Department of Social Policy Seminars
International Social and Public Policy Seminar Series
The ISPP seminar series features international scholars and LSE Social Policy faculty presenting cutting-edge, interdisciplinary research on global social policy topics. Open to LSE staff, students, alumni, and the wider community, the series fosters collaboration and academic exchange across disciplines such as sociology, criminology, education, demography, anthropology, and economics.
Winter Term Schedule 2026
Thursday 26 March 2026
Presenters: Dr Sunil Kumar (Department of Social Policy, LSE) and Rifan Rahim (Development Practitioner)
Chair: Professor Hakan Seckinelgin (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Abstract: We analyse ‘spatial segregation” from the perspective of young Muslim professionals vis-à-vis Delhi’s private rental housing market with a view to ask: ‘how do they experience segregation’? Our point of departure is the lived experience of co-researcher Rifan Rahim and a paper by Mishra (2020). Rifan’s lived experience forms the basis for an equitable and coproduced research epistemology. In contrast, although Mishra’s “Caste, Religion and Ethnicity: Role of Social Determinants in Accessing Rental Housing” (2020), analyses how religion, caste and regional geography structure discrimination, it does not explore how it is experienced, negotiated, and internalised by those who face it. We draw on 30 in-depth interviews of Jamia Nagar residents to argue that residential segregation is not simply a residue of communal violence or state enforcement, but an ongoing process of what we term the ‘dispossession of aspiration,’ – the denial of meritocratic based residential locational aspirations in upwardly mobile areas of the city. This is enacted by both an atomistic as well as a collectively produced/reproduced, intentional othering by Hindu landlords. Everyday prejudices and anti-Muslim tropes are produced, reproduced and reinforced yet contradicted by the (ir)rationalities of neoliberal urbanism real estate return.
Presenters Bios:
Sunil Kumar convenes the MSc International Social and Public Policy (Development) degree as well as the elective, Urbanisation and Social Policy in the Global Souths for undergraduates and postgraduates. He has researched housing since 1982 and gained his PhD from University College London on ‘Low-Income Landlords in Madras India’. He went on to research low-income landlords in the cities of Bangalore and Surat, a study funded by the then UK Department of International Development (DFID), entitled: Social Relations, Rental Housing Markets and the Poor in Urban India. He went on to research (with Melissa Fernandez) The Urbanisation-Construction-Migration Nexus in Five Cities in South Asia: Kabul, Dhaka, Chennai, Kathmandu and Lahore, research also funded by DFID (click here for a six-page briefing note). He returns to housing after a hiatus of 25 years and now researches the anti-Muslim othering in the rental housing markets of Ned Delhi, India (together with Rifan Rahim).
Rifan Rahim is a development practitioner from Kerala, India. Rifan has a BA (Hons) in Political Science, Philosophy and Economics and an MA in Urban Policy and Governance from the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai, India. Rifan’s MA thesis was entitled, ‘Male Migration, Gulf Remittance And Its Socio-Economic Impact On The Lives Of Stay-Behind Wives In Calicut, Kerala’. Rifan’s research interests sit at the intersection of social justice and the urban, engaging with how cities shape and are shaped by questions of identity, power, and belonging. Rifan is interested the intersection of housing with segregation, as well as everyday exclusion, especially in the lived experiences of marginalised communities in India.
Attend in person- OLD 2.21
Thursday 2 April 2026
Mannheim seminar
Presenter: Dr Nirvikar Jassal (Department of Government, LSE)
Chair: Dr Johann Koehler (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Abstract: Do specialized courts designed to deliver quick judgments—especially for cases of violence against women—enhance justice delivery? In India, fast-track courtrooms were introduced to speed up verdict issuance, including for rape and child sexual assault. This institutional design raises theoretical questions about whether emphases on speed facilitates case resolution without compromising justice quality. Leveraging the staggered roll-out of specialized courtrooms in two Indian states, we assess their impact on trial duration, conviction and clearance rates, as well as spillover on non-targeted cases. We study the universe of over 5 million individual court records, police files, and judge CVs to probe effects at the complainant- and court-level. Then, at the judge-level, we utilize a “mover” design to study how the same judge behaves differently when transferred into and out of a special courtroom. To investigate mechanisms, we introduce and analyze, for the first time, a new dataset containing the full, unredacted text of court judgments, allowing us to detect shifts in judge tone and behavior. The findings speak to whether reallocating judicial resources improves justice delivery, facilitates judicial efficiency, and mitigates discrimination against female plaintiffs.
