Shackled in Debt: Global Capitalism, Economic Crisis and Penal Politics in Greece - III Inequalities Seminar Series
Speaker: Dr Leonidas Cheliotis (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Chair: Dr Fabrício Mendes Fialho (Research Officer, LSE III)
Irrespective of geographical or temporal scope, the impact that different extranational factors and actors may have in terms of economic, political or directly penal matters domestically is still poorly understood. In addressing this gap in the literature, this seminar identified the direction and assessed the extent of influence exerted by government political orientation and by economic downturn upon the evolution of incarceration and other forms of state punishment in the context of two economic crises in Greece: the first experienced in the late 1920s and early 1930s, and the second one in the 2010s.
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Inequality and the Differentiation of Capital: the Scientific Project of Political Economy
Speaker: Professor Facundo Alvaredo (Paris School of Economics and the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales)
Chair: Professor Francisco Ferreira (Amartya Sen Professor of Inequality Studies and LSE III Director)
In this event, Professor Alvaredo argued that only the continuation of the living yet dormant Political Economy scientific project offers the keys to apprehend the challenges of contemporary capitalism (including our particular focus of concern: socioeconomic inequalities), where the main conflict is ‘who plans whom,’ and where the concept of capital differentiation explains all the social differentiations we observe (of labor, social classes, nation states, currencies, wealth, incomes).
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Concentration of economic and political power in Latin America and the Caribbean
Wednesday 17 November 2021
Speaker: Dr Marcela Meléndez (Chief Economist for Latin America and the Caribbean, UNDP)
Discussants: Professor Kirsten Sehnbruch (British Academy Global Professor, LSE III) and Professor Jean-Paul Faguet (LSE Department of International Development)
Chair: Professor Gareth Jones (Director, LSE Latin America and Caribbean Centre)
This event presented the UNDP Regional Human Development Report 2021, which argues that a common factor behind the Latin America and the Caribbean high-inequality low-growth trap is the concentration of economic and political power in the hands of a few. But how does the story of market power in LAC differ from the rest of the world? And should we be concerned about the role of other economic elites with power for policy interference like organised labour?
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New Estimates of Inequality of Opportunity Across European Cohorts - III Inequalities Seminar Series
Speaker: Professor Philippe Van Kerm (University of Luxembourg)
Chair: Dr Paolo Brunori (Assistant Professorial Research Fellow, LSE III)
This seminar, based on a study of the same name, provided a set of new estimates of inequality of opportunity (IOp) in Europe, using the European Union Statistics on Income and Living Condition (EU-SILC). Unlike previous research, inequality of opportunity is estimated within birth cohorts, which is argued to be the appropriate population level for inequality of opportunity analysis.
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Taxation History, Theory, Law and Administration
Speaker: Professor Parthasarathi Shome (Visiting Senior Fellow, LSE III)
Discussant: Ricardo Guerrero Fernández (King's College London)
Chair: Professor Robin Burgess (International Growth Centre, LSE)
This event focussed on taxation and its ramifications for inequality in different aspects. Professor Shome covered the theoretical concern with equality in taxation, the characteristics that address equality in actual tax codes, the history of international taxation including the latest discussions on a global minimum tax so that tax revenues are beneficially shared across nations, and the equal treatment of taxpayers by the tax administration.
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Technological Change, Cities and Spatial Inequality
Thursday 04 November 2021
Speakers: Professor Simona Iammarino (Department of Geography and Environment, LSE), Dr Tom Kemeny (III Visiting Fellow) and Dr Megha Mukim (World Bank Group)
Chair: Professor Kirsten Sehnbruch (III Distinguished Policy Fellow)
This event discussed how technological change is reshaping economic geography, raising profound challenges for economic development. The tech sector is concentrated in a small number of superstar cities, while the economies of less successful cities have found themselves languishing in middle-income traps. This raises significant challenges for policy – how to spread the benefits of the high-tech economy, without diluting its benefits? How can we ensure low-wage workers benefit from the innovation economy?
