Brexit referendum

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Democracy for Sale: Dark Money and Dirty Politics by Peter Geoghegan

4chan, Adam Curtis, Affordable Care Act / Obamacare, American Legislative Exchange Council, anti-globalists, basic income, Berlin Wall, Big Tech, Black Lives Matter, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, British Empire, Cambridge Analytica, centre right, corporate raider, crony capitalism, data science, deepfake, deindustrialization, demographic winter, disinformation, Dominic Cummings, Donald Trump, East Village, Etonian, F. W. de Klerk, fake news, first-past-the-post, Francis Fukuyama: the end of history, Frank Gehry, Greta Thunberg, invisible hand, James Dyson, Jeremy Corbyn, John Bercow, Mark Zuckerberg, market fundamentalism, military-industrial complex, moral panic, Naomi Klein, Nelson Mandela, obamacare, offshore financial centre, open borders, Overton Window, Paris climate accords, plutocrats, post-truth, post-war consensus, pre–internet, private military company, Renaissance Technologies, Robert Mercer, Ronald Reagan, Silicon Valley, Snapchat, special economic zone, Steve Bannon, surveillance capitalism, tech billionaire, technoutopianism, Torches of Freedom, universal basic income, WikiLeaks, Yochai Benkler, éminence grise

Regardless of what the country’s post-Brexit future looks like, its broken system needs radical surgery. But before we open the patient up, we need to understand the disease’s aetiology. I have structured this book both chronologically and thematically. The opening chapters are directly concerned with the 2016 Brexit referendum and examine in some detail examples of electoral sharp practice that took place, from Vote Leave’s law-breaking to Arron Banks’s record spending to the DUP’s dark money. These different stories are both crucial to understanding the context of modern British politics and illustrative of far deeper problems in our democracy.

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The claim was refuted by the Electoral Commission and the non-aligned Political Studies Association. It didn’t matter. Billboards ran photographs of a sick child in an incubator alongside the slogan “She needs a new cardiac facility, not an alternative voting system.” ‘Yes’ lost by a crushing two to one on polling day.18 NO to AV also provided a trial run for the Brexit referendum in other ways. Elliott focused heavily on digital campaigning. He pushed messages on Facebook and built online applications that encouraged voters to attend real-world campaign events. It was cutting-edge for the time. “Matthew was one of those people who saw early that we needed to put digital at the heart of the campaign.

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To illustrate how much the assembly would cost taxpayers, campaign chairman John Elliott – no relation to Matthew – delivered a short talk on local government finance while standing next to a bonfire onto which blonde girls from Durham University wearing tight t-shirts threw bundles of fake £50 notes. Cummings brought an inflatable white elephant on a tour of the north-east. As he would in 2016, he said that the money saved on another layer of government could be used to hire additional doctors, teachers or police.23 In another echo of the Brexit referendum, the campaign was also dogged by arguments with the Electoral Commission and fellow campaigners against the assembly over designations and spending. In his insider account of the North-East referendum, Cummings’s “ground war commander” William Norton writes that the regulator was “utterly useless”.

How to Stop Brexit (And Make Britain Great Again) by Nick Clegg

Berlin Wall, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, collapse of Lehman Brothers, Dominic Cummings, Donald Trump, eurozone crisis, Fall of the Berlin Wall, Francis Fukuyama: the end of history, Jeremy Corbyn, low interest rates, offshore financial centre, sceptred isle, Snapchat, Steve Bannon

Look closer and you can begin to make out the outline of a new European vessel emerging from the mist, an EU under reconstruction, which is sleeker, more nimble and perhaps more accommodating to us Brits than that which came before. So there has been a huge amount of change across Europe – and the world – in the months since our Brexit referendum. And when the world changes, people’s views change, too. In this new landscape, I will now explain why stopping Brexit would not be anti-democratic. It would actually be the more democratic thing to do. Why it is right to stop Brexit THE REFERENDUM CAMPAIGN was, for the most part, an uninspiring affair – for which both sides must bear some responsibility. Much of the argy-bargy between the two sides was unenlightening and forgettable.

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Pooling sovereignty gives us more control of our future; being part of a larger bloc gives us greater influence and a bigger say in shaping events across the globe. Don’t take my word for it. Just look at how the world’s largest nations have reacted to Brexit. Since the referendum the leaders of two of the world’s most significant new powers, Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India and President Xi Jinping of China, have visited Europe on more than one occasion. Both have been to Germany to hold talks with Angela Merkel. Modi has also been to Spain and France. Xi has taken trips to Belgium and the Netherlands. Neither has come to the UK since the Brexit referendum. Both Xi and Modi know that it makes far more sense to do business with a major bloc rather than with an isolated nation.

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The Brexit vote was a major catalyst in pushing EU governments to accept that change can no longer be avoided. In an ironic twist of fate, the Brexit vote in Britain against a future in the EU may help to provoke precisely the reforms that will assist in securing the EU’s own future. So there is a silver lining to the Brexit referendum: it may help to strengthen the EU itself; and it may lead to the conditions in which the UK could be reintegrated into a reformed EU. To say that the EU has been going through something of a rocky time in recent years is an understatement. Go back to the summer of 2015 and ask a random person in the street what they associate with the EU, and it would not be peace and prosperity.

Revolting!: How the Establishment Are Undermining Democracy and What They're Afraid Of by Mick Hume

anti-communist, battle of ideas, Berlin Wall, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, central bank independence, colonial rule, David Brooks, disinformation, Donald Trump, eurozone crisis, Fall of the Berlin Wall, Francis Fukuyama: the end of history, Jeremy Corbyn, Martin Wolf, mass immigration, non-tariff barriers, Occupy movement, open borders, plutocrats, post-truth, public intellectual, Slavoj Žižek, the scientific method, We are the 99%, World Values Survey

Ours is the age of ‘I’m a democrat, but …’, when the establishment insists it is all for democracy, but only in moderation; it just cannot tolerate what one former member of President Barack Obama’s administration calls ‘too much of a good thing’, suggesting that America ‘might be a healthier democracy if it were a slightly less democratic one’.1 For some in high places these days it seems that, where democracy is concerned, less really can be more. It is an attitude captured in the UK by former Conservative prime minister John Major who, dismissing the suggestion that the Brexit referendum result should be binding, declared that ‘the tyranny of the majority has never applied in a democracy’.2 Some of us might naively have imagined that majority rule was the essence of democracy. But not, it seems, when millions of common ‘tyrants’ vote against the wishes of the minority political elite.

