Rob Johns

If you are an advanced PhD student or PostDoc working on AI and global politics/tech/authoritarianism come spend 1-6 months in Berlin this year with @scripts-berlin.eu! We have some funding for you and will help w/ visa and other moving issues.
Info here: www.scripts-berlin.eu/about-us/job...

UKICE Lunch Hour: UK politics in flux - UK in a changing Europe Join UK in a Changing Europe experts as they discuss the high levels of volatility and fragmentation in UK politics.

🌀It's safe to say that UK politics is in flux 🌀

Join our expert panel @anandmenon.bsky.social, @sophiestowers.bsky.social, Rachel Wolf and @drjennings.bsky.social as they unpack the latest in UK politics

📆 Tues 10 Feb, 1pm GMT
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Weird and almost universal revisionism today. Even at the time, it was pretty clear that Mandelson wasn't appointed *despite* his dodgy links but *because* of them. Trump's Washington is a dirty swamp. Mandelson was deemed a man able to swim in it. This wasn't a secret. Everybody said it out loud.

It’s not the central issue here, granted, but surely “paedophile _and_ financier”, not “paedophile financier”.

All news is local...

This is (characteristically) excellent.

It’s Bosham.

No.

Our Collaborative studentship competition is NOW OPEN!

We have 8 exciting projects open for applications until 16 February 2026.

For more info visit: www.senss.ac.uk/collaborativ...

Voters like Us Identity, belonging, and the normalisation of Reform

This is, again, why I think "They are just the Tories with a new name" isn't necessarily damaging for them. Lots of people like(d) voting for the Tories.

www.joxleywrites.jmoxley.co.uk/p/voters-lik...

Britain's youth are living in Nick Clegg's shadow All except the richest graduates since 2012 face a bespoke additional tax. No wonder they're radicalised

I feel staggeringly lucky to have missed the fee increase and been able to pay off my loan on a vaguely normal timescale. People who did the same course as me at the same place two years later face an additional 9% tax for 30 years of their working life

www.newstatesman.com/politics/uk-...

"I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of Peace"

Big fan of this phrase:

"If the grass seems greener on Nigel Farage’s side, it has been well fertilised by the careers of anybody who has challenged, overshadowed, or even in one case succeeded by agreement, the position of the supreme leader."

Portugal is having a presidential election tomorrow (Sunday).

It is a fairly unusual one, which is representative of how much the political landscape has changed in the country.

Here is some quick context about it, in case that is of interest:

1/9

First Scotland poll of the year, first Scotland poll tracker of the year. SNP still projected one short of a majority.

Seats (+/- 2021):

SNP: 64 (-)
Ref: 19 (+19)
Lab: 17 (-5)
Grn: 13 (+5)
Con: 9 (-22)
LD: 7 (+3)
Alba: 0 (-)

21 marginals: 17 SNP, 3 Labour, 1 Conservative.

1/3

Essex Summer School is back!

With a boundless energy and a freshness of slides that you wouldn't expect from someone now squarely in the 'veteran' category, I'll be delivering my course on Designing & Analysing Surveys.

And that's just one of the delights on offer. Browse below and sign up ASAP.

On the vidiprinter, it would have said "Labour: 10% (ten per cent)".

"We were able to show that voting would take less time than traditional peer review and would spread the workload over many more reviewers." Well, there's that.

Just read the abstract of the paper cited in support of the democratic option. Even its authors don't buy it: "This is a preliminary study that does not investigate many of the concerns about how a voting system would work...including vote rigging, lobbying and it becoming a popularity contest."

BJPolS abstract examining Jair Bolsonaro's influence on anti-system political attitudes and job dissatisfaction using Brazil's RAIS database, discussing demographic, employment, and survey findings related to his supporters.

From November 2025 -

From the Factory Floor to the Ballot Box: Firm-Based Origins of Brazil’s Populist Right - https://cup.org/4r04qrj

- @matigiannoni.bsky.social

#OpenAccess

In other words, if we're talking about the might-have-voted-Labour as opposed to the did-vote-Labour-in-2024, then I think the relative importance of the economy would be reduced.

I have a similar experience, actually, and I think it would have helped to put a timeframe on the abandonment. The quote was more about losses since the election. Labour's pretty meagre vote share in July 2024 indicates that many liberal-inclined voters had already turned against them by then.

Two possibilities:

i) they believe [rightly or wrongly] that another party offers a better economy;

ii) concluding [rightly or wrongly] that there's little between the parties on the economy, they judge on other grounds, e.g. values, where some find Labour too liberal and some not liberal enough.

Granted, data on electoral motivations is rarely in the upper reaches of Moh's scale, but I'd say that this from @profjanegreen.bsky.social, @zackgp94.bsky.social and colleagues makes a pretty compelling case that economic insecurity is driving Labour losses: www.jrf.org.uk/public-attit....

🌈

"Where voters go after they abandon Labour is driven by culture and values, but their decision to move away from Labour is driven by economics."

Beautiful essay prompt from @stephenkb.bsky.social's Inside Politics today. (And I think that, if called upon to 'Discuss' it, I'd be pretty sympathetic.)

The precedent.

A very worrying return to the Cold War in the current geopolitical context. It evokes a past of interventionism: from Guatemala in 1954 to Caracas today, the historical echoes of bombings and external pressure as tools of political and economic control in Latin America are still present.

Merry Christmas, academics!