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New Data and New Dimensions of Inequality: launch of the public economics of inequality
Wednesday 27 October 2021
Speakers: Dr Xavier Jaravel (Department of Economics, LSE), Professor Camille Landais (Department of Economics, LSE), Dr Daniel Reck (Department of Economics, LSE) and Professor Johannes Spinnewijn (Department of Economics, LSE)
Chair: Professor Francisco Ferreira (Amartya Sen Professor of Inequality Studies and LSE III Director
In this inaugural lecture for the Public Economics of Inequality - research theme, the speakers illustrated how big data from administrative registers allows to go beyond standard measurement of inequality. The discussed topics included gender inequality, the contribution of tax evasion and price inflation to inequality in wealth and consumption, and inequality in health outcomes.
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Is Inequality a Side Effect of Central Bank Independence? - III Inequalities Seminar Series
Speaker: Dr Andreas Kern (Georgetown University)
Chair: Dr Joaquin Prieto (Research Officer, LSE III)
Since the 1980s, income inequality has increased substantially in several countries. This event was based on a paper that builds a theory linking these dynamics to central bank independence.
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Social Policy: a critical and intersectional analysis
Hosted by the Department of Social Policy and International Inequalities Institute
Speaker: Professor Fiona Williams (University of Leeds)
Discussants: Dr Timo Fleckenstein (Department of Social Policy, LSE), Dr Isabel Shutes (Department of Social Policy, LSE) and Dr Armine Ishkanian (Executive Director AFSEE programme and Associate Professor at the Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Chair: Professor Lucinda Platt (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
In this event, Professor Fiona Williams talked about her new book Social Policy. A Critical and Intersectional Analysis. Following a presentation of the key themes and arguments in the book by Williams, the three discussants shared their perspectives.
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Feminist Readings of COVID-19: a conversation - III Inequalities Seminar Series
Speakers: Professor Naila Kabeer (Department of Gender Studies, LSE), Dr Alessandra Mezzadri (Department of Development Studies, SOAS) and Dr Sara Stevano (Department of Economics, SOAS)
Chair: Shalini Grover, (Research Fellow, LSE III)
This panel was organised as a conversation exploring the gendered impact of COVID-19 on livelihoods, life-making sectors, and the world of work. Themes explored included the differential impact of the pandemic on women, the restructuring of social reproduction, and the rise of novel work dichotomies such as 'essential' and 'non-essential' work. The panel also explored which policies and practices are likely to centre the post-pandemic recovery on gendered labour, care, and social reproduction.
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The Dawn of Everything
Speakers: Professor David Wengrow (Institute of Archaeology, University College London) and Professor Alpa Shah (Convenor Global Economies of Care Research Theme and Professor in Anthropology, Department of Anthropology)
Chair: Professor Francisco Ferreira (Amartya Sen Professor of Inequality Studies and LSE III Director)
In this event, Prof David Wengrow was in conversation with Prof Alpa Shah about his new book co-authored with the late David Graeber, The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity.
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Changing the Story on Disability?
Speakers: Liz Sayce (JRF Practitioner Fellow, LSE III), Tom Shakespeare (London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine), Fredrick Ouko (Atlantic Fellow, LSE III), Kate Stanley (FrameWorks UK)
Chair: Dr Armine Ishkanian (Convenor Politics of Inequality research theme, LSE III; Executive Director AFSEE programme and Associate Professor at the Department of Social Policy, LSE)
This event heard from those who are striving to shift narratives around disability through public awareness campaigns globally and explored whether and how an empirical approach to ‘framing’ could effectively move public perceptions and behaviours.
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Why is Latin American Inequality So Extreme?
Speakers: Dr Santiago Levy (Brookings Institution), Professor Nora Lustig (Tulane University), Dr Marcela Meléndez (UNDP), Professor James Robinson (University of Chicago), Professor Andrés Velasco (School of Public Policy, LSE)
Chair: Professor Francisco Ferreira (Amartya Sen Professor of Inequality Studies and LSE III Director)
For as long as data on income inequality has been available, Latin America has stood as one of the world’s two most unequal regions (along with sub-Saharan Africa). Despite some promising declines during the 2000s, inequality in many countries remains higher today than it was in the 1970s, suggesting a persistent high-inequality political economy equilibrium.
