Peter Allen

Martin Parr RIP
One of my favourite photographers. If you don't know his work, dip into the internet; it's a joy.

#7 for my @newbooksnetwork.bsky.social podcast countdown is essential reading (& listening!) for everyone- @peterallen.bsky.social on How to Think about Politics: A Guide in Five Parts newbooksnetwork.com/how-to-think...

It’s the playlist we all didn’t know we needed.

*sweary. Though ‘sweaty’ also works.

Is there going to be an accompanying anti-Brexit songs playlist? EU Supergirl, for starters ofc; that sweaty folk song too?

No Second Chances Between 2016 and 2019, a unique coalition assembled within British politics. Combining Corbynite campaigners and Conservative Cabinet ministers, celebrities and grassroots activists, seasoned politica...

Excitingly, my book now has a cover. You can see it here, where you can also now pre-order!

www.bitebackpublishing.com/books/no-sec...

Fiction: I’m really enjoying Karl Ove Knausgaard’s Morning Star series (4 books so far, speculative fiction). Also recently enjoyed There Is No Antimemetics Divison by qntm (sci-fi).

Non-fiction: The Wager by David Grann is pacy and gripping, historical adventure.

This Labour government lacks a future You might be forgiven for thinking that the Labour government is focused on the future. Since before his government’s first Budget, the Prime Minister has repeatedly asked the British public to stomac...

"If the government is to have any hope of getting itself back into the driver’s seat of our political moment, of getting its future back, it must start arguing in terms of a bold and coherent vision for the future."

@mbarnfield.bsky.social on the budget and the government's empty long-termism

V happy to see this paper out with @chrisclaassen.bsky.social at @bjpols.bsky.social .

We argue that nostalgia for Britain's past is an important, distinct opinion dimension which has meaningful consequences for party evaluations and vote choice.

AI farts stink up your art Purely as a matter of aesthetics, on an emotional, instinctive level, I reject the use of generative AI in the creative arts. When people were playing with Craiyon a few years ago, I found somethin…

BLOG POST: An attempt to put into words my *feelings* about generative AI and why (a) I don't like being tricked into consuming it and (b) I just don't care about things that are made using it.

precastreinforced.co.uk/2025/11/21/a...

I don’t leave the house without mine, just in case.

This is pathetic, really.

I don't see such an obvious swerve achieving anything politically. A ragtag of small taxes gobbles up attention and kneecaps purposiveness. It increases vulnerabilities, including a 2026 rerun. The leadership remains on borrowed time. Nobody becomes happier.

Possibly a coincidence but £46k is roughly the top end of the main teacher pay scale in England (outside of London) www.nasuwt.org.uk/advice/pay-p...

That opening ceremony was a celebration of a bunch of things that government no longer had the imagination, political will, or state capacity to achieve even by 2012.

Everything you always wanted to know about the Bribery Act (but were afraid to ask)

What would you do if democracy was being dismantled before your eyes? Whatever you’re doing right now | Andy Beckett In California, daily life under Trump is marked by sporadic resistance and avoidance. Neither will defeat the autocrats, says Guardian columnist Andy Beckett

‘However, avoiding and engaging with politics are not necessarily mutually exclusive. Often, both impulses coexist in people, especially when faced with something as simultaneously provocative and exhausting as hard-right populism’.

Great column by Andy Beckett. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Hearts and minds | Fabian Society Fabian Society

We are seeing increased illiberalism, and anti-liberalism, in our politics. The Labour party has a responsibility, as a government and as a centre-left political tradition, to counter this illiberalism, which takes different forms.
fabians.org.uk/hearts-and-m...

Keir Starmer needs to give voters short-term gain to persuade them he can deliver long-term renewal Keir Starmer says painful decisions are needed now to fix the country for the future. But voters may not stick around to find out if he’s right.

My write-up for The Conversation on how a strategy of "short-term pain for long-term gain" could be losing the government support from the more short-term-focused of its voters:

theconversation.com/keir-starmer...

Trailed in the FT this morning (www.ft.com/content/e984...)

Latest from our politics of impatience project - some excellent analysis by @mbarnfield.bsky.social showing Labour is losing the jam today voters.

