Simon Hix

I analysed 40 years of British laws and found that society was the footnote. Dirty rivers, absurd train fares, families fighting for support: all share the same flaw: governments optimise the wrong things. Could software engineering offer a fix? laurenleek.substack.com/p/theres-no-...

Fabulous new Substack by @laurenleek.eu, explaining, among other things, why water prices, train tickets, and special educational needs are so expensive in the UK: laurenleek.substack.com/p/theres-no-...

Vučić gone!!! #StudentPower giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/... Serbia’s ex-president Vučić concedes defeat to Student List in parliamentary poll

Desperate stuff Home Secretary originally argued (very misleadingly) care workers shouldn't be allowed to settle because their wages were so low that they'd be a fiscal cost. Now she's arguing they shouldn't be allowed to settle because they'd get better paid jobs www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/...

… wait, do any other countries make wine that can be bought in Canada? 🤦‍♂️

Couldn't ask for a better start to the week than Matt Goodwin arguing we shouldn't rejoin the EU because it's become so right wing and populist.

New working paper: the Norwegian wealth tax was a huge success. The "exodus" of wealthy people never happened (less than 100 individuals left). Tax revenue increased by 71.5%. No changes in business activity or investment. www.nber.org/papers/w35854

🚨new working paper🚨 Chris Blair (@chriswblair.bsky.social), Jeremy Weinstein, and I describe here The Dataset of World Refugee and Asylum Policies, in which we code de jure asylum policy for 205 countries, from 1951-2022. We hope you will find the paper and data helpful. osf.io/preprints/so...

A potential effect of the radical left taking over the Greens could be the centre left reuniting in Burnham’s Labour Party

"How voters evaluate the proportionality-concentration tradeoff" www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti... <- people like proportionality less if you tell them there won't be a clear majority

The New Power Map of the European Parliament 👇 I very much look forward to this panel discussion with @simonhix.bsky.social, @abiralsahlani.bsky.social, @jonassjostedt.bsky.social, @gvonsydow.bsky.social in Stockholm’s Kulturhuset on Friday, 9 October. Registration here: sieps.se/en/seminars/...

You know those (rare) papers that really make you proud? In new piece out at APR, we show that #AffectivePolarization likely spills onto other types of non-political polarization - notably, PREFERENCES FOR CATS VS. DOGS (aka “affective PAWlarization”) paper: tinyurl.com/jn48bypp data: osf.io/4p2zu

On rejoining the EU Support: 55% Oppose: 34% ... but on the conditions of single currency and Schengen membership Support: 35% Oppose: 43% via YouGov, Jun 2026 britainelects.substack.com/p/is-rejoin-...

Whether you like the third runway or not, this is further proof that that the UK is utterly useless at delivering on major infrastructure projects

I have blamed The agents That hacked Your website And which You probably Reasonably thought I controlled Forgive me I am rich And unaccustomed To taking responsibility

🧩 Do voters dislike parties that mix left and right positions? In ten countries, @rdassonneville.bsky.social, Patrick Fournier & @zeynsom.bsky.social find voters know less about such parties and like them less, in part because of the inconsistency itself. 🔗 doi.org/10.1080/0140...

Very excited to announce a new Political Methodology Seminar Series co-hosted by the @lsegovernment.bsky.social, @lsemethodology.bsky.social and European Institute. This bi-weekly series is designed to support ECRs applying state-of-the-art methodological tools to political science research.

#OpenAccess from 2025 - A Crisis of Political Trust? Global Trends in Institutional Trust from 1958 to 2019 - cup.org/4gCcLuT - @viktorv.bsky.social, @drjennings.bsky.social, Gerry Stoker, @hannahbunting.bsky.social, @danjdevine.bsky.social, @lawrencemckay.bsky.social & Andrew Klassen #epop2026

AI is screwing up journal papers: Journal editor asks authors of 10 submitted papers to meet and discuss their paper. Of the 7 that showed up, 3 were unable to answer basic questions about the paper and 3 had difficulty when asked further questions on technical details… medium.com/@TmlrOrg/ask...

📢 The Call for Papers for EPSS 2027 is open! After a fantastic first conference in Belfast, we’re heading to Copenhagen 🇩🇰, 24–26 June 2027. ⏰ Deadline: 13 Nov 2026 👉 Call for papers: epssnet.org/2027-copenha... 1/2

🚨 Madrid people, mark your calendars: the permanent seminar of the Instituto Juan Linz is back! We have a great series of speakers from across the social sciences this year. First talk this Friday with @llschenoni.bsky.social Here is the program for this Fall:

Easy to donate: rnli.org/support-us/g...