In this launch event, three of the Review Panel members and two eminent discussants presented and debated some of the core questions of the nascent LAC Inequality Review.
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Caste, Class and Social Mobility in Palanpur - Inequalities Seminar Series
Speaker: Dr Floriane Bolazzi (Università degli Studi di Milano)
Chair: Professor Nicholas Stern (Chair of the Grantham Research Institute, LSE)
Since its independence (1947), India has undergone profound social, political and economic transformations. While these changes have contributed to the economic development of the country, it is less clear to what extent better opportunities for social mobility opened up to individuals, particularly those from groups historically disadvantaged by their caste position. Previous large-scale studies of social mobility in India have been limited by the lack of intergenerational data and the impossibility to disaggregate administrative caste categories into jatis (birth-ascribed endogamous groups). This talk was based on a new study that aims at verifying whether social mobility has increased over time and whether caste, at the jati level, continues to be a determinant factor of social (im)mobility.
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Investing in Care? Private Finance and Social Infrastructures
Wednesday 07 July 2021
Speakers: Emma Dowling (Sociologist, University of Vienna; author of 'The Care Crisis: What Caused It and How Can We End It?') and Amy Horton (Economic Geographer, UCL)
Discussant: Bev Skeggs (Former convenor of Global Economies of Care research theme, LSE III)
Chair: Dr Alpa Shah (Associate Professor in Anthropology; convenor of the Global Economies of Care research theme, LSE III)
Social care is often seen as a drain on the economy, subject to a sustained crisis, which has been exacerbated by the covid-19 pandemic. Yet in the UK and internationally these services have attracted huge investor interest over the last two decades – from private equity firms and real estate funds to impact investors. In this event, we explored: Why has private finance come to play such a significant role in care homes, home care and related efforts to achieve social impact? What does this mean for the many people working in care and all of us who rely on these services? What alternative approaches could we promote that might address the inequalities of the current ‘financialised’ system?
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Youth and Inequalities in the UK
Speakers: Jason Allen (St Mary's Youth Team Manager), Jeremiah Emmanuel (entrepreneur, youth activist and author) and Michaela Rafferty (III Atlantic Fellow; Young People’s Development Worker, Just for Kids Law)
Chair: Dr Armine Ishkanian (Convenor Politics of Inequality research theme, LSE III; Executive Director AFSEE programme and Associate Professor at the Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Even before the pandemic, young people in the UK faced many forms of inequality and their health and wellbeing was being eroded by a lack of jobs, a shortage of affordable housing, and cuts to public services. As the gap between the generations grows and young people’s voices and concerns are not adequately taken into account by policy makers and politicians, it is no surprise that young people increasingly feel anxious of what the future holds. This panel brought together three young leaders who are working in and beyond their local communities to address inequalities in education, housing, employment and the criminal justice system.
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Changing Elites
Wednesday 16 June 2021
Speakers: Aaron Reeves (Associate Professor of Evidence-Based Social Intervention and Policy Evaluation, Department of Social Policy and Intervention, University of Oxford), Dr Eve Worth (Postdoctoral Fellow in the History of Elites, Department of Social Policy & Intervention, University of Oxford) and Sam Friedman (Associate Professor, Department of Sociology, LSE)
Chair: Professor Mike Savage (Martin White Professor of Sociology, LSE; convenor of 'Wealth Elites and Tax Justice' Research Theme, LSE III)
This seminar presented research on changes in the British elite over the last 120 years. Using data from Who’s Who, the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, genealogical records, Probate data and interviews, the speakers explored topics such as social origin, diversity, power and wealth, and processes of reproduction and public performance among Britain’s elite.