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But the fury of the political, economic and cultural elites in response to the 17.4 million UK voters who dared to back Brexit, and the 62 million-plus Americans who had the temerity to vote for Trump, brought these anti-democratic poisons bubbling to the surface of our civilised societies once more. The real Brexit–Trump connection There has been a concerted attempt to explain the link between the Brexit referendum result and the election of Donald Trump. For angry social media commentators, it seemed obvious that ‘both were clearly mired in racism, bigotry and hate’. Many mainstream media pundits took a similar line, concluding that ‘both votes were marked by emotional, divisive campaigns’ and were won on ‘a tide’ of racism and hate.9 Much of this misses the point.

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There is a difference between supporting a broad democratic principle in a yes/no referendum, and backing a specific party’s narrow-minded candidate in an election. That is why some of us in the UK who voted Leave with passion could not have contemplated voting for the illiberal, free-speech-stomping Donald. Nor, by the way, could we have stomached supporting the illiberal-liberal Hillary Clinton. (Note to the confused: the Brexit referendum result was not a vote for Trump fan and UK Independence Party leader Nigel Farage, who responded to his triumph by giving up politics rather than taking power.) No; the genuine comparison between the two concerns not the actors, but the anti-democratic reaction to the results. The backlash against Brexit set the pattern.

Three Years in Hell: The Brexit Chronicles by Fintan O'Toole

airport security, banking crisis, Berlin Wall, blockchain, Bob Geldof, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, British Empire, Bullingdon Club, Cambridge Analytica, centre right, classic study, cognitive dissonance, congestion charging, deindustrialization, deliberate practice, Dominic Cummings, Donald Trump, Double Irish / Dutch Sandwich, Downton Abbey, Etonian, eurozone crisis, facts on the ground, fake news, Fall of the Berlin Wall, first-past-the-post, full employment, income inequality, Jeremy Corbyn, l'esprit de l'escalier, labour mobility, late capitalism, open borders, rewilding, Slavoj Žižek, South China Sea, technoutopianism, zero-sum game

TIMELINE 23 June 2016: UK holds referendum on its membership of the EU, with the majority of voters choosing to leave the EU (51.9 per cent of the vote, versus 48.1 per cent voting to remain). 24 June 2016: Shortly after the result is announced, Prime Minister David Cameron makes known his intention to resign. 13 July 2016: Theresa May becomes the new UK prime minister. 2 October 2016: In her party conference speech, Theresa May confirms Article 50 will be triggered before the end of March 2017 18 June 2016 Six days before the Brexit referendum, it seems that something profound is being created: not a mere exit from the EU but the real possibility of an English state. Yet no one seems to want to talk about it. It is a question the English used to ask about their subject peoples: are they ready for self-government? But it is now one that has to be asked about the English themselves.

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Before the war of words escalates, and positions petrify into irreconcilability, Ireland should make an urgent and coherent effort to plead the virtues of equivocation. If nothing else, Ireland helping England out of a hole would be a historical irony worth savouring. TIMELINE 17 January 2017: Prime Minister Theresa May gives her Lancaster House speech, setting out a hardline interpretation of the meaning of the Brexit referendum result. 26 January 2017: Government publishes European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Bill. 2 February 2017: Government publishes its Brexit white paper, formally setting out its strategy for the UK to leave the EU. March 2017: The prime minister triggers Article 50 of the Treaty on European Union, meaning that the UK is to leave at 11 p.m. on 29 March 2019. 18 April 2017: May calls a general election – to be held on 8 June 2017. 17 January 2017 Elections are held for the Northern Ireland Assembly, following the collapse of the Executive over, among other things, the ‘cash for ash’ scandal in which DUP ministers allowed a subsidy scheme for renewable energy to run wildly out of control.

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The most unrealistic proposition in contemporary politics is that ‘strong and stable’ democracies can coexist with inequality, insecurity and hopelessness. Corbyn will not win the election, but he has won the campaign by showing that he understands this far better than May does. 9 June 2017 May and Corbyn both lost the election. The result – a hung parliament – seems to bear out the feeling that the Brexit referendum had undermined the stability of Britain’s political institutions. So there’s only one queen in England after all. The coronation of Queen Theresa is much more likely to be a decapitation. And the remarkable result of the election she called in the expectation of a triumphal procession raises the most fundamental question that can be asked in any state: who’s in charge here?

Cultural Backlash: Trump, Brexit, and Authoritarian Populism by Pippa Norris, Ronald Inglehart

affirmative action, Affordable Care Act / Obamacare, bank run, banking crisis, Berlin Wall, Bernie Sanders, Black Lives Matter, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, Cass Sunstein, centre right, classic study, cognitive dissonance, conceptual framework, declining real wages, desegregation, digital divide, Donald Trump, eurozone crisis, fake news, Fall of the Berlin Wall, feminist movement, first-past-the-post, illegal immigration, immigration reform, income inequality, It's morning again in America, Jeremy Corbyn, job automation, knowledge economy, labor-force participation, land reform, liberal world order, longitudinal study, low skilled workers, machine readable, mass immigration, meta-analysis, obamacare, open borders, open economy, opioid epidemic / opioid crisis, Paris climate accords, post-industrial society, post-materialism, precariat, purchasing power parity, rising living standards, Ronald Reagan, sexual politics, Silicon Valley, statistical model, stem cell, Steve Bannon, War on Poverty, white flight, winner-take-all economy, women in the workforce, working-age population, World Values Survey, zero-sum game

Lived experience is regarded as a far superior guide to action rather than book-­ learning. The collective will of ‘the people’ (‘Most people say...’) is regarded as unified, authentic, and unquestionably morally right. In cases of conflict, for example, if Westminster disagrees with the outcome of the Brexit referendum, the public’s decision is thought to take automatic precedent. On the night of the Brexit referendum to leave the European Union, for example, the leader of UK Independence Party (UKIP), Nigel Farage, crowed that ‘This will be a victory for real people, a victory for ordinary people, a victory for decent people.’13 For the German protest movement Pegida, ‘We are the people’ (‘Wir sind das Volk’).14 Similarly, Trump’s inaugural address proclaimed: ‘We are transferring power from Washington, DC and giving it back to you, the American People ...

