James Wood

"Few Reform supporters have voted for Labour at any point in the 21st century. This is true if we look at where Farage’s parties drew votes between 2015 and 2025, and across twenty years of voting history" This type of conclusion is not specific to the UK.

🚨 Please share widely! 🚨

I'm hiring a postdoc (from Aug 1) to help build a new research program on politically sustainable immigration policies at Notre Dame.

Looking for a social scientist with strong quant skills, familiarity with new computational tools, and interest in public-facing research.

How partisan politics shielded the Federal Reserve from inflation blame | LSE United States Politics and Policy Criticisms of the Fed’s role were overshadowed by party political narratives, allowing it to avoid scrutiny over its actions and their consequences.

Inflation was the defining issue of the 2024 election, yet neither party seriously questioned the Federal Reserve - the institution primarily responsible for controlling it.

New piece @lseusablog.bsky.social on how partisan politics shielded the Fed from scrutiny:

blogs.lse.ac.uk/usappblog/20...

The student loan system — and its danger for Keir Starmer and Labour Growing anger among millions of graduates who face decades of debt is causing unease in Westminster

This is becoming an increasingly important issue, but it needs to be recognised that previous governments sold tranches of student loan debt to private investors, so many students are making repayments to financial institutions, not the government

www.ft.com/content/7bf5...

Homeownership and political efficacy: how housing wealth shapes whether people feel heard Why do some citizens feel that political institutions are responsive to people like them, while others do not? Existing research highlights the role of education and income in shaping external poli...

Just out in @wepsocial.bsky.social: how housing wealth shapes whether people feel heard. Together with @madselk.bsky.social and @benansell.bsky.social, I looked at a neglected determinant of political efficacy: homeownership.

Read the #OA paper: doi.org/10.1080/0140...

Quick overview below (1/5)

Strategic repoliticisation: inflation, blame, and the fracturing of democratic accountability in the United States When inflation returned to the United States during the COVID-19 pandemic after decades of price stability, it created a critical test for the accountability mechanisms underpinning the system of d...

Did Congress forget the Fed controls inflation, or was forgetting the point?

My paper in New Political Economy shows Congress engaged in strategic repoliticisation, where political conflict serves electoral interests and preserves the Fed's technocratic autonomy www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

CARNEY: “.. You cannot live within the lie of mutual benefit through integration when integration becomes the source of your subordination.” 🔥

We are happy to release the Paths to Power Dashboard. It is the perfect tool for politics nerds!

You can find it here: ptp.isv.sv.uio.no/ptp/

It allows you to explore governments from 1966-2021 using the PtP and WhoGov datasets. See examples below.

The app has been programmed by Stuart Bramwell.

Photo of Trinity College Dublin taken by Stefan Müller

Our neighbours at @tcdpoliticalsci.bsky.social are hiring 3 (!) tenure-track faculty members:

– Assistant Professor in Political Economy
– Assistant Professor in International Politics
– Assistant Professor in Political Science

Deadline: 15 Jan 2026
More details: jobs.tcd.ie
@tcddublin.bsky.social

Why America’s innovation ecosystem will survive Trump’s cuts to R&D | USAPP America’s “polycentric innovation state” remains and will continue to adapt to economic challenges.

America’s innovation ecosystem will survive Trump’s cuts to R&D writes @thinkwoodist.bsky.social @campolis.bsky.social @cam.ac.uk c.uk

blogs.lse.ac.uk/usappblog/20...

My book on American innovation policy is out!

'States of Innovation' shows how state and federal governments are active catalysts driving innovation-led growth, challenging the idea that US capitalism is uniquely market-driven.

www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/...

A graph that tells you everything you need to know about why British politics is in the state it is in.

A flow chart shows 17.4 million leave voters in 2016, vs 16.1m remain. In 2025, 5 million of those people have died, and 3 million new voters have come of age. The result (plus some people changing their mind) is 19.8 million voters now back rejoin, versus just 11.7 million wanting to stay out.

Absolutely amazing chart from @peterkellner.bsky.social's piece in @thenewworldmag.bsky.social today:
www.thenewworld.co.uk/peter-kellne...

Cambridge Journal of Regions, Economy and Society | Oxford Academic A journal of the Cambridge Political Economy Society. The journal publishes multi-disciplinary research on the spatial dimensions of contemporary socio-economic-political change, and examines the effe...