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The Return of Inequality- Book Launch
Speakers: Professor Mike Savage (Martin White Professor of Sociology, LSE; convenor of Wealth Elites and Tax Justice Research Theme, LSE III), Gurminder K Bhambra (Professor of Postcolonial and Decolonial Studies, School of Global Studies, University of Sussex; Fellow of the British Academy), and Patrick Le Galès (writer)
Chair: Dr Alpa Shah (Associate Professor of Anthropology; Research Theme leader of ‘Global Economies of Care’, LSE III)
In his new book, The Return of Inequality, which he discussed at this event, sociologist Mike Savage explains inequality’s profound deleterious effects on the shape of societies.
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Good Girls: Sonia Faleiro in conversation with Alpa Shah
Wednesday 2 June 2021
Speakers: Sonia Faleiro (journalist and writer) and Dr Alpa Shah (Associate Professor of Anthropology; Research Theme leader of ‘Global Economies of Care’, LSE III)
Chair: Dr Armine Ishkanian (III Research Theme Convenor (Politics of Inequality), Executive Director AFSEE programme and Associate Professor at the Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Sonia Faleiro was in conversation with Alpa Shah about her new book ‘Good Girls: An Ordinary Killing’. A deep investigation into the death of two low caste teenage girls, Faleiro explores the coming of age, the failures of care, and the violence of caste, honour and shame in contemporary India.
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For a Reparatory Social Science
Wednesday 26 May 2021
Speakers: Gurminder K Bhambra (Professor of Postcolonial and Decolonial Studies, School of Global Studies, University of Sussex; Fellow of the British Academy)
Chair: Dr Armine Ishkanian (III Research Theme Convenor (Politics of Inequality), Executive Director AFSEE programme and Associate Professor at the Department of Social Policy, LSE)
In the inaugural Atlantic Fellows for Social and Economic Equity Keynote Lecture, Professor Bhambra explored the social sciences’ failure to acknowledge the extent to which modern nation-states were bound up with relations of colonial extraction and domination. Without putting such relations at the heart of our analyses, we cannot address global inequality effectively. Positing colonial histories as central to national imaginaries and the structures through which inequalities are legitimated and reproduced, she explored a framework for a reparatory social science, oriented to global justice as a reconstructive project of the present. The past cannot be undone, she concluded, but its legacies can be transformed to bring about a world that works for us all.
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Intergenerational Transfers, Wealth and Gender in Britain - Inequalities Seminar Series
Tuesday 25 May 2021
Speakers: Brian Nolan (Professor of Social Policy, Department of Social Policy and Intervention, University of Oxford) and Juan Palomino (Research Officer, Department of Social Policy and Intervention, University of Oxford)
Chair: Professor Francisco Ferreira (Amartya Sen Professor of Inequality Studies and LSE III Director)
This talk investigated the impact of intergenerational wealth transfers on wealth levels and inequality, exploiting rich household survey data. The speakers analysed patterns of intergenerational transfer receipt by gender, and assessed the extent to which differences in the scale and nature of these receipts contribute to the gender wealth gap.
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Career Hubs as Corporate Global Networks
Wednesday 19 May 2021
Speakers: Felix Bühlmann (Associate Professor, University of Lausanne), Christoph Houman Ellersgaard (Associate Professor, Copenhagen Business School), Anton Grau Larsen (Assistant Professor, Copenhagen Business School and the Uni-versity of Roskilde) and Jacob Aagard Lunding (PhD Student, Copenhagen Business School)
Chair: Professor Johannes Hjellbrekke (Department of Sociology, University of Bergen, Norway)
This talk introduced the concept of “career hubs” as analytical strategy to understand corporate global business elites. While studies on corporate interlocks, based on network analyses between boards of directors, investigate the organization and coordination of corporate control, career hubs, defined as the most frequent common career organizations, allows us to study the formative years and the circulation of ideas and knowledge among the most important business leaders. We asked whether we can identify global career hubs, and if those career hubs differ according to the national context in countries such as the US, UK, Germany, France, Japan or China.
