Caerffili - featuring our very own @jaclarner.bsky.social! Blwyddyn newydd dda! www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Two predictions from me for 2026: 1) Anti-Labour tactical voting, which I know sounds obvious but the massive extent to which I think this will happen is still going underpriced imo 2) Tactical voting against Gaza independents, which is a more medium-/long-term thing to look out for in the future

We’ve been analysing what drives support for scottish independence. I was surprised that 50% of the variance of support is driven by which PM is in charge and high the aggregate right wing (Con/Ref) vote is in the U.K.

A rather glum New Year’s Eve Times column on Scottish independence and the rise of Reform UK. www.thetimes.com/article/57aa...

A leader who is rejected by a majority of his own party’s supporters is not long for this world. If you can’t hold your own tribe, you can’t survive. I go into more detail as to why I think this will get worse, not better, in early 2026 in the thread: bsky.app/profile/robf...

I second this recommendation even though, or rather particularly because, not infrequently I disagree with some of his conclusions - but being made to think by data-led evidence is always a good thing!

Two predictions from me for 2026: 1) Anti-Labour tactical voting, which I know sounds obvious but the massive extent to which I think this will happen is still going underpriced imo 2) Tactical voting against Gaza independents, which is a more medium-/long-term thing to look out for in the future

If you don't already read @jamesbreckwoldt.bsky.social's substack and you're into British politics, can I recommend doing so as a New Year's Resolution? Always enjoyable and thought provoking in equal measure - although maybe pass on this one if you're a Labour diehard and don't want to spoil NYEve!

Continuing the tradition, I have compiled an end-of-year overview of the soccer analytics content that I liked the most in 2025. This edition includes pointers to about 200 resources, including research papers, blog posts, news articles, podcasts, and webinars. janvanhaaren.be/posts/soccer...

🧵 Thread on new research on gender gaps in “don’t know” responses Some of you will know that my stellar coauthors @hannahbunting.bsky.social @cerifowler.bsky.social @jess-smith.bsky.social @annasanders.bsky.social & I have been working on a large-scale project on “don’t know” responses in surveys.

🚨 NEW BLOG Labour have won every election in Wales for 100 years, but they are on track to (badly) lose the 2026 Senedd election - why? @jaclarner.bsky.social and I have looked at new data, which shows how support is shifting within (not between) Wales's blocs! blogs.cardiff.ac.uk/thinking-wal...

Watching football on UK TV is expensive and inconvenient The reasons usually given are unsatisfying and end up with simplistic and moralising arguments The truth is far more interesting. It’s about economic incentives, monopoly power, consumer choice, and a regulatory decision by the EU in 2006…

Watching football on UK TV is expensive and inconvenient The reasons usually given are unsatisfying and end up with simplistic and moralising arguments The truth is far more interesting. It’s about economic incentives, monopoly power, consumer choice, and a regulatory decision by the EU in 2006…

Sssh, don't tell the other MPs. Ed Davey wins the Christmas card stakes this year.

100% of people say this is the perfect Christmas present for family, friends, neighbours, enemies and yourself:* buff.ly/4YOetDn (* Data from PackPolling, sample size 1)

Back when Trump was implementing tariffs, I had a look into the problem of international trade imbalances. TLDR: International trade is great, but trade imbalances are very bad. Countries with big trade surpluses are massively reducing demand in global economy and suppressing domestic consumption

It's unarguable that being a modern politician contains many new elements that weren't there even 10 years ago, and it's both interesting and positive to see some Labour backbenchers start to engage with social media. Unsurprisingly I have some thoughts www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Do any people who study German politics have a postal code to Bundestag constituency look-up file? Hat jemand, der sich mit deutscher Politik beschäftigt, eine Zuordnungstabelle von Postleitzahlen zu Bundestagswahlkreisen? #polisky

New from my phd student @joshgoddard98.bsky.social: he shows, using many election and panel studies across the advanced democracies, that housing status has replaced occupational class as a key predictor of voting. Class voting is now about assets, not income www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Do any people who study German politics have a postal code to Bundestag constituency look-up file? Hat jemand, der sich mit deutscher Politik beschäftigt, eine Zuordnungstabelle von Postleitzahlen zu Bundestagswahlkreisen? #polisky

In anticipation of the Budget, here is my Glazer-era Manchester United theory of Britain's economic decline Both started out in a great position and then blew it with a serious of bad decisions, whilst ignoring what had made them great before

The second year of magical thinking: this evening's newsletter on the Budget:

🚨 LSE Assistant Professor in Political Science 🚨 We’re hiring a tenure-track assistant professor - any area of empirical political science - to join our wonderful Government Dept @lsegovernment.bsky.social Any questions, please reach out to me 📣 Please share! 📣 jobs.lse.ac.uk/Vacancies/W/...

