ProfAFinlayson

The thing is, she chose to tell this (half-true?) story to advertise her product. It’s meant as a selling point. The thought must be that people want to be freed from domestic/personal relations so they can focus on work. I wonder why that’s not selling well?

The Red Wall is a myth, a spook story that British politicians must worship at the altar of: do what I tell you or the Red Wall will get you. It is made up. It has long since lost contact with its original definition. It encourages people to confuse places and people. It is past its sell by date.

These are very significant changes to Treasury rules on public spending - with a distinct focus on place.

It shouldn’t bother me so much, but when people use ‘one bad apple’ they never complete the thought ‘spoils the whole barrel’. In other words it typically doesn’t mean what is intended, but it’s the unintended, correct, meaning that is typically true, in sweet revenge for linguistic purists.

"Culture needs a champion. Will Andy Burnham step up?" www.ft.com/content/b7c6...

BONUS EPISODE OUT NOW! In this PPF+ bonus we conclude our series about transhumanism by exploring where things stand today. David talks to @duncanbell.bsky.social about existential risk, warnings of AI apocalypse and dreams of living forever. Join PPF+ now: www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus

It’s nice for him that Starmer’s ministry has a legacy. But I wonder if the PLP will change its mind.

Impressive rhetorical style here - a kind of performance art it condenses an entire political culture and moment into a few gestures & a guttural exhalation. This is what authentcity looks & sounds like. www.tmz.com/2026/10/13/i...

An answer to the question: ‘What happens when a nation’s ruling class is thirty-somethings who’ve learned about the world from comic book movies, Something Awful, video games & poorly digested cybernetics?’ Answer: It rationalises consuming the spectacle of violent cruelty as liberation.

I did a panel the other day where we talked about the cost of compute as being a massively limiting factor, but for lots of AI purchasers that cost is still being masked by VC/investor money so the vulnerabilities are high but hidden wch leads to scepticism

Super excited to see this article in print in the APSR: 📚 “Public Service Decline and Support for the Populist Right: Evidence from England’s National Health Service” - with the brilliant @zachdickson.bsky.social @catherinedevries.bsky.social @simonecremaschi.bsky.social doi.org/10.1017/S000...

UEA, @electoralintegrity.bsky.social & International IDEA today launch a report on the elections quality around the world: it warns of threats from violence, mis/disinfo cyber attacks & natural hazards. Online webinar 2-4pm. To join use link below. Report summary here: www.uea.ac.uk/about/news/a...

CPP with F&G live! That’s me with @jemgilbert.bsky.social podcasting ‘live from London’. This time the theme is ‘everything’.

NEW EVENT: Join us next month for another live recording of the Culture, Power, Politics Podcast with Alan Finlayson & @jemgilbert.bsky.social 🎤 'The Conjuncture' Thurs 12th Nov, 18:30 Oxford House, Bethnal Green Sign-up 👇 actionnetwork.org/events/cultu...

Death by a thousand cuts as universities revoke international offers "en masse" of prospective students from Bangladesh, Nigeria and Pakistan to avoid losing ability to recruit international students. More job losses and course closures predicted in consequence. giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/...

Accurate. Head of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops Paul Coakley called the Pentagon’s firing-squad livestream “a barbaric promotion of a culture of death.” open.substack.com/pub/lettersf...

Over time the concentration of award-winning researchers weakens: from 'a few science-strong universities in high-income countries to a more diverse set of institutions across the world'. Except in economics. Huh. www.nber.org/papers/w35875

This from @will-davies.bsky.social is just great. Pulls all the threads together & presents the whole thing so well, so clearly. I sincerely wish commentators, policy makers etc. would read & digest this. We live in in anti-sociological times & that intensifies the slow, huge, expanding tide of woe.

This is insane.

Here is my rhetorical analysis of Trump's black-and-white 'final battle' video. I argue that the black-and-white video’s main achievement was to collapse the ‘now’ between a past whose significance is already decided and a future that is already determined. It does+ substack.com/home/post/p-...

In which we learn the real cause of the bump in US inflation. As Internet speak would have it, ‘the answer will surprise you’. substack.com/home/post/p-...

1. Two thoughts on the AB speech A) Just more — much more — ground traversed with big political arguments than the average leader’s speech. Not just care/pensions, but PR, housing/property, Brexit etc etc B) Almost exactly in tune with the median LP member on nearly all these topics

'The Westminster government’s contribution to funding domestic undergraduates studying in England fell in real terms from £8.9 billion in 2012-13 to just £3.3bn in 2024-25, a drop of more than 60 per cent, an analysis has found.'

I get the appeal & political value of nostalgia. But Cortonwood colliery closed 40 yrs ago. The site is now a shopping & leisure centre. I really want a government that proceeds from analysis of now not a past it imagines ‘hope’ can bring back. History matters. So do sociology & Political Economy.

V good. “Indie” became a pastiche of ‘authentic’ Englishness (against electronic, international, dance music). There are big risks to Labour’s pastiche of that pastiche: making policy for an imaginary nation inspired by The Who rather than a real one half into Olivia Rodrigo & half into Skrewdriver.

yes my bull went rogue in your china shop but I think we can all agree there’s no liability here it’s an agentic being

They’re talking about Fabians coz they think that’s when Marxists first hid (original logo was a wolf in sheeps clothing); along with Tavistock it’s ground zero for critical theory/cultural Marxism. An was an obscure in 1980s but now sorta mainstream in MAGA/Reform. I’m sure Braverman thinks this.

This, from a Starmer adviser is worth reading for several reasons. One is this: he thinks digital post-material politics is ‘expressive’. It’s not. It’s participatory. It looks expressive because participation is blocked & has nowhere to go becoming more shrill. You have to give people things to do.

Wait, what? There’s a Secretary of State for Culture?

Kind of grimly fascinating as always, coming from the former director of strategy to a Labour PM. There just isn't a future for a centre-left politics that is this hostile to pretty basic progressive values.

I watched the 70-up finale. Finally it really is about the English class system - the rise of the media/cultural 'intelligentsia' gazing at society from "outside", judging everyone in it by their standards & pretending to be 'the public'. Then all types unite against them. That's the 21st Century!

It would be "over video" if somehow it was filming the slashing that was the offence, but it clearly isn't!

What's the threshold beyond which hacking a government isn't a crime but a mistake? Teenagers get deported for it. Extortion via ransomware is still wrong, right? But if your company has a certain size, fame or market cap, it's not crime? Or is it power? Asking for a friend in a rogue state.