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Faces of Inequality: a mixed methods approach to multidimensional inequalities - Inequalities Seminar Series
Tuesday 18 May 2021
Speaker: Paul Segal (Reader in Economics of Development, Department of International Development at King's College London)
Chair: Dr Tahnee Ooms (Research Officer, LSE III)
This talk presented a new mixed methods approach to measuring and understanding multidimensional inequality, applied to new data for Mexico City. Quantitative and qualitative dimensions of inequality were incorporated, integrating the concerns of both economists and sociologists.
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The Heirs, the Managers and the Bureaucrats: sketching economic power in contemporary France
Wednesday 12 May 2021
Speakers: François Denord (CNRS, CESSP, France), Paul Lagneau-Ymonet (PSL, Paris-Dauphine, IRISSO, France) and Sylvain Thine (CESSP, France)
Chair: Professor Mike Savage (Martin White Professor of Sociology, LSE; convenor of Wealth Elites and Tax Justice Research Theme, LSE III)
This talk presented an original dataset that combines organisational and prosopographical data. The authors resort to geometric data analysis to study the forms of differentiation, the principles of hierarchisation and the modes of coordination that structure economic power in contemporary France.
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Refusing Discriminatory Technologies of Power: racial justice and the challenge of hi-tech policing - Inequalities Seminar Series
Tuesday 11 May 2021
Speaker: Dr Seeta Peña Gangadharan (Associate Professor, Department of Media and Communications, LSE)
Chair: Professor Ellen Helsper (Research Theme Convenor (Politics of Inequality); Professor in Digital Inequalities, Department of Media and Communications, LSE)
From informational capitalism to biased code, technological systems increasingly form part of larger structures of oppression and domination. This talk tackled the topic of technology, injustice, and inequity with a focus on bottom-up practices of resistance, rejection, and refusal of digital and automated systems that increasingly govern people’s lives.
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Are Regional Inequalities Driving Us Apart? Geographical and political polarisation in an age of populism
Thursday 6 May 2021
Speakers: Jonathan Hopkin (Professor of Comparative Politics, European University Institute, LSE), Maria Abreu (University Senior Lecturer, Department of Land Economy, University of Cambridge), Ellen Helsper (Professor of Digital Inequalities, Department of Media and Communications, LSE), Andrés Rodriguez-Pose (Princesa de Asturias Chair; Professor of Economic Geography, LSE)
Chair: Professor Neil Lee (Professor of Economic Geography, LSE; Associate, III)
Is regional inequality driving political polarisation? And, if so, what can we do about it? This event brought together high-profile authors from political science, geography, economics, and psychology to debate this question.
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Homoploutia: Top Labor and Capital Incomes in the United States, 1950-2020 - Inequalities Seminar Series
Tuesday 4 May 2021
Speaker: Yonatan Berman (Research Fellow, London Mathematical Laboratory)
Chair: Dr Nora Waitkus (Research Officer, LSE III)
Homoploutia describes the situation in which the same people are rich in the space of capital and labor income. In this talk, survey and administrative data was combined to document the evolution of homoploutia in the United States since 1950, finding that the increase in labor income inequality contributed to the rising homoploutia, which in turn explains 20% of the increase in interpersonal income inequality since 1986.
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Mary Wollstonecraft and the Vindication of Human Rights
Wednesday 28 April 2021
Speakers: Professor Amartya Sen, Bee Rowlatt (writer and public speaker)
Chair: Dr Alpa Shah (Associate Professor of Anthropology; Research Theme leader of ‘Global Economies of Care’, LSE III)
Mary Wollstonecraft claimed human rights for all. She overcame limited education and a background of domestic violence to become an educational and political pioneer, and one of the greatest thinkers of the eighteenth century. As well as her intellectual audacity, it is Wollstonecraft’s love for humanity, her self-proclaimed “ardent affection for the human race” that continues to inspire. This event explored how, despite a savage pandemic, economic downturn, and increasing isolation in both political and individual life, there is a counter-story of community building and education, of optimism and hope.