In anticipation of the Budget, here is my Glazer-era Manchester United theory of Britain's economic decline Both started out in a great position and then blew it with a serious of bad decisions, whilst ignoring what had made them great before

Promises, promises, promises Rhetoric, rhetoric, rhetoric Blah, blah, blah Why I think nothing will change if nothing actually changes 👇

Seconded (non-paywalled version here: proftimbale.com/tag/vox-pops/)!

I wrote this in September and it's holding up better with each passing day

"If something's hard, then it's not worth doing..." m.youtube.com/watch?v=1G8X...

🚨 New paper with Maria Grasso on generational shifts in political values. Despite talk of rising age polarisation, we show that gaps in attitudes are stable or even narrowing. Economic attitudes move in cycles, while social values have become more liberal – mainly due to generational replacement.

New article from me on importance of charisma and attention seeking in elections Includes: - A short history of "charisma" - How different mediums (radio, TV, social media etc.) require different types of charisma - Why you need to be Everything Everywhere All at Once in today’s political landscape

The re-election path for this govt has always involved betting an early period of unpopular budgets on hopefully delivering the improvements asked for by Labour voters by the next election. The problem is the leadership, and internal critics, favour combos that avoid one side of the equation.

Like, you can debate how much Starmer is directly responsible for Labour's current unpopularity, but I can absolutely guarantee that a replacement will also be really unpopular if they don't substantively improve cost of living or public services, which will require politically difficult budgets.

If MPs defected at the same rates as their voters, the Commons would look like: Labour: 212 (-199) Lib Dems: 110 (+38) Conservatives: 99 (-22) Greens: 87 (+83) Reform UK: 86 (+81) SNP/PC: 25 (+12) Others: 31 (+7)

TLDR: buy shares in Zack Polanski Let The Rock explain:

TLDR: buy shares in Zack Polanski Let The Rock explain:

🚨 NEW in @bjpols.bsky.social : When Partygate hit Westminster, trust in Scottish politicians increased. Our experiments reveal a "contrast effect" - scandals at one level can make the other look better by comparison. Who lost most trust in Westminster? Scottish unionists. Read now #OpenAccess 👇

New article from me on importance of charisma and attention seeking in elections Includes: - A short history of "charisma" - How different mediums (radio, TV, social media etc.) require different types of charisma - Why you need to be Everything Everywhere All at Once in today’s political landscape

For more on the strange language that politicians use to describe the average voter that Phil and Armando talk about here, I wrote a short history of the weird and wonderful world of voter segmentation names in September

While going through the proofs for "The British General Election of 2024" (out very soon!) I came across this - Paul Johnson of the IFS's verdict on Labour's manifesto last year. Labour's current attempts to claim the need to break their tax pledges was impossible to forsee don't stack up

I've made the code for the ANES output available at: gist.github.com/philswatton/...

I've written a blog post about using metric unfolding to extract latent dimensions from data, using the ANES feeling thermometers & BES 'like' scales as examples. It's a high-level intro to unfolding and using the smacof R package. These plots are the results. philswatton.github.io/2025/11/05/e...

Mamdani is important because he best represents one emerging theory on how left wins again: Clear targeted cost of living offer + populist rhetoric; comfort with naming enemies to get attention. Don’t abandon liberal causes but trim unpopular positions to keep focus of conflict on affordability

I am now a doctor. Not a useful one, mind you, but a doctor nonetheless. As an amuse-bouche for you, here is an abridged/accessible version of my PhD thesis's introduction section to entice you to read the whole thing...

ANES Data Release! electionstudies.org/data-center/... The 3-wave ANES panel is now available. It merges data from 3 election studies (2016-2020-2024), the first time the ANES has collected interviews of the same respondents across 3 presidential elections.

I am now a doctor. Not a useful one, mind you, but a doctor nonetheless. As an amuse-bouche for you, here is an abridged/accessible version of my PhD thesis's introduction section to entice you to read the whole thing...

NEWYDD - @jaclarner.bsky.social a minnau ar Etholiad 2024 yng Nghymru NEW - Jac Larner and myself on the 2024 UK GE in 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿 2024 UK General Election in Wales url: academic.oup.com/pa/article-a...

It feels like scrambling for an excuse that allows them to keep their heads in the clouds, without thinking through what they're actually saying