Presenter Bio: Nirvikar Jassal is an assistant professor of political science at the LSE's Department of Government. His work focuses on policing, crime, and criminal justice, primarily in South Asia.
Attend in person- OLD 2.21
Catch up on our 2025/26 seminar series via our YouTube channel here.
Thursday 19 March 2026
The Politics of Defensive Welfare Inclusion and Exclusion: The Case of Social Policy for the Self-Employed
Presenter: Dr Maxime Borg (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Decentralisation, bureaucratic politicisation, and environmental performance: How political capture shapes multi-level environmental governance
Presenter: Dr Santiago Quintero (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Chair: Dr Margaux Suteau
Thursday 19 February 2026
The Intergenerational Persistence of Poverty in the United States
CASE seminar
Presenter: Professor Zach Parolin (University of Oxford)
Chair: Professor Kitty Stewart (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Thursday 12 February 2026
Rainbow Trap: Diversity Policies, LGBTQ Categories and the Dangers of Inclusion
Global Sexual & Gender Identities Policy Lab Seminar
Presenter: Dr Kevin Guyan (University of Edinburgh)
Chair: Professor Hakan Seckinelgin (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Thursday 5 February 2026
Agenda-setting for selective schooling: A Swedish case study on the policy reframing of comprehensive education
Presenter: Dr Jonathan Lilliedahl (Linnaeus University)
Chair: Dr Sonia Exley (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Thursday 29 January 2026
How will we know if the AI revolution is happening?
Presenter: Professor Diane Coyle (Bennett School of Public Policy, University of Cambridge)
Chair: Professor Almudena Sevilla (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Thursday 22 January 2026
The Precarious Refusal: The “Sanhe Gods” and The Search for Meaning among China’s Marginalized Youth
LSE Fudan Hub seminar
Presenter: Dr Zhuang Han (LSE)
Chair: Dr Tim Hildebrandt (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Thursday 11 December 2025
Working from Home and School Absence (joint work with Jonathan James)
Presenter: Dr Joanna Clifton-Sprigg (The University of Bath)
Chair: Professor Almudena Sevilla (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Thursday 4 December 2025
Research Reflections from Ofsted
Education Research and Policy Hub Seminar
Presenter: Dr Philip Noden (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Chair: Dr Sonia Exley (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Thursday 27 November 2025
Policing’s will to care and the bleeding heart of austerity welfare in England
Mannheim Centre for Criminology Seminar
Presenter: Dr Simon Tawfic (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Chair: Dr Johann Koehler (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Thursday 20 November 2025
Long Problems: Climate Change and the Challenge of Governing Across Time
Sustainable Social Policy and Welfare States Research Hub Seminar
Presenter: Professor Thomas Hale (University of Oxford)
Chair: Dr Liam Beiser-McGrath (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Thursday 13 November 2025
Philanthrocapitalism & Africa’s ecosystem of health research and policy-making: a decolonial critique
Presenter: Dr Eyob Gebremariam (University of Bristol)
Chair: Dr Robtel Neajai Pailey (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Thursday 30 October 2025
Understanding School Bulling Through the Eyes of the Aggressors: Lessons from Mexico
Presenter: Dr Kevin Zapata-Celestino (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Chair: Professor Almudena Sevilla (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Women's Employment: A Lifetime Perspective and Policy Impact
Presenter: Gillian Paull (CASE, LSE)
Chair: Professor Almudena Sevilla (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Thursday 16 October 2025
From Slavery to Crude Oil Pipelines: Tracing Gendered Extractive Geographies in the Niger Delta
Race Matters Seminar
Presenter: Amina Adebisi Odofin (Ghent University)
Chair: Dr Robtel Neajai Pailey (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Thursday 9 October 2025
The Capability Approach as a Framework for Rethinking Employment and Labour Markets
Presenter: Professor Kirsten Sehnbruch (III, LSE)
Chair: Professor Almudena Sevilla (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Thursday 2 October 2025
Degrees of value: Cultivating privilege at an elite university
Presenter: Dr Fiona Gogescu (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Chair: Professor Almudena Sevilla (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
From Public Good to Residual Function: Adopting a Comparative Social Policy Approach to Understanding Shifts in Social Housing
Presenter: Professor Deirdre Howard-Wagner (The Australian National University)
Chair: Professor Almudena Sevilla (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Catch up on our 2024/25 seminar series via our YouTube channel here.