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Debating Capital and Ideology
Monday 26 April 2021
Speakers: Professor Gurminder Bhambra (University of Sussex), Dr Jens Lerche (SOAS), Dr Sanjay G. Reddy (The New School for Social Research), Professor Diego Sánchez-Ancochea (Oxford University) and Dr Nora Waitkus (LSE III)
Respondent: Professor Thomas Piketty (EHESS and Paris School of Economics)
Chair: Poornima Paidipaty (Department of Sociology, LSE)
This event debated Thomas Piketty’s urgent new book, Capital and Ideology, and featured an interdisciplinary panel of experts. The conversation probed his views on race and slavery, the nature of capitalism, the impact of political divides, and the contours of long-term social change.
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Anonymous and Non-Anonymous Growth Incidence Curves in the United States, 1968-2016 - Inequalities Seminar Series
Tuesday 30 March 2021
Speaker: Professor François Bourguignon (Emeritus Professor of Economics, Paris School of Economics)
Chair: Professor Francisco Ferreira (Amartya Sen Professor of Inequality Studies and LSE III Director)
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Innovation in Real Places: strategies for prosperity in an unforgiving world
Monday 29 March 2021
Speakers: Professor Dan Breznitz (Co-Director of the Innovation Policy Lab and Munk Chair of Innovation Studies, University of Toronto), Vidhya Alakeson (Chief Executive of Power to Change) and Professor David Soskice (Professor of Political Science and Economics, LSE Department of Government)
Chair: Professor Neil Lee (Professor of Economic Geography, LSE; Associate, III)
The COVID-19 pandemic has been the largest economic shock in living memory, and the economic impact has been uneven across cities and regions. How do we build back better after COVID?
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How to Fight Inequality: and why that fight needs you - Book Launch
Thursday 18 March 2021
Speakers: Masana Ndinga-Kanga (Lead for the Crisis Response Fund, MENA and Women Human Rights Defenders at CIVICUS), Ben Phillips (Co-founder of the Fight Inequality Alliance), Pedro Telles (Co-founder and director of Quid, a communications and mobilisation lab focused on democracy and human rights).
Chair: Dr Armine Ishkanian (III Research Theme Convenor (Politics of Inequality), Executive Director AFSEE programme and Associate Professor at the Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Inequality is the crisis of our time. The growing gap between a few at the top and the rest of society damages us all. No longer able to deny the crisis, governments across the globe have pledged to address it – and yet inequality keeps on getting worse. In his new book, How to Fight Inequality: and why that fight needs you, international anti-inequalities campaigner Ben Phillips discussed why winning the debate is not enough: we have to win the fight.
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Households, Inequalities and Care: lockdown experiences from the UK, New Zealand and India - Inequalities Seminar Series
Tuesday 09 March 2021
Speakers: Dr Alpa Shah (Associate Professor of Anthropology; Research Theme leader of ‘Global Economies of Care’, III, LSE), Professor Laura Bear (Professor of Anthropology, LSE), Dr Nick Long (Associate Professor of Anthropology, LSE)
Chair: Dr Insa Koch (Associate Professor of Law and Anthropology)
This event explored how the COVID-19 pandemic has revealed the need to centre an understanding of the household in policy-making and politics if we are to mitigate inequalities. It did so by unveiling the insights of immersive anthropological research on the impact of the COVID-19 lockdowns as experienced in the UK, New Zealand and India.
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The Underbelly of the Virus: how COVID-19 revealed our unequal world
Wednesday 03 March 2021
Speakers: Tracy Jooste (Senior Atlantic Fellow for Social and Economic Equity), Pablo Andres Rivero Morales (Oxfam), Julie Seghers (Oxfam International), and Mwanahamisi Singano (African Women's Development and Communication Network (FEMNET) )
Chair: Dr Armine Ishkanian (III Research Theme Convenor (Politics of Inequality), Executive Director AFSEE programme and Associate Professor at the Department of Social Policy, LSE)
In the twelve months since the first lockdowns in the Global North, there has been a measurable rise in inequality in almost every country in the world, with preliminary studies indicating that unless urgent action is taken, the crisis will lead to a lasting, and even greater, economic divide.Hosted by the Atlantic Fellows for Social and Economic Equity programme at the International Inequalities Institute, this discussion brought together an international panel of practitioners, scholars and policy-makers to discuss a new Oxfam briefing paper, The Inequality Virus: Bringing together a world torn apart by coronavirus through a fair, just and sustainable economy.