Europe may increasingly need to learn how to act together without always acting as one. My new CEPR Europe 2050 paper on Preserving Europe’s Capacity to Act: cepr.org/publications... Pre-order my new OUP book with Alex Kentikelenis: global.oup.com/academic/pro... /end

One reason England does so well is our second generation immigrants outperform their peers which is not true in most OECD countries. We are also very good at integration. And it's v sad that this is never acknowledge in debates on immigration.

Saxony-Anhalt went to the polls, with the AfD falling just short of a majority. Here are some takeaways based on the preliminary results across all 218 municipalities and local socioeconomic characteristics. A thread 🧵(1 /n) Full analysis + write-up: juliuskoelzer.de/saxony-anhal...

Otherwise it will be deadlock, but the current admin will stay on until that is resolved.

This does look like a more likely outcome now but the question is which parties would tolerate such a government (all parties minus AfD, or if it would just be a figurehead for a AfD minority/AfD-BSW coal in all but name). I suspect it would be the ladder.

ZDF has now updated their forecast and it looks like BSW will be in (ARD has also slightly adjusted their score for them upwards). That means there would likely be a razor thin majority for AfD + BSW. Pre-election, Wagenknecht claimed that BSW won’t vote in a AfD PM- they favoured a technocratic PM.

😳

No surprise there. Nb. the US didn’t really back the UK in the Falklands War or the Suez Crisis. Trump hints US would not back UK over Falkland Islands due to lack of Iran war support www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Burnham wants “electoral reform” in Labour’s manifesto ahead of the next election. But, what type of electoral reform/ PR will he/they back? Work needs to be done … watch this space 😉 www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Brexit pretty bad for Sterling as a reserve currency: UK exports to non-EU and non-US customers now more often invoiced in USD than GBP. via Catherine Mann @ Jackson Hole: www.kansascityfed.org/documents/18...

Today’s must-read, IMHO.

They might as well just call them “We Don’t Think They Are Too Bad Right”

I said exactly this to a journalist this week on the same topic. And linked to the @ecprtheloop.bsky.social blog by @timbale.bsky.social: theloop.ecpr.eu/why-we-need-...

👋 @theguardian.com

I have no idea what “Hard Right” means! We have established terms: Far Right, Extreme Right, Radical Right. Why invent a new one? Bizarre how UK journos have adopted a term that no-one else in the world uses or understands. Pathetic parochialism I guess 🤷‍♂️ www.theguardian.com/world/2026/a...

Could Wenger be the candidate to defeat Infantino? (and I say that as a West Ham fan 😉)

The irony of that is that PM’s big policy push is only about English devolution and unlike Scotland, Wales or N Ireland it is unconstrained even by statute. This is English devolution backed with the full unbridled sovereignty of the U.K. Parliament.

While I favour a written UK constitution, the devil will be in the details, and I fear all sorts of bells and whistles that will be attached along the way, making it unwieldy, and difficult ratify. Maybe start with a Citizens Assembly and see what happens … www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Should immigrants be given the right to vote in elections? And what political implications would this have? On @lseeuroppblog.bsky.social, @simonhix.bsky.social @tarekjaziri.bsky.social show that granting voting rights to immigrants in Spain has had little impact on party vote or seat shares.

@markeaston1.bsky.social Fair point; well made!

Should immigrants be given the right to vote in elections? New research shows that when voting rights were given to immigrants in Spain, it had little impact on party vote or seat shares. ✍ @simonhix.bsky.social & @tarekjaziri.bsky.social blogs.lse.ac.uk/europpblog/2...

Super excited to see the second article from my dissertation published in @politicsgenderj.bsky.social Drawing on unique Norwegian data, I find the green gender gap already exists in early adolescence. Boys are less climate-concerned, less supportive of green policies and less likely to vote green.

The new UK cabinet has 12 women and 11 men. 👏

I am pro a wealth tax. But I’m sceptical starting at 2% would work, as superrich would hide or move assets (as cases in other countries have shown). Why not start at a low level, eg. 0.5%. That would still raise a huge amount and would test feasibility. www.theguardian.com/business/202...

The UK fall not as dramatic as EU-wide fall. This won't change much changing UK terms of protection (2023 ban on claims had v little impact). It could be addressed by deeper UK-EU cooperation. We aren't in shared database of claims, so people will now try the UK second. Scale up routes/returns deal