3 April 2025
The enduring effect of higher education on attitudes towards immigrants across generations and within the family
Presenter: Dr Victoria Donnaloja (University of Essex)
Watch the presentation here
27 March 2025
Inequalities in Applications and Offers to Graduate Recruitment Programmes
Presenter: Professor Lindsey Macmillan (UCL).
Watch the presentation here
20 March 2025
Family change and welfare provision in complex families: evidence from the UK and policy lessons from abroad
Presenter: Professor Susan Harkness (University of Bristol).
Watch the presentation here
20 February 2025
The Bystander Issue: Why Do We Take The Harassers' Side?
Presenter: Dr Margaux Suteau (LSE).
Watch the presentation here
13 February 2025
A Brief Introduction about the Young Lives Study and a Paper Presentation: "A Sound Methodology: Measuring Experiences of Violent Conflict through Audio Self-Interviews"
Presenter: Dr Marta Favara (University of Oxford)
Watch the presentation here
7 February 2025
Born to Rule: The Making and Remaking of the British Elite
Presenter: Professor Sam Friedman (LSE)
Watch the presentation here
30 January 2025
Working with Hope: Reflections on Researching Child Poverty in Incredibly Hard Times
Presenter: Professor Ruth Patrick (University of York).
Watch the presentation here
23 January 2025
How Should we Conceptualize the Sposal Relationship of 'Mixed Race' People?
Presenter: Professor Miri Song (University of Kent)
No video available
5 December 2024
Status-Enforcing Criminal Laws
Presenter: Professor Jamelia Morgan (Northwestern University)
Watch the presentation here
28 November 2024
Neighbourhood Migration and the Air Pollution Disadvantage of Immigrant Minorities
Presenter: Dr Tobias Rüttenauer (University College London)
No video available
21 November 2024
The role of default options and financial and pension literacy for retirement saving in a fully funded system
Presenter: Dr Piera Bello (University of Bergamo)
No video available
14 November 2024
Aid’s Impact on Social Protection in the Global South
Presenter: Dr Miguel Niño-Zarazúa (SOAS, University of London)
Watch the presentation here
24 October 2024
Understanding Global Blackness: Indigeneity, Reparations and the Post-colonial State SPECIAL Race Matters Initiative (RMI) Seminar
Presenter: Dr Althea-Maria Rivas (SOAS, University of London)
No video available
17 October 2024
The Concentration of Children on Income Distribution and Its Consequences for Poverty and Inequality
Presenter: Professor Berkay Ozcan (LSE)
Watch the presentation here
10 October 2024
Analysis of Cybercrime Issues in Anglophone West Africa
Presenter: Dr Suleman Lazarus (LSE)
Watch the presentation here
Catch up on our 2023/24 seminar series via our YouTube channel here.