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Wealth Inequality Across the Globe
Thursday 18 February 2021
Speakers: Professor André J. Caetano (Professor of Sociology and Demography, Catholic University of Minas Gerais, Brazil), Professor Li Chunling (Professor of Sociology, University of Luxembourg), Sventlana Mareeva (Centre Director of the Institute of Social Policy, Higher School of Economics Moscow), Professor Celi Scalon (Professor Sociology, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro), Professor Kwang-Yeong Shin (Professor of Sociology, Chung-Ang University, Seoul)
Chair: Professor Mike Savage (Martin White Professor of Sociology, LSE and convenor of the Wealth Elites and Tax Justice Theme at the International Inequalities Institute at LSE)
This event introduced a special issue of The Journal of Chinese Sociology, which showcases new analyses of wealth inequality and their implications for social stratification and inequality in comparative perspective. The contributions range across Russia, China, South Korea, Brazil, as well as Europe and North America, to reflect on the size of the wealth gap, its dimensions and its significance for remaking traditional class divides.
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The Changing Geography of Social Mobility in the United States - Inequalities Seminar Series
Tuesday 16 February 2021
Speaker: Dr Dylan Connor (Assistant Professor at School of Geographical Sciences and Urban Planning, Arizona State University)
Chair: Dr Neil Cummins (Associate Professor of Economic History, LSE)
New evidence shows that intergenerational social mobility – the rate at which children born into poverty climb the income ladder – varies considerably across the United States. Is this current geography of opportunity something new or does it reflect a continuation of long-term trends?
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Migrants in the Chilean Labour Market: a story of successful Integration? - Migration, Ethnicity and Race Seminar Series
Tuesday 09 February 2021
Speaker: Kirsten Sehnbruch (Professor and Distinguished Policy Fellow, LSE III)
Chair: Professor Lucinda Platt (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
In recent years, Latin American countries have experienced rapidly increasing flows of intraregional migration as migrants flee poverty, political instability and violence. This process has been facilitated by immigration legislation that poses few obstacles to this migration. However, little research has focused on how well Latin American migrants integrate into the local labour markets of their destination countries, both in terms of whether they find employment opportunities and, just as importantly what type of employment they find.
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COVID-19, Inequalities and the Future of Work
Monday 08 February 2021
Speakers: Aveek Bhattacharya (Chief Economist at the Social Market Foundation), The Rt Hon. Yvette Cooper MP (Chair of the Fabian Commission of Work and Technology), and Professor Kirsten Sehnbruch (British Academy Global Professor and Distinguished Policy Fellow, III)
Chair: Professor Neil Lee (Professor of Economic Geography, LSE; Associate, III)
The COVID-19 pandemic has led to rapid changes in labour markets across the world. Some workers have used digital technology to work from home. But for many workers, particularly the low-paid, this has been impossible. Meanwhile, job losses have been worst the least well off. Because of this, there are concerns that the pandemic has exacerbated inequality. What does COVID-19 mean for the future of work? Will it speed up employment polarisation? Or be a leveller, with low wage workers benefiting from greater use of technology?
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Building a Caring Economy
Thursday 04 February 2021
Speakers: Madeleine Bunting (Author and fomer Guardian columnist and associate editor), Professor Diane Elson, Professor Lynne Segal (Anniversary Professor of Psychology and Gender Studies, Birkbeck, University of London).
Chair: Dr Alpa Shah (Associate Professor in Anthropology and convenor of the Global Economies of Care theme in the International Inequalities Institute at LSE)
The spread of the COVID-19 pandemic has made us aware of an acute crisis of care that lies at the heart of global inequalities. Care has long been marginalised and neglected as a central part of our economy. It’s a crisis not just of care workers but moves from the intimate domain of our households to global planetary care itself. What is this crisis of care, how should we think about care, and what can be done to make care more central to what we value? How do we build back our global economy by putting care – care of people and care of the environment - at its centre?