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In the long run, it can bring surging support for the French National Front or the Alternative for Germany or Donald Trump. The literature provides considerable support for the cultural grievance thesis. Several recent studies have found that support for the Leave outcome in the Brexit referendum was strongly associated with prejudice against foreigners, measured by right-­wing authoritarianism.61 Similarly, in the run up to the Brexit referendum, Curtice found that many British people saw EU membership as economically beneficial, but expressed concern about its cultural consequences.62 Survey results also suggested that respondents expressing concerns about immigration into Britain were more likely to vote Leave.63 Other research on European attitudes based on analysis of the 2002 ESS survey showed that, even after controlling for standard socio-­economic and demographic variables, voting for the radical right was significantly linked with negative attitudes toward immigrants, refugees, and multiculturalism in seven West European countries, including Denmark, France, and the Netherlands.64 A parallel process may have emerged in Eastern Europe, where authoritarian-populist ­success has been attributed to resentment against ethnic minorities.65 In the US 2016 presidential election, feelings of racial resentment and whether or not voters supported a path for citizenship for undocumented immigrants, was strongly associated with vote switching from Obama in 2012 to Trump in 2016.

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In the Americas, Libertarian-­Populist leaders are exemplified by Bernie Sanders, as well as the Peronist tradition followed by Cristina Fernández de Kirchner in Argentina, Evo Morales in Bolivia, and Rafael Correa in Ecuador.32 Arguably, there are also centrist-­populist leaders, such as President Emmanuel Macron in France who campaigned as an outsider, criticizing the established parties although governing more like a moderate. 12 Understanding Populism Even in nations where Authoritarian-­Populist parties hold few parliamentary seats, they can still exert ‘blackmail’ pressure on governments and shape the policy agenda.33 In Britain, for example, the UK Independence Party won only one seat in the May 2015 general election, but its rhetoric fueled rabid anti-­European and anti-­immigration sentiment, pressuring the Conservatives to call the Brexit referendum, with massive consequences.34 Similarly, in the September 2017 elections to the Bundestag, the nationalistic, anti-­Islamic, and pro-­family values Alternative for Germany (AfD) won only 12.6 percent of the vote, but they gained 94 seats in the aftermath of the refugee crisis, entering parliament for the first time and thereby hindering Angela Merkel’s negotiations to form a Grand Coalition government, leaving the government in limbo for four months.35 Mainstream parties can seek to co-­opt minor parties in formal or informal governing alliances, and they can adopt their language and policies in the attempt to steal their votes.

The Politics of Pain by Fintan O'Toole

banking crisis, Berlin Wall, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, British Empire, classic study, colonial rule, deindustrialization, delayed gratification, Desert Island Discs, Donald Trump, eurozone crisis, full employment, Jeremy Corbyn, Khartoum Gordon, Peter Thiel, Potemkin village, Ronald Reagan, Silicon Valley, Silicon Valley billionaire, Stanford marshmallow experiment, Suez crisis 1956, tech billionaire

The near-implosion of British politics after 2016 was obviously a local variant of a wider crisis of democracy. As Donald Trump Jr wrote in March 2019, ‘In a way, you could say that Brexit and my father’s election are one and the same’4 – the same rhetoric of the people versus the elites was deployed using the same dark arts of mass persuasion. It is equally obvious that the stunning result of the Brexit referendum was merely the most dramatic expression of a much wider sense of alienation in Europe. The long years of budgetary austerity after the great banking crisis of 2008, gross inequalities in the division of the spoils of economic globalization and the huge wave of refugees from the catastrophic collapse of Syria created a potent cocktail of popular anxieties.

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White identity politics filled the vacuum where the promise of incremental progress had once been. It makes perfect sense, then, to see what happened in England as a local version of a global phenomenon, just one eruption on a great seismic fault line that stretches across the continents. But it is also different. For one thing, the English continued to vote – both before the Brexit referendum in the general election of 2015 and after it in the election of 2017 – for their traditional political parties. In England, 88 per cent of voters cast their ballots in 2017 for either the Conservatives or Labour, and this long-established duopoly won all but nine of the 533 English parliamentary seats.

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In Ireland, most of us were part of a powerful majority culture; in England we had to learn what it was like to belong to the few rather than the many. So we had these two very different ways of thinking about England: as the opposite of Us and as a place where Us could mean something much more fluid and open. And the poignant thing about the decade before the Brexit referendum of June 2016 is not that one of these ways of thinking had banished the other; it’s that they’ve both been banished. The first one – the notion that Ireland and England are opposites – is long gone. No Irish kid today would experience the sense of strangeness in moving through a built-up English landscape that I felt in 1969: most Irish people now live in the same kind of urban or suburban places as their English counterparts do.

The Rise of the Outsiders: How Mainstream Politics Lost Its Way by Steve Richards

"World Economic Forum" Davos, Affordable Care Act / Obamacare, Airbnb, banking crisis, battle of ideas, Bernie Sanders, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, call centre, centre right, collapse of Lehman Brothers, David Brooks, Dominic Cummings, Donald Trump, driverless car, Etonian, eurozone crisis, fake news, falling living standards, full employment, gentrification, high-speed rail, housing crisis, Jeremy Corbyn, low skilled workers, manufacturing employment, Martin Wolf, mass immigration, Neil Kinnock, obamacare, Occupy movement, post-truth, Ronald Reagan, Silicon Valley, Steve Bannon

If you were in power, would you reduce the numbers? Yes or no?’ These were the binary questions posed constantly to UK politicians responding to the Brexit referendum, which was itself a binary question that allowed no room for nuance and qualifications. The right-wing populists do not qualify their assertions. Without hesitation they cry, ‘Yes – we will reduce the numbers’ and appear strong as they make that unqualified promise. The pledge to ‘take back control’ became a defining one for the leading supporters of Brexit in the UK referendum. And Trump used the same phrase in his campaign. Yet the vote-winning slogan also leads us towards a fundamental weakness of the outsiders.