21 March 2024
Birth spacing and the health of mothers and fathers: an analysis of physical and mental health using individual- and sibling-fixed effects
Presenter: Dr Kieron Barclay
14 March 2024
Intergenerational educational mobility during the twentieth century in 77 low- and middle-income and 15 high-income countries
Presenter: Dr Mobarak Hossain
15 February 2024
Conflict-related migration: new insights from Ukraine
Presenter: Professor Lucinda Platt
8 February 2024
Research similarity and Women in Academia
Presenter: Dr Alessandra Casarico
1 February 2024
Colonization and Social Policy: A Comparative Analysis of Social Policy Development in South Asia; Pre to Post Colonial Era
Presenter: Dr Zahid Mumtaz
25 January 2024
Intergenerational Poverty Persistence in Europe - is there a Great Gatsby Curve for Poverty?
Presenter: Professor Brian Nolan
18 January 2024
Kingdon at 40: Multiple Streams, Multiple Flaws
Presenter: Dr Fabio Battaglia
No video available
7 December 2023
The Altruistic Authoritarian Citizen
Presenters:Professor Reza Hasmath (University of Alberta) and Dr Timothy Hildebrandt (LSE)
23 November 2023
Formal Trade, Informal State: Public Authority and the Governance of Informal Cross-Border Trade in Eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC)
Presenter: Dr Jonathan Bashi Rudahindwa (SOAS, University of London)
16 November 2023
Qualitative Literacy: A Guide to Evaluating Ethnographic and Interview Research
Presenters: Professor Mario Small (Columbia University) and Dr Jessica Calarco (University of Wisconsin-Madison)
9 November 2023
The Political Economy of Women's Work in Palestine under Settler Colonialism
Presenter: Dr Samia M Al-Botmeh (Birzeit University)
26 October 2023
Energy Policy Support Increases through Policy Goal Communication
Presenter: Dr Gracia Bruckmann (University of Bern)
No video available
12 October 2023
Marketing Development Studies in the Neoliberal University and How to Be Cosmopolitan
SPECIAL Race Matters Initiative (RMI) Seminar
Presenter: Dr Kamna Patel (University College London)
5 October 2023
Imperial Development: The Humanitarian-Development Nexus in Jordan and Lebanon
Presenter: Dr Lama Tawakkol (University of Manchester)
- Catch up on our 2022/23 seminar series via our YouTube channel here.
30 March 2023
Social and academic embeddedness as buffers against school closure effects on schooling outcomes
Speaker: Professor Herman van de Werfhorst, European University Institute
23 March 2023
Zero poverty society: on how to lift the social floor
Speaker: Professor Ive Marx, University of Antwerp
2 February 2023
When the burden lifts: The effect of school and day care re-openings on parent’s employment and life satisfaction
Speaker: Professor Marita Jacob, University of Cologne
26 January 2023
More driven? Experimental evidence on differences in cognitive effort by social origin
Speaker: Dr Jonas Radl, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid
19 January 2023
An historical analysis of NGO registration in contemporary China
Speakers: Dr Tim Hildebrandt, Department of Social Policy, LSE, Dr Blake Miller, Department of Methodology, LSE, and Guodong Ju, Department of Social Policy, LSE.
Video not available
8 December 2022
Energy taxes, social policy, and economic vulnerability
Speaker: Professor Kenneth Nelson, SoFI, Stokholm University
Video not available
1 December 2022
What accounts for the recent 'tutoring revolution' in English education policy?
Speaker: Dr Sonia Exley, Department of Social Policy, LSE
Video not available
17 November 2022
Why research (does not) affect policy: experimental evidence on the role of perceived political bias
Speaker: Dr Berkay Ozcan, Department of Social Policy, LSE
Video not available
10 November 2022
Why do we need data on sex?
Speaker: Professor Alice Sullivan, UCL
20 October 2022
Disability and Trade Union Membership in the UK
Speaker: Professor Melanie Jones, Cardiff University
13 October 2022
A Political Economy of Behavioural Public Policy
Speaker: Dr Adam Oliver, Department of Social Policy, LSE
6 October 2022
Orderly Britain
Speaker: Professor Tim Newburn, Department of Social Policy, LSE
- Catch up on all of our 2021/22 seminar series via our YouTube channel here.