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The Economic Consequences of Major Tax Cuts for the Rich - Inequalities Seminar Series
Tuesday 02 February 2021
Speakers: Dr David Hope (Department of Political Economy, Kings College London, Visiting Research Fellow, International Inequalities Institute), Dr Julian Limberg (Department of Political Economy, Kings College London)
Chair: Dr Luna Glucksberg (Research Fellow, LSE III)
The last 40 years have seen a substantial fall in taxes on the rich across the OECD countries. This coincided with a period of rising income inequality, especially in the Anglo-Saxon countries. Given the difficulties of establishing causality from cross-country panel studies, however, the extent to which tax cuts on the rich have driven up income inequality remains an open empirical question.
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The Politics of Inequality: why should we focus on resistance from below?
Wednesday 27 January 2021
Speakers: Professor John Chalcroft (Professor of Middle East History and Politics in the Department of Government at LSE), Dr Flora Cornish (Associate Professor in Research Methodology in the Department of Methodology at LSE), Professor Ellen Helsper (Professor of Digital Inequalities in the Department of Media and Communications at LSE), Dr Armine Ishkanian (Associate Professor in Social Policy and Executive Director of the Atlantic Fellows for Social and Economic Equity at the International Inequalities Institute at LSE), Dr Sumi Madhok (Associate Professor in Transnational Gender Studies in the Department of Gender Studies at LSE)
Chair: Dr Alpa Shah (Associate Professor in Anthropology; convenor of the Global Economies of Care theme, LSE III)
While it is now widely accepted that inequality is the defining issue of our time and there is growing research on the drivers and impacts of inequalities, there has been less focus on how inequalities are experienced and resisted by ordinary people and communities. The newly launched Politics of Inequality research theme at the International Inequalities Institute explores the practices of resistance, mobilisation, and contestation from a bottom-up perspective.
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The unintended consequences of quantifying quality: Does ranking school performance shape the geographical concentration of advantage? - Inequalities Seminar Series
Tuesday 26 January 2021
Speakers: Dr Aaron Reeves (Associate Professor in the Department of Social Policy and Intervention at Oxford University, and a Visiting Senior Fellow in the International Inequalities Institute), Daniel McArthur (Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Department of Politics and International Relations at Oxford University)
Chair: Dr Nora Waitkus (Research Officer, LSE III)
Based on a paper of the same name, this talk investigated whether quantifying school performance can have the perverse consequence of increasing the spatial concentration of advantage.
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Deepening Democracy in Chile: from social crisis to constitutional revolution?
Tuesday 19 January 2021
Speakers: Emmanuelle Barozet (Professor of Sociology, University of Chile), Javier Couso (Professor of Constitutional Law, Diego Portales University, Chile), Oscar Landerretche (Professor of Economics, University of Chile)
Chair: Kirsten Sehnbruch (Professor and Distinguished Policy Fellow, LSE III)
In 2019, an explosion of social protest brought Chile to a standstill. Protesters had many far-reaching demands, not least the establishment of a new constitution and greater social justice in health, education, and pensions. These demands, however, met only with repression from security forces, who showed scant respect for protesters' human rights. Unrest continued well into 2020 and was only contained inadvertently by the country's first COVID-19 lockdown.
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Apocalypse or new dawn? Social mobility, inequality and education in the post-COVID era - Inequalities Seminar Series
Tuesday 19 January 2021
Speaker: Professor Lee Elliot-Major (Professor of Social Mobility, University of Exeter)
Chair: Dr Sara Camacho-Felix (Assistant Professorial Lecturer, LSE III)
What are the prospects for social mobility in the wake of the Covid pandemic? Britain’s first Professor of Social Mobility assessed the future implications of growing educational and societal inequalities, drawing on evidence from the latest research and his new book.
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