Labour sheds support from impatient Britons: on.ft.com/48EaX4h

Labour sheds support from impatient Britons Research shows party losing voters who want results now, with women more likely to prioritise short-term gains

Great to speak to @greenmirandahere.bsky.social for today's FT Inside Politics about the latest finding from our politics of (im)patience project, w/ @karlpike.bsky.social and @philipjcowley.bsky.social.

www.ft.com/content/e984...

This is one of academics working on British Politics that might be of interest, I put it together back when everyone initially moved so might be missing newer arrivals go.bsky.app/EqXUQbt

An egalitarian answer to gerontocracy Debates about gerontocracy often focus on the age of leaders, but the deeper issue lies in the age of electorates. Older citizens vote far more than the young, skewing democratic outcomes. This blo…

I’ve written a response to @samuelmoyn.bsky.social’s recent essay in Democracy Project - agreeing with him about the problem of gerontocracy, but suggesting his advocacy of weighted votes for the young ignores an obvious egalitarian alternative: compulsory voting

This was a lot of fun to do, and with a really engaged audience of students (and future young voters) who asked some great questions.

Really enjoyed this, especially the contemporary references you included for the young audience such as mentions of Monty Python and Mystic Meg. Reminds me of talking to my UG students about their CD collections.

A very eighties Christmas card that has a picture of a candle and reads “Season’s Greetings”

This was the front of the card #eighties

A card that reads: Dear Name and Name, How are you both? I are still in Shropshire , inspite of one valiant attempt fo get back to Oxfordshire , my parents’ home county. Name and I finally parted for good and all last July (1982) He met someone in the Psychology Dept at Keele and they are now living together in Sussex. I was very upset, as you can imagine, and I am still not properly back to my old self. Such is life though and I try to make my life useful in other respects. I am once again involned in the L.P. and C.N.D. I would love to hear from you and hear how life treats you in South Wales. Have a lovely time at Christmas. Take care, Name XX

A delightful but poignant find in a second-hand copy of Ulysses that bought this weekend. I doubt that someone today would think that they could ‘make their life useful again’ after a divorce by getting more involved in politics.

A graph from the FT showing government spending by age cohort. Over-70s have more spent on them than any other age cohort.

Print and send this chart (from your newsletter on Tuesday) to every household in the country.

Article abstract, which says: The educational cleavage is restructuring electoral competition in many democracies, yet there has been insufficient attention on how variation in educational content affects this. In order to address this, this article combines English administrative school records with a unique representative panel of adolescents to estimate the within-individual effect of studying different subjects at school on political party preference. This analysis finds that studying arts and humanities subjects leads to greater support for socially liberal parties, whilst studying business and economics increases support for economically right-wing parties. Students who study technical subjects become more likely to support socially conservative and economically right-wing parties. These relationships between particular subjects and party support also persist into adulthood. As such, this article provides new evidence on the importance of subjects taken in secondary school for political socialisation, during the impressionable years of adolescence.

📣 NEW PAPER ALERT! 🚨

"School subject choices in adolescence affect political party support"

Just published in @wepsocial.bsky.social with @nspmartin.bsky.social and @rolandkappe.bsky.social.

doi.org/10.1080/0140...

🧵👇

Following the success of our spring seminar series earlier this year, we @psapolpsychology.bsky.social are running an autumn/winter series, with four online presentations by great scholars.

Please do register and come along to hear about some really fascinating research!

Strategic Inclusion Without Transformation: How Populist Radical Right Parties Engage With Women’s Interests - Bonnie M. Meguid, Hilde Coffé, Ana Catalano Weeks, Miki Caul Kittilson, 2025 Despite their Männerparteien reputation, populist radical right (PRR) parties have recently expanded their agendas to include women’s interests. When do they em...

🚨 New article out today in @cpsjournal.bsky.social !

📄 “Strategic Inclusion Without Transformation: How Populist Radical Right Parties Engage With Women’s Interests”

With Bonnie Meguid, @hildecoffe.bsky.social & Miki Kittilson

🔗 doi.org/10.1177/0010...