19 May 2022
Wellbeing and Do-gooding? Critical understandings of individual altruism and human sociality
Speaker: Professor Hartley Dean (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
12 May 2022
Family Goals and Behavior in an International Comparative Analysis
Speaker: Dr Alicia Adserà (Princeton University)
Video not available
24 March 2022
Forgotten Wives: an alternative history of LSE
Speaker: Professor Ann Oakley (UCL Social Research Institute)
17 March 2022
Diversity in Seminar and Study Groups and Student Outcomes: Evidence from SP401
Speakers: Dr Berkay Ozcan and Valentina Contreras (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
10 March 2022
The Contours of Political Manipulation: Inside Richard Nixon’s ‘Law and Order’ Campaign
Speaker: Dr Leonidas Cheliotis (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
Video not available
3 March 2022
Leaving Fathers Behind? The Politics of Departing from the Male Breadwinner Model in Germany and the UK
Speaker: Dr Sam Mohun-Himmelweit (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
24 February 2022
PISA, Political Discourse, and Education Governance in the Age of Global Reference Societies
Speaker: Professor Louis Volante (Brock University)
10 February 2022
Parental Skills, Assortative Mating, and the Incidence of Autism Spectrum Disorder
Speaker: Dr Chiara Orsini (University of Sheffield)
Video not available
3 February 2022
Policy capacity matters for education reforms: A diverging tale of two Brazilian states
Speaker: Dr Yifei Yan (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
27 January 2022
Income source confusion using the SILC
Speaker: Dr Iva Tasseva (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
9 December 2021
The Schumpeterian consensus: the new logic of global social policy to face the fourth industrial revolution
Speaker: Dr Vicente Silva (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
25 November 2021
Tracking system in education and inequalities. A longitudinal analysis of two school reforms in Switzerland
Speaker: Professor Georges Felouzis (University of Geneva)
18 November 2021
After Covid-19: what have we learned about the UK's labour market, inequality and the welfare system
Speaker: Dr Mike Brewer (Resolution Foundation)
11 November 2021
Home Care Fault Lines: Understanding Tensions and Creating Alliances (book talk)
Speaker: Professor Cynthia Crawford (University of Toronto)
4 November 2021
The Positive Effect of Women’s Education on Fertility in Low-Fertility China
Speaker: Dr Shuang Chen (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
7 October 2021
SLEEPWALKING INTO THE ‘POST-RACIAL’: SOCIAL POLICY AND THE STUDY OF RACE
Seminar based on joint Paper by Professor Coretta Phillips (Department of Social Policy, LSE) and Professor Fiona Williams (University of Leeds)
Speaker: Professor Coretta Phillips (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
- Catch up on all of our 2020/21 seminar series via our YouTube channel here.
23 March 2021
Which integration policies work? The heterogeneous impact of policies and institutions on immigrants’ labor market success in Europe
Speaker: Professor Lucinda Platt (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
16 March 2021
Unidentical Twins? Comparing Social Policy Responses to COVID-19 in North America
Speaker: Professor Daniel Béland (McGill University)
9 March 2021
Demographic Change and Perceptions of Racism
Speaker: Christopher Maggio (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
2 March 2021
Poverty Among the Working Age Population in Post-Industrial Democracies (with some comments on inequality)
Speaker: Professor Evelyne Huber (University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill)
23 February 2021
Tense times for young migrants: Temporality, life-course, and immigration status
Speaker: Dr Vanessa Hughes (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
16 February 2021
Poverty, Not the Poor
Speaker: Professor David Brady (University of California, Riverside)
9 February 2021
Does Incarceration Shape Trust in the State, Community Engagement, and Civic Participation?