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Of the leading campaigners in the ‘Out’ campaign, only Boris Johnson plays a role, as Foreign Secretary, in what form Brexit will take. Even his role is limited. The rest do not have to face the consequences of their campaigning swagger. Early in 2017 one of the architects of the victory in the Brexit referendum, Dominic Cummings, formerly an adviser to Gove, wrote a wittily provocative account of why his side had won. Cummings insisted, as part of his compelling exposition, that contrary to mythology, Gove and Johnson were relaxed and delighted on the day after the referendum. Perhaps the close ally and behind-the-scenes witness is best placed to make the definitive judgement.

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Marine Le Pen is subtler and more sophisticated, but beneath her are some of those unreliable eccentrics who followed her father’s leadership. The internal machinations of some parties on the outside are darkly comical, and perhaps inevitably so. Forming new parties is a difficult task, and many do not last very long. UKIP struggled to find a successor to Nigel Farage to lead it, after the Brexit referendum. One candidate, in one of several leadership contests that took place within months of the referendum, ended up in hospital. Steven Woolfe was involved in what was described as an ‘altercation’ with another UKIP MEP. Based on the photographs of Woolfe recovering in hospital, it was quite an altercation.

Heroic Failure: Brexit and the Politics of Pain by Fintan O'Toole

Berlin Wall, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, British Empire, colonial rule, deindustrialization, delayed gratification, Desert Island Discs, Donald Trump, eurozone crisis, full employment, Jeremy Corbyn, Khartoum Gordon, Peter Thiel, Potemkin village, Ronald Reagan, Silicon Valley, Silicon Valley billionaire, Stanford marshmallow experiment, Suez crisis 1956, tech billionaire

In Ireland, most of us were part of a powerful majority culture; in England we had to learn what it was like to belong to the few rather than the many. So we had these two very different ways of thinking about England: as the opposite of Us and as a place where Us could mean something much more fluid and open. And the poignant thing about the decade before the Brexit referendum of June 2016 is not that one of these ways of thinking had banished the other; it’s that they’ve both been banished. The first one – the notion that Ireland and England are opposites – is long gone. No Irish kid today would experience the sense of strangeness in moving through a built-up English landscape that I felt in 1969: most Irish people now live in the same kind of urban or suburban places as their English counterparts do.

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Camilla Schofield, in her reading of the tsunami of letters sent by supporters to Enoch Powell after the ‘rivers of blood’ speech predicting a racial apocalypse, notes that ‘Powell’s letter-writers speak of student protests, labour unrest, but most of all they speak of the indignities of declining welfare provisions – filled hospital beds and unavailable council houses… concern that immigration could destroy the National Health Service and public housing ran throughout.’30 The Leave campaign in the Brexit referendum would of course make the same false connection: we are anti-immigrant because we wish to defend the welfare state. Powell didn’t actually believe in the welfare state, and most of the leading Brexiteers don’t either, but they knew that many of their supporters did so. It may be, too, that what lingered in England’s collective consciousness from the extraordinary success of the Labour government in creating the welfare state in a few short years after the end of the war was a distorted idea of radical change.

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In his bibliographical note Sansom notes, ‘In looking at how a British Resistance movement might have fought a collaborationist regime, the closest (though not exact) parallel has to be the French Resistance.’42 (Sansom’s book was animated in particular by fear of Scottish independence, and its depiction of a pro-Nazi collaborationist Scottish National Party in 1952 is explicitly aimed at discouraging support for the contemporary SNP – in an appendix, he directly urges readers to donate to and support the ‘No’ campaign in the impending referendum of 2014.) The pay-off for all of this lurid imagining would come with Brexit. In February 2016, when David Cameron was seeking concessions from Brussels in advance of the Brexit referendum, the Daily Mail, forgetting its own history of appeasement, brazenly compared him to Neville Chamberlain in a rabid front-page editorial headed, of course ‘Who will speak for England?’43 (While drawing these parallels between the Nazis and the EU, it added in the smaller print, ‘Nobody is suggesting there are any parallels whatever between the Nazis and the EU.’)

Dreams of Leaving and Remaining by James Meek

"World Economic Forum" Davos, Affordable Care Act / Obamacare, agricultural Revolution, anti-communist, bank run, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, centre right, Corn Laws, corporate governance, Donald Trump, Elon Musk, Etonian, full employment, global supply chain, illegal immigration, Jeff Bezos, Jeremy Corbyn, Leo Hollis, low skilled workers, Martin Wolf, mega-rich, Neil Kinnock, North Sea oil, Northern Rock, obamacare, offshore financial centre, race to the bottom, Ronald Reagan, savings glut, Shenzhen special economic zone , Skype, sovereign wealth fund, special economic zone, Stephen Hawking, working-age population

Leaving the Sea and Remaining Grimsby 2015 2. Leaving the Land and Remaining Norfolk 2016 3. Leaving Life and Remaining Leicestershire 2017–18 4. Leaving Work and Remaining Somerdale 1923–2011, Skarbimierz 2010– EPILOGUE: Robin Hood Notes and Acknowledgements Notes Introduction: St George A few weeks after the Brexit referendum, I went out in the evening with a friend. I’d always thought of him – I still do – as a small ‘l’ liberal: a white English man in his late forties, middle-class, a native Londoner, articulate, funny, tolerant, easy-going, well-travelled, open-minded, Oxbridge-educated. I deemed him a sceptic of institutions – big corporations, governments, political parties – but a believer in the principles that kept them in check: democracy, transparency, the rule of law.

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Provocatively, Stevens compared the situation to the time of the NHS’s birth in 1948 – ‘an economy in disarray, the end of empire, a nation negotiating its place in the world, a need for massive house building’. Sticking the knife in even deeper, he reminded the government that it had eagerly taken ownership of a Brexit referendum result partly achieved on the basis of a promise that leaving the EU would free up an extra £350 million a week for the NHS.* He said: ‘Trust in democratic politics will not be strengthened if anyone now tries to argue: “You voted Brexit, partly for a better funded health service. But precisely because of Brexit, you can’t have one.” ’ Stevens’s frustration was understandable.

