeling heard go include doing something with what is heard beyond echoing to responding and acting on it.

The other big takeaway from Caerphilly is that despite a brief resuscitation in 2017 the two party system is well and truly over for the UK. And that means either we bite the bullet on PR or the parties are all going to have to make deals to not split the left or right vote

“Her ‘Lucy Listens’ initiative ‘designed’ to reconnect the membership to the leaders might…be a handy information gathering exercise for a leadership campaign…naively wondering which would-be leader closely associated with Powell could profit from…a ringside seat listening to members’ complaints?”

this is what will happen if mamdani makes bus rides free

There's plenty of demand for left-leaning economic populism among the British public.

“We’re not banning protest. We’re just banning too much protest…protesting a lot. I would urge them to feel strongly about it once and then just feel calm.” An utter disgrace for a Labour politician.

We have just advertised a Full Prof position in the Political and Social Sciences department at the EUI (@eui-sps.bsky.social). Here are the details. Please spread the word, and get in touch if you have any questions. www.eui.eu/Documents/Se...

How safe are UK research institutions from politicisation? Answer - not at all. A Reform government could do the worst of Trump2 in a couple of weeks. blogs.lse.ac.uk/impactofsoci...

Rachel Reeves says she needs to raise taxes to “balance the books.” But that’s not how government finance works. In this video, I explain why the government’s job is to sustain spending power, not drain it. youtu.be/iUxvARzRi8U?...

On the Post-16 Education & Skills paper: government has effectively reduced missions to a single goal of growth—which increasingly seems to mean Labour’s electoral prospects. It yields a brutal reduction, instrumentalization & quasi-Taylorist segmentation of human intellectual & creative capacities.

This isn’t accurate. Context will determine whether that statement is un/lawful or if it’s un/protected. It is wrong to say that we need to exclude by policy and practice as if the law cannot in fact already address many examples of “less grave” hate speech. It risks emboldening racists.

I wish people with large followings wouldn’t repeat such misleading statements. It’s not protected speech under Article 10 due to Article 17. Any public authority has to act compatibly with the Convention. Private employers could reasonably to take disciplinary action per codes of conduct.

“In a turbulent world [SHAPE degrees] also offer hope and a guiding light, deeper understanding and creative solutions.”

I sense an opportunity for participatory research 🙀 www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

Exactly. Good reading in this from my former Merton colleague, Daniela Dover (miss her so much!): static1.squarespace.com/static/5cb8c...

Freedom of association & assembly are under existential threat. This report calls for urgent global action to rebuild solidarity, protect civil society & uphold democracy. 🧵👇

This.

Exactly.

Pol profs (follow e.g. @benansell.bsky.social, @drjennings.bsky.social, @profjanegreen.bsky.social) doing sterling work trying to show Labour why its electoral strategy won’t work and thereby defending universities. HE’s future increasingly seems to turn on shifting Labour’s electoral calculus.

I’m struck by the aural metaphors in Macron’s speech on the “degeneration of our democracies” to mark the Tag der Deutschen Einheit, especially in this passage. One cannot ignore that the distinction between noise and logos is both colonialist and reminiscent of Plato’s critique of democracy. 1/3

7am this morning in my little piece of heaven on earth before returning to the real world

I didn’t even find his calling out very effective. Damage to private property came before inciting racial violence and hatred, as if it were more deplorable. And he excuses the Oldham woman using one of the lamest defences in the book: she can’t be racist because she has a friend of colour.

Let’s not mince our words. This is class war from the party founded to represent the working classes, and yet Labourism has always been an obstacle to that. At the same time, it wouldn’t hurt, if we claim the humanities are essential to UK or global challenges, to demonstrate that in our curricula.

NEW! In Liverpool for Labour Conference... Starmer is concentrating on Reform but Labour shouldn't mistake their threat on the right, even in Leave voting heartlands. Our new analysis w/ @martamiori.bsky.social explains: politicscentre.nuffield.ox.ac.uk/news-and-eve...

Ha! I recall being so inspired by this that I tried to imitate it (badly no doubt) for a piece of creative writing homework at primary school and being devastated when it got a C, losing any confidence in my ability to write. No wonder I eventually became an academic! 😂

In Thomas Guggeis’s debut with the Berlin Philharmoniker performing Also sprach Zarathustra, Tout un monde lointain… (with Maximilian Hornung), and Daphnis and Chloe Suite no. 2 the sound of the orchestra was utterly gorgeous and glorious, with a luster and voluptuousness as if from times past.

In this post @tomdannenbaum.bsky.social & I trace how the Starmer Government's repeatedly misconstrues its obligations under the Genocide Convention in #Gaza, hiding behind a Court judgement that is years away with a position that we call "legally illiterate" and "morally indefensible".

The educational effect on political attitudes and values has been overstated. As the paper below demonstrates, the education effect largely disappears when cohort differences, i.e. *age*, is take into account.

From @auralflaneur.bsky.social - what can Foucault's prison activism and Derrida's anti-Apartheid advocacy tell us about lived experience testimony in the fight to abolish modern day slavery? olrsupplement.com/2025/09/19/l...