🗓️ One for your calendar 🔥
The 2026 Cambridge Journal of Regions, Economy and Society (academic.oup.com/cjres) annual conference , will be held in St Catharine’s College, Cambridge UK on 16-17 July 2026.

Text: We're hiring. the Department of Political Science at Memorial University invites applications to the highly prestigious Canada Excellence Research Chairs (CERC) Program with a specialization in Comparative Democratic Resilience in the Global South. Closing Date: December 14, 2025. QR code and image with a picture of the Memorial University campus in the background.

Job - please share widely!
Canada Excellence Research Chair in Comparative Democratic Resilience in the Global South.
Research focus - grassroots movements, Indigenous sovereignties, and racial justice campaigns contesting and transforming public institutions

www.mun.ca/vpacademic/m...

When big banks worry that something will look like a bribe, you have to ask, why don’t Amazon and the others think about this?

We're recruiting!

Please do spread the news far and wide. We're excited by the prospect of being joined by another great new colleague!

NEW! How should Labour respond to the two key issues to voters of the economy and immigration and what are the electoral stakes this week of the budget?

Read on for our answer...

@nprcoxford.bsky.social @jrf-uk.bsky.social

Out Tomorrow! So excited that my book A History of Modern Britain in 12 Crises will be published tomorrow by
@brisunipress.bsky.social

This looks at 12 crises from the People's Budget of 1909 to COVID-19 and how they have shaped British politics. bristoluniversitypress.co.uk/a-history-of...

🚨 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/...

With thanks to @ukandeu.bsky.social for asking me & Patrick Bayer to summarize our recent @bjpols.bsky.social article where we argue that while UK/EU communities exposed to climate mitigation are generally afraid of net zero, some may be more interested in int'l climate cooperation than you think...

Governing by Decree: The Trump Presidency and the Decline of “Legislating Together” Abstract. During his two terms as president, Donald Trump has asserted exceptional executive power, diluting Congress's governing responsibilities. The Tru

Governing by Decree: The Trump Presidency and the Decline of “Legislating Together” | Political Science Quarterly
Interesting, cautious take on the utter collapse of U.S. checks and balances, but fails to cover Trump’s rule of law breaches & corruption.
academic.oup.com/psq/advance-...

Part 1: My Life Is a Lie How a Broken Benchmark Quietly Broke America

Mike Green is writing some amazing stuff at the moment. It's not in the delta, it's in the level and the cost structure. Read this and you will understand Angrynomics on a new level: www.yesigiveafig.com/p/part-1-my-...

From the great new NBER paper by Bloom et al on the cost of Brexit.

It ain't pretty - they estimate UK GDP is down between 6-8%. Consistent with the doppelgang model of @johnspringford.bsky.social for CER.

A lot of 'free' GDP available availabe for Labour if it had the courage to reset properly.

It is indisputable that Brexit has been an economic disaster, and notable that none of its political architects have paid any price.

Thrilled to see our latest paper published in @iojournal.bsky.social! 🥳
"Dollar Diminished: The Unmaking of US Financial Hegemony Under Trump" co-authored with Tobias Pforr (@eui-eu.bsky.social) and @fabianpape.bsky.social 🙂

doi.org/10.1017/S002...

Attention is on NEETs today, but the problem is much worse.

NEETs include stay-at-home parents & jobseekers.

Strip those out to focus on people not working, not seeking work, not in education & not parenting: this group of economically & socially dislocated young adults has *doubled* in a decade.

Breaking out of old paths? Towards a research agenda on path decline Abstract. The climate crisis confronts carbon-intensive industries with profound decarbonisation challenges, which may lead to reductions in production, jo

Breaking out of old paths? Towards a research agenda on path decline

Michaela Trippl, Maximilian Benner and Jannik Kastrup

Cambridge Journal of Regions, Economy and Society, rsaf045, doi.org/10.1093/cjre...

#PathDependence #LockIns

Lecturer in Economics | King's College London

📢 We’re hiring!

King's College London Political Economy is recruiting an Assistant Professor (Lecturer in the UK system) in Economics.

Apply here: www.kcl.ac.uk/jobs/130885-...

Feel free to contact me for information about the role and our department.

@kcl-spe.bsky.social @kingsqpe.bsky.social