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Her body reacted against the antibiotics prescribed by the Canary Islands doctors and her Achilles tendons began to soften and collapse. At about the same time she developed an autoimmune condition in her leg muscles, myositis. Finding it harder to see and walk, Warren began to pay for a home help to come in the mornings. Life was becoming more constrained, although she was determined to cast her vote for Leave in the Brexit referendum in June. The chest problems never fully went away and in September 2016, after the GPs had tried three different courses of antibiotics, she was admitted to Glenfield Hospital in Leicester with pneumonia. Just before she was due to be discharged she experienced agonising abdominal pain. Her colon was leaking into her bladder through a fistula.

The New Snobbery by David Skelton

assortative mating, banking crisis, Black Lives Matter, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, British Empire, call centre, centre right, collective bargaining, coronavirus, corporate governance, corporate social responsibility, COVID-19, critical race theory, David Brooks, defund the police, deindustrialization, Etonian, Extinction Rebellion, financial deregulation, gender pay gap, glass ceiling, housing crisis, income inequality, Jeremy Corbyn, job automation, knowledge economy, lockdown, low skilled workers, market fundamentalism, meritocracy, microaggression, new economy, Northern Rock, open borders, postindustrial economy, race to the bottom, rent-seeking, Richard Florida, Right to Buy, rising living standards, shareholder value, social distancing, Social Justice Warrior, TED Talk, TikTok, wealth creators, women in the workforce

The real prejudice is coming from the elitists who use political disagreement as an excuse to throw around snobbish abuse. I’m not prepared to stand back and let my friends and family be insulted in this way; I think it’s important that this snobbery is called out for what it is – hence my decision to write this book. The second reason is political. The years since the Brexit referendum have seen the Tory Party move in the direction I’ve long been advocating: towards a genuinely One Nation politics that embraces an active state in order to bring about economic renewal to places that badly need it. I don’t need to be persuaded of the importance of ‘levelling up’. I saw my hometown devastated by the loss of the steelworks that gave it pride and identity, and then be forgotten about by generations of politicians who had simply moved on.

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Others argued that voters need to be more aware of their own limitations and more grateful of the expertise of specialists and elites. One author wrote a book in defence of elitism. The likes of Brennan were bolder than most, but the message was a common one: democracy only works when it is guided by an elite and run in the best interests of that elite. In the Brexit referendum, echoes of this refrain were to be found in the Remain campaign’s complaint to the BBC that the Corporation’s coverage would have ‘a FTSE 100 CEO and then someone who makes a couple of prams in Sheffield’.10 A prominent Leave supporter from County Durham, who left his fashion degree to help the Leave campaign, was regularly lambasted as ‘just being a hairdresser’ and was the regular recipient of snobbish abuse on social media.

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At the same time, the turnout ‘gap’ between working-class people and professionals became a gaping chasm, growing from a 6 per cent difference in 1992 to almost 20 per cent two decades later. At the 2019 election, the lowest-turnout constituencies were almost all predominantly working class (one in Hull couldn’t even muster a turnout of more than half). It was only with the Brexit referendum, when working-class voters were able to protest at their values being ignored, that turnout ticked up. At the election in 2019, some working-class voters returned to their non-voting habit after seeing the political class use every procedural trick to prevent Brexit from happening. Others decided to use the same election to send an even more emphatic message to the political class not to ignore the message they had sent in 2016.

Brexit and Ireland: The Dangers, the Opportunities, and the Inside Story of the Irish Response by Tony Connelly

"World Economic Forum" Davos, air freight, Berlin Wall, Big bang: deregulation of the City of London, Big Tech, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, call centre, centre right, Double Irish / Dutch Sandwich, electricity market, eurozone crisis, Fall of the Berlin Wall, Jeremy Corbyn, Ken Thompson, knowledge economy, land bank, LNG terminal, low skilled workers, non-tariff barriers, open borders, personalized medicine, race to the bottom, regulatory arbitrage, tech worker, éminence grise

Child-benefit payments for children living outside the UK would be indexed to the cost of living for all new arrivals to the UK, extending to all workers from 1 January 2020. There were other concessions on Britain’s relationship with the eurozone, and an explicit opt-out on any treaty references to ‘ever-closer union’. The next day Cameron held an emergency Cabinet meeting, the first on a Saturday since the Falklands War. The Cabinet endorsed the deal. The Brexit referendum would be held on 23 June. Cameron declared he would fight ‘heart and soul’ for Britain to remain in the EU. Any optimism that Cameron had won a decisive deal quickly evaporated. The agreement was mocked in the tabloid press. The Tory eurosceptic hardliner Jacob Rees-Mogg, MP, called it ‘very thin gruel’.

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He left Number 10 to work in the City of London for both Barclays and Citigroup, returning to Downing Street in 2012 as Cameron’s Adviser for Europe and Global Issues. In 2013 he was back in Brussels, this time as Permanent Representative, where he struck up a firm friendship with Declan Kelleher, his Irish counterpart, who himself had just arrived from Ireland’s embassy in China. By the time of the Brexit referendum, he had been ‘Sir Ivan’ for less than half a year, the title having been bestowed on him in the 2016 New Year’s Honours. Rogers was always of a disposition that was realistic, verging on the gloomy. It was a character trait that would later lose him his job. In the months leading up to the referendum, he was significantly more pessimistic than anyone else in Cameron’s circle, and regarded the Remain camp as being overly confident.

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On checking, the authors of the report discovered the company’s trucks were transporting food from Monaghan over the border into Armagh and Down, back over the border again into Louth and down to Dublin Port. From there the food was shipped to Great Britain, processed and then sent back by lorry again to a distributor in the West of Ireland. This entire paradigm of economic activity was now under threat. On the night of the Brexit referendum, the BBC signal found its way to a quiet farmhouse near the village of Ballacolla in County Laois. Jer Bergin and his wife, Margaret, stayed up till 1.30 a.m., and went to bed thinking that the UK would be remaining in the European Union. Outside, the dew settled on 150 acres of pasture and tillage.

