Lse: Public Lectures And Events

Contributor(s): Daria Zakharova, Professor Elli Leadbeater, Professor Jonathan Birch, Sam Beckbessinger | Human beings are part of a vast sentient world full of conscious creatures, and even those of us far away from centres of political power have immense influence over huge numbers of animal lives - influence which we can choose to exercise for good or ill. 

Contributor(s): Sadiqah Musa, Professor Neil Lawrence, Dr Chandrima Ganguly | Who is in charge of the algorithms and models that shape our future? 

Contributor(s): Ros Taylor, Dr Laura Gilbert, Rafael Behr | Trust (in media, institutions, politics and democracy) is widely reported to be in decline, but how important is it for a functioning society and why? What’s the relationship between trust and power?

Contributor(s): Professor Naila Kabeer, Phillip Hensher, Monica Ali | How can an author bring out the stories and voices buried in their research to deliver the impact they are hoping for? And how should writers communicate experiences of power and oppression that are not their own? Whether embarking on a creative novel or an academic monograph, an author is faced with choices about the ways in which they tell their stories. 

Contributor(s): Dr Grace Lordan | Recently there has been a surge in popular voices in social media stating that DEI is bad for business. There has also been a significant reduction in investment in diversity and inclusion by some of the world’s largest firms.

Contributor(s): Iliana Sarafian, Rita Kahsay, Fatou Bensouda | Global legal frameworks to protect women in conflict have been agreed by all members of the UN Security Council. Yet evidence from around the world shows that violence against women, because they are women, remains very much a part of twenty first century warfare.

Contributor(s): Dr Maël Lavenaire, Leah Eryenyu, Professor Neil Cummins | Politics of power and wealth have had a huge impact on the structuring of inequalities across the globe. As the racial and ethnic inequalities that we see today stem from centuries of discrimination and marginalisation, in order to tackle them, we will need to understand how they have been embedded in the very structures of our societies. 

Contributor(s): Salman Usmani, Professor Alpa Shah, Ross Holder | Amidst the surge of global authoritarianism, how do we protect the freedom of speech and the freedom of dissent that is crucial for democracy? What is the role of global financial institutions and regimes in the crackdown on dissent in faraway places? What role do international human rights organisations, cultural spaces and educational institutions have in protecting the spaces of democracy globally? 

Contributor(s): Sarah O'Connor, Professor Alan Manning, Professor Stephen Machin, Kate Bell | How much power should employers have over their workers’ lives? Most countries recognise that employer power needs to be curbed – with governments setting out legal requirements on minimum pay, maximum working hours and paid leave. And governments also intervene to curb worker power – ruling on trade union recognition, who can strike and under what conditions. But should governments intervene between employer and employee on matters such as sending out-of-hours emails, or on whether to pay bonuses?

Contributor(s): Professor Giles Atkinson, Dr Matthew Agarwala | Discover how to measure economic progress and sustainability with practical illustrations in this one-hour workshop by leading experts on measuring sustainable development, Giles Atkinson and Matthew Agarwala. Learn what is at the heart of this topic – “Beyond GDP” is easy to say, but what does it actually mean to move beyond Gross Domestic Product as the primary way that nations use to measure economic and social development? Find out how thinking about "nature as capital" is a key step in this journey and why, more generally, focusing on national and planetary wealth is a better guide to economic and social development prospects. Discover which countries and organisations are doing what to go “Beyond GDP” around the world. Begin to be able to distil a picture of whether national economies are sustainable, using a handful of available indicators.

Contributor(s): Professor Leslie Vinjamuri, Professor Helen Thompson, Gideon Rachman | Early hopes that Western democracies’ unified response to Vladimir Putin’s war against Ukraine would break the populist, anti-globalist fever have not been fulfilled. Instead, since the invasion, opponents of the liberal order have made deeper inroads in France, Italy, Sweden, the Netherlands, and elsewhere. Meanwhile, the possibility persists that Trump may return to the White House in 2025. 

Contributor(s): Kerryn Krige, Dr Jonathan Roberts | You will learn five practical skills to challenge and reshape power dynamics: Understanding social problems Prioritising coproduction with communities and users Considering organisational design Leading systems change Building (and sometimes not building) market-based solutions

Contributor(s): Dr Nesrin Alrefaai, Professor Matthew Spangler | The new play 'A handful of lentils' by Dr Nesrin Alrefaai and Professor Matthew Spangler, focuses on the interaction between a Syrian refugee and a state official. They discuss how theatre plays a role in addressing life experiences during political upheaval.  

Contributor(s): Professor Paul Collier | Left behind places can be found in prosperous countries — from South Yorkshire, integral to the industrial revolution and now England’s poorest county, to Barranquilla, once Colombia’s portal to the Caribbean and now struggling. More alarmingly, the poorest countries in the world are diverging further from the rest of humanity.

Contributor(s): Professor Gerry Simpson, Dr Joana Setzer, Sir Howard Morrison KC, Professor Larry Kramer | There is a growing expectation for law and courts, whether domestic or international, to be remedies for international problems. Our panel explore the power of law and courts in the face of contemporary international challenges. 

Contributor(s): Professor Andrés Rodríguez-Pose, Dr Özge Öner, James Blagden | Recent EU research highlights a clear connection between stagnant growth within some European regions and their support for Eurosceptic parties, also suggesting that the longer the period of stagnation, the stronger the opposition to European integration.

Contributor(s): Professor Andrew Murray | Learn the fundamentals of data regulation – how data is gathered and processed, held and stored according to the law Discuss how regulation supports opportunities for data use, and how regulation sets limitations on abuse or misuse of data Explore the latest legal developments including the Data Act and the AI Act Consolidate your understanding with the Q&A

Contributor(s): Dr Bugra Susler, Dr Yolanda Spies, Professor Chris Alden | Now, as emerging global middle powers begin to assert their influence in their respective regions, and on the global stage, diverse perspectives on pressing global issues, spanning international conflicts to climate change, present various visions for the future of the international system. With recent elections in Turkey, and forthcoming voting in South Africa and the Western world (the UK, EU and the US), our panel will delve into the aspirations and perspectives of global middle powers, and will analyse the impact of their rise on the global order.

Contributor(s): Professor Tony Travers | Devolution offers an opportunity to reshape where power resides in the UK. But after years of austerity, the impact of the pandemic, and the cost-of-living crisis, can it be made to work for our most deprived communities?

Contributor(s): Xiaolu Guo, Professor William A. Callahan, Dr Elena Barabantseva | Elena Barabantseva’s Chinese-Russian Group Wedding (5 min) explores the relations of these two superpowers through the intimate geopolitics of mixed-marriages, and William A. Callahan’s The Nose Knows (15min) traces how Chinese artists and officials have imagined foreigners in terms of their “big noses” both historically and up to the present day. The films challenge stereotypes by showing a multifaceted understanding of the UK and the world, exploring personal experience, foreign policy agendas, and artistic creativity through the eyes of different groups of Chinese people.