Speaker: Professor Chris Wildeman (Duke University)
2 February 2021
The normativity of marriage and the marriage premium for children’s outcomes
Speaker: Professor Florencia Torche (Stanford University)
26 January 2021
Inequalities in Breastfeeding in the U.S. across the 20th Century
Speaker: Dr Vida Maralani (Cornell University)
19 Jaunary 2021
Family structure and gender ideologies of youth in Britain
Speaker: Professor Pia Schober (University of Tübingen)
8 December 2020
The Company We Keep
Interracial Friendships and Romantic Relationships from Adolescence to Adulthood
Speaker: Professor Grace Kao (Yale University)
1 December 2020
They Can’t All Be Stars: The Matthew Effect, Status Bias, and Status Persistence in NBA All-Star Elections
Speaker: Dr Thomas Biegert (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
24 November 2020
How combination and sequence of weather events shape Mexico-U.S. migration flows
Speaker: Professor Filiz Garip (Cornell University)
17 November 2020
Policy Capacity Matters for Capacity Development: Comparing Teacher In-service Training and Career Advancement in Basic Education Systems of India and China
Speaker: Dr Yifei Yan (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
10 November 2020
Social class inequalities in school GCSE attainment – Mis-reading cultural capital
Speakers: Professor Vernon Gayle (University of Edinburgh), Dr Sarah Stopforth (University of Sussex)
3 November 2020
From the Local to the Global: Care Chains, Ageing and Futurity through the Indian Ayah
Speaker: Dr Shalini Grover (International Inequalities Institute, LSE)
28 October 2020
Mechanisms of Matthew effects in social investment
Speaker: Dr Amelia Peterson (Department of Social Policy, LSE)
2019/20
29 January 2020
‘Emplaced’ Indian Construction Labour-Camps: The Architecture of Discipline and the Limits to Collective Action.
Speaker: Dr Sunil Kumar (LSE, Department of Social Policy)
11 December 2019
Experimental Criminology and the Free-Rider Problem
Speakers: Dr Johann Koehler (LSE, Department of Social Policy) and Tobias Smith (UC-Berkeley)
30th October 2019
Collaborative ethnography and its limitations: Researching young migrants in London
Speaker: Vanessa Hughes (LSE, Department of Social Policy)
2018/19
13 March 2019
Challenging dominant social policy assumptions; an apprenticeship for young people with multiple problems and needs.
Speakers: Alice Sampson and Femi Ade-Davis
27 February 2019
Administrative Burden: Policymaking by Other Means
Speakers: Professor Pamela Herd and Professor Donald Moynihan
30 January 2019
Towards a New Social Contract - Taking on Distributional Tensions in Europe and Central Asia
Speaker: Maurizio Bussolo
31 October 2018
How useful is Gillian Hart's Distinction between 'Little d' and 'Big D' Development? Theoretical Reflections, a Case Study, and some Lessons for Social Policy
Speaker: Professor David Lewis, LSE
2017/18
16 May 2018
Health implications of Economic Insecurity
Speaker: Professor Lars Osberg
7 March 2018
Police Reform and the Politics of Denial: An Academic's Journey into "Activism".
Speaker: Dr Michael Shiner, LSE
21 February 2018
Political Parties and Private Schools: A Comparative Analysis of Policy and Politics in England and Germany
Speaker: Dr Rita Nikolai, Humboldt University, Berlin
24 January 2018
The Kids Are Alright: The Rise in Non-Marital Births and Child Well-being
Speaker: Professor Christina Gibson-Davis, Duke University
10 January 2018
The Politics of Post-Crisis European Social Spending
Speaker: Dr Ian McManus, LSE
22 November 2017
Accumulation or Absorption? The Development of Household Non-Employment in Europe during the Great Recession
Speakers: Professor Bernhard Ebbinghaus, University of Oxford, Dr Thomas Biegert, LSE
15 November 2017
Great Expectations: Long-term Poverty Reduction, Intergenerational Change and Young Beneficiaries’ Aspirations in Brazil’s Bolsa Família Programme
Speaker: Dr Hayley Jones, LSE
18 October 2017
Ethnic school composition and multiple ethnic identity formation of adolescents in the Netherlands
Speaker: Dr Gert-Jan Veerman, Ede Christian University of Applied Sciences
11 October 2017
Inter-ethnic relations of teenagers in England’s schools: the role of school and neighbourhood ethnic composition
Speaker: Professor Simon Burgess, University of Bristol