Shadows of Empire: The Anglosphere in British Politics by Michael Kenny, Nick Pearce

battle of ideas, Berlin Wall, Boris Johnson, Bretton Woods, Brexit referendum, British Empire, colonial rule, corporate governance, Dominic Cummings, Donald Trump, eurozone crisis, Fall of the Berlin Wall, floating exchange rates, Francis Fukuyama: the end of history, full employment, global reserve currency, imperial preference, informal economy, invention of the telegraph, Khartoum Gordon, labour mobility, Les Trente Glorieuses, liberal capitalism, Mahatma Gandhi, mass immigration, Monroe Doctrine, Neal Stephenson, Nixon shock, public intellectual, quantitative easing, reserve currency, Ronald Reagan, Steve Bannon, Suez canal 1869, Suez crisis 1956, trade route, Washington Consensus

Abbott was an enthusiast for the Anglosphere and argued in a speech in Oxford in 2012 that, ‘As with all the countries that think and argue among themselves in English (that these days include Singapore and Hong Kong, Malaysia and even India), what we have in common is usually more important than anything that divides us.’20 For Antipodean conservatives, embracing the Asian countries that were once part of the British Empire made perfect sense. Towards the EU Referendum With Stephen Harper, Tony Abbott and John Key all in office at the same time as a Conservative-led coalition in the UK, and the prospect of an impending Brexit referendum, the gravitational pull of the Anglosphere on the political imagination of neo-liberal Eurosceptics intensified. Politicians, commentators and think-tanks such as the Institute of Economic Affairs and the Adam Smith Institute, which had long-established transatlantic ties with Washington counterparts such as the Heritage Foundation, the Cato Institute and the American Enterprise Institute, began to publish pamphlets, speeches and blogs making the case for Brexit.

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Politicians, commentators and think-tanks such as the Institute of Economic Affairs and the Adam Smith Institute, which had long-established transatlantic ties with Washington counterparts such as the Heritage Foundation, the Cato Institute and the American Enterprise Institute, began to publish pamphlets, speeches and blogs making the case for Brexit. These typically reimagined Britain as a freewheeling, globally networked economy, striking trade deals with the USA, Canada and an expanded Asian and Australasian Anglosphere. Arguments that would subsequently be played out during the Brexit referendum were first rehearsed in these quarters. At the core of these arguments was a very distinctive economic vision. The financial crisis of 2008–9 had blown a large hole in the intellectual edifice of Anglo-American capitalism. But, in its immediate aftermath, a combination of quantitative easing, the judicious application of Keynesian fiscal prescriptions and massive Chinese credit creation helped pull the US, UK and Asian economies out of recession.

…

With the long-anticipated referendum on the UK's membership of the EU now imminent, proponents of the Anglosphere moved into a more overtly political mode of operation, drawing on their ideological reworking of Britain's global history to advance a new account of the country's role in the world outside the EU and establishing the key positions that would form the core of their referendum platform. The overarching rationale for these was supplied by Michael Gove, a long-time ally of the prime minister who decamped to help lead the official Vote Leave campaign alongside the former mayor of London, Boris Johnson. (Johnson would later unwittingly bestow a metaphor on the effect the Brexit referendum would have on his own party's leadership when he described the media scrum outside his house, as he announced his support for leaving the EU, as an ‘imperial goatfuck’.)1 Gove built his case on the same foundations as those established by Powell in 1975, namely that Britain had lost her sovereignty by joining this wider union: ‘our membership of the European Union prevents us being able to change huge swathes of law and stops us being able to choose who makes critical decisions which affect all our lives.

Welcome to Britain: Fixing Our Broken Immigration System by Colin Yeo;

barriers to entry, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, British Empire, coronavirus, COVID-19, Donald Trump, G4S, illegal immigration, immigration reform, Jeremy Corbyn, low skilled workers, lump of labour, open immigration, post-war consensus, self-driving car, Shamima Begum, Skype, Socratic dialogue

The growth in the number of asylum claims from the mid-1990s onwards, before a rapid and unplanned increase in migration from new members of the European Union from 2004, enabled immigration to be rapidly repoliticised as an issue. Ultimately, it would contribute its part to Labour’s loss of office and the subsequent Brexit referendum result just over five years later. The second chapter takes a long, hard look at the evolution and effect of the net migration target. As the primary driver of immigration policy for a decade, this target was hugely influential. Widely thought to have been announced by David Cameron when he was Leader of the Opposition in January 2010, the idea of introducing a specific numerical limit to immigration actually dated back to the Conservative Party manifesto of 2005.

…

In this context, media stories about inconvenience to migrants or hardnosed decisions by officials would help rather than harm a minister’s reputation. A trickle and then a flood of outraged news stories about the rejection of applications by EU nationals for permanent residence and citizenship after the Brexit referendum vote in 2016 showed that public attitudes were more nuanced than had been thought.9 Those personally unfamiliar with the immigration system began to ask why their friends and neighbours were being treated so abysmally by immigration officials. The fact that white, middle-class professionals were affected gave the issue more traction in the media and with the general public than would have been the case if the victims had been racialised or poor.

…

The Guardian ran an article about the report but the Home Office response was dismissive.43 There were no plans to set up any such special unit, a spokesman said, and ‘it is up to anyone who does not have an established immigration status to regularise their position, however long they have been here’. At the time, there was no other interest outside the immigration law and campaigning community. The ‘Chasing Status’ report seemed to have sunk without trace. After the Brexit referendum in 2016, though, the media found a new appetite for stories critical of the Home Office, following a string of articles about generally white, middle-class EU migrants who were facing difficulties proving their permanent residence. Guardian journalist Amelia Gentleman soon started to investigate the cases of destitute black and Asian residents.

Rule Britannia: Brexit and the End of Empire by Danny Dorling, Sally Tomlinson

3D printing, Ada Lovelace, Alfred Russel Wallace, anti-communist, anti-globalists, Big bang: deregulation of the City of London, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, British Empire, Bullingdon Club, Cambridge Analytica, centre right, colonial rule, Corn Laws, correlation does not imply causation, David Ricardo: comparative advantage, deindustrialization, disinformation, Dominic Cummings, Donald Trump, Edward Snowden, electricity market, en.wikipedia.org, epigenetics, Etonian, falling living standards, Flynn Effect, gentrification, housing crisis, illegal immigration, imperial preference, income inequality, inflation targeting, invisible hand, Jeremy Corbyn, knowledge economy, market fundamentalism, mass immigration, megacity, New Urbanism, Nick Leeson, North Sea oil, offshore financial centre, out of africa, Right to Buy, Ronald Reagan, Silicon Valley, South China Sea, sovereign wealth fund, spinning jenny, Steven Pinker, Suez canal 1869, Suez crisis 1956, The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, Thomas Malthus, University of East Anglia, Wayback Machine, We are the 99%, wealth creators

They could see that if they did not promise the EU rebels their referendum then the Conservative Party might tear itself apart, that the UK Independence Party (UKIP) would take even more votes from the Conservatives, and that Labour might then have gained power in 2015. In the event, UKIP disintegrated, with their votes going mainly to the Conservatives; there was some speculation that erstwhile leader Nigel Farage would stand for a Northern Irish Democratic Unionist Party parliamentary seat.13 Furthermore, the long Brexit referendum run-up and debate became a useful distraction from the reality of austerity. In any case, once the EU referendum result was declared, David Cameron immediately quit as Prime Minister, with his family wealth of well over £10 million intact.14 He then charged up to £120,000 for speeches15 and re-joined White’s Club, the ‘gentlemen-only’ club he had resigned from on becoming PM.16 He left a woman to sort out the mess.

…

These schools are still instilling feelings of superiority today, but with no empire to absorb the urges that creates. A small coterie of mainly rich and privileged people mouthed slogans about improving social mobility while producing policies that actually ring-fenced the wealthy and made most of the population poorer. After the Brexit referendum, these people tried to convince us that it was poorer northern Labour supporters who swung the vote to leave the EU, whereas it was huge numbers of Tory voters in poorer Tory areas voting Leave that did it. Was it, as Robert Peston so eloquently wrote, that people wanted to give a bloody nose to these posh boys who had created so much more inequality to the benefit of only a tiny few?

…

It’s time to bust the myths’, The Guardian, 17 May, https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/may/17/immigration-good-for-britain-bust-myths-austerity 25 Watts, J. (2017) ‘Brexit: Britons now back Remain over Leave by 10 points, exclusive poll shows’, The Independent, 16 December, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/brexit-second-referendum-latest-poll-remain-ten-points-leave-bmg-a8114406.html 26 Jack, I. (2018) ‘The sun may never set on British misconceptions about our empire’, The Guardian, 6 January, https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/jan/06/british-misconceptions-empire-guilty-colonialism 27 Ipsos MORI (2016) ‘How Britain voted in the 2016 EU referendum’, Ipsos MORI news blog, 5 September, https://www.ipsos.com/ipsos-mori/en-uk/how-britain-voted-2016-eu-referendum 28 Moore, M. (2018) ‘Cumberbatch to play Vote Leave mastermind Cummings in Brexit TV drama’, The Times, 16 May, https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/benedict-cumberbatch-to-play-vote-leave-mastermind-dominic-cummings-in-brexit-tv-drama-b297ckpv8 29 Goodwin, M. (2017) ‘Brexit Britain: The Causes and Consequences of the Leave Vote’, public lecture, text available here: http://www.matthewjgoodwin.org/uploads/6/4/0/2/64026337/leave_vote_lecture.pdf CHAPTER 2 BRITAIN’S IMMIGRANT ORIGINS The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland came into being in a series of treaties between its constituent nations, England and Wales in 1536, with Scotland in 1707 and with Ireland, thus formalizing its long-standing occupation, in 1801.

Brexit, No Exit: Why in the End Britain Won't Leave Europe by Denis MacShane

"World Economic Forum" Davos, 3D printing, Alan Greenspan, Alvin Toffler, banking crisis, battle of ideas, Big bang: deregulation of the City of London, Boris Johnson, Bretton Woods, Brexit referendum, British Empire, centre right, Corn Laws, deindustrialization, Doha Development Round, Donald Trump, Etonian, European colonialism, fake news, financial engineering, first-past-the-post, fixed income, Gini coefficient, greed is good, illegal immigration, information security, James Dyson, Jeremy Corbyn, labour mobility, liberal capitalism, low cost airline, low interest rates, Martin Wolf, mass immigration, military-industrial complex, Mont Pelerin Society, negative equity, Neil Kinnock, new economy, non-tariff barriers, offshore financial centre, open borders, open economy, post-truth, price stability, purchasing power parity, quantitative easing, reshoring, road to serfdom, secular stagnation, Silicon Valley, Thales and the olive presses, trade liberalization, transaction costs, women in the workforce

Never have two British prime ministers shown such lack of judgement in just twelve months. Theresa May, whose election manifesto was almost a UKIP document in its repudiation of Europe, suffered a humiliating defeat after less than a year in office. Although she did not resign on the spot as David Cameron did after his Brexit referendum defeat the year before, few could see Mrs May staying long in office after voters rejected her policy and her decision to call an opportunistic election. Mrs May had opted for a hardline on Brexit but she no longer has a majority in the House of Commons for this policy. The Northern Irish Democratic Unionist Party is very right-wing on issues like gay and women’s rights or climate change but its voters base is in Northern Ireland’s farming community which depends on there being no border or customs clearing between Northern Ireland in the UK and Ireland in the EU.

…

Will demands from Boris Johnson and the other Germanophobe Tories persuade the pro-EU Free Democratic Party or even those in the anti-Muslim, racist Alternative für Deutschland party (AfD) that they should tear up their values and common rule book to appease UKIP and anti-Europeans in the British government? The conservatives expelled the AfD from their group in the European Parliament in March 2016 as part of David Cameron’s attempts to schmooze Angela Merkel ahead of the Brexit referendum. There is understandable bitterness that having been welcomed by conservatives as a fellow Eurosceptic party after winning seats in the 2014 European Parliament elections, the AfD should be dumped by British Tories two years later in a futile attempt to curry favour with the German Chancellor.

…

Normally a prime minister makes programmatic speeches at a party conference, designed as much for international consumption as domestic party politics. At her party conference Mrs May was not speaking to the world or even the nation and its elected representatives, let alone the 48 per cent of the Brexit referendum voters who voted in favour of Europe, but to her beloved Tory Party rank and file. She refused to say anything to heal the wounds of a badly divided nation. There was no acknowledgement of the 48 per cent of voters who did not fall in behind UKIP and the Tory campaign based on acknowledged lies.

The Border: The Legacy of a Century of Anglo-Irish Politics by Diarmaid Ferriter

Berlin Wall, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, British Empire, open borders, Ronald Reagan, upwardly mobile

Rather than seeing the border people as in limbo she preferred the idea of them as an identity unto themselves, a ‘third space in which physical borders create new ways of seeing and scheming, including the man who owned a bridge across the border; he bought a chip van on eBay and then put the van on it’, so avoiding taxes as it was neither in the North nor the South.32 Nolan was also interested in the perspective of children who had never seen a militarised Irish border and ‘don’t recognise a border – even a ritual as simple as going to get the dinner in the chipper could involve walking across the border’ – and the ease of visiting a grandparent who lived five minutes over the border.33 This idea of a specific border people or identity also struck Garrett Carr when on his border travels in 2016: ‘border people … seemed to be giving name to an identity, a culture even’.34 There was even, with the European soccer championships in France in June 2016, in which both Northern Ireland and Republic of Ireland teams participated, a cathartic sense of peaceful and supportive co-existence between northern and southern fans, summed up in the comment of the French sports newspaper L’Equipe on 22 June, ‘for atmosphere, Ireland is unified’.35 And then, a day later, came the Brexit vote. — 7 — Brexit, Backstops and Brinkmanship While 55.8 per cent of the Northern Ireland electorate who voted in the Brexit referendum opted to remain in the EU (although the DUP, unlike most northern politicians, supported Brexit), the overall UK vote meant, it seemed, that Northern Ireland would be exiting the EU against its will. Tricky questions came tumbling fast: was it the case that with Northern Ireland outside the EU, those northerners who wished to remain European citizens would be required to claim Irish citizenship, even if they saw themselves as British?

…

While the long-term potential for an expanded united Irish economy may have held out reasons for optimism, how the Republic would manage to absorb the cost of unification and replacing the UK subvention in the short term was a troubling question with predictions that it could reduce the Republic’s living standards and national income by up to 15 per cent.18 What also remained problematic amidst any talk of unity was dealing with the reality of an Ulster unionism that may have been much weakened – power sharing collapsed in Northern Ireland in January 2017 and the consequent Northern Ireland assembly elections indicated that, for the first time, unionist parties no longer had an outright majority and 70 per cent of voters backed parties opposed to Brexit – but could not be ignored or coerced, and the need for the British government to court a DUP that was now propping up a Conservative party at war. The aftermath of the Brexit referendum brought numerous reminders of the extent to which the policing and security infrastructure around the border had been largely dismantled as a result of the peace process and that there were many aspects of cross-border movement and co-operation quietly convenient and successful. These included cross-border social welfare and pension entitlements because the Common Travel Area between Britain and Ireland (founded upon administrative agreements in 1922 and 1952) provided for reciprocal rights between both countries, ensuring that British and Irish citizens could continue to travel freely between North and South and Britain and Ireland with the right to live, work, study and access welfare and other services in each other’s countries.

…

I think we should call that particular bluff.’26 This was a moronic case of seeking to blame someone else for the consequences of Brexit and ignoring the reality of international trade rules, namely that if the UK left the EU trading bloc then a border would become an imperative.27 David Davis, Brexit secretary until July 2018, was forced to apologise for not telling Northern Ireland politicians about his first, farcical, visit to the Irish border, an unannounced trip to several sites along the County Armagh side of the border, almost two years after the Brexit referendum. There was still, it seemed, a determination to avoid, as former home secretary and prime minister James Callaghan was advised, ‘getting sucked into the Irish bog’. Likewise, in March 2018 Theresa May walked through a farm between Bangor and Belfast in the constituency of North Down and looked indifferently at a cow, more than fifty miles away from the nearest section of the border.

The New Nomads: How the Migration Revolution Is Making the World a Better Place by Felix Marquardt

"World Economic Forum" Davos, agricultural Revolution, Anthropocene, Black Lives Matter, Black Swan, Boris Johnson, Bretton Woods, Brexit referendum, British Empire, carbon footprint, carbon tax, coronavirus, COVID-19, dark matter, digital nomad, Donald Trump, George Floyd, ghettoisation, glass ceiling, green new deal, Greta Thunberg, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Joi Ito, Kickstarter, knowledge economy, labour market flexibility, Les Trente Glorieuses, out of africa, phenotype, place-making, Ponzi scheme, pre–internet, QAnon, Ray Kurzweil, remote working, Richard Feynman, road to serfdom, Silicon Valley, Skype, Snapchat, social distancing, sustainable-tourism, technological solutionism, technoutopianism, Yogi Berra, young professional

movement 48–54, 69, 123–7, 130, 145–6 Barry, Boubakar 132–3 Barry, Ismaila 131–9, 144, 145 Beckett, Samuel 243 Bengal famine (1943) 100 Berry, Wendell: ‘The Peace of Wild Things’ 224 Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) 140 Black Elephant 232–9, 241 Blair, Tony 30 Blanc, Louis 159 Blueground 75–6 Bogotá, Colombia 116, 119–20 Bohr, Niels 212 Boswell, Scott 201, 202–3, 204 Breslau, Silesia 32 Brexit referendum (2016) 8, 15–16, 30, 40–1, 99, 100–1, 205, 210, 218, 238 Brilliant Minds conference (2019) 212–14, 215 Britain 14, 125 air travel in 217 Brexit referendum see Brexit referendum emigration from Britain to the EU 99, 101, 121 Empire 77, 100–1, 134 European migrants in 54–5, 128–30 football supporters in 59–63 ‘hostile environment’ policy 146, 168 private schools in 49 university sector 77–8, 108, 146 Canada 52, 72, 73, 116, 118, 128, 176–7, 178, 179 carbon emissions 16–17, 163, 198, 214, 217, 241 Carrère, Emmanuel 27 Casablanca, Charlotte de 116–20, 229 Caudill, Debbie 64 Caudill, Jeremiah 59, 63–8 Céline, Louis-Ferdinand: Journey to the End of the Night 93 Central America, emigration from 9, 10 Chang, Lulu 107–111, 115, 116, 119–20, 229 Charlie Hebdo 23, 24 Charlottesville rally, US (2017) 15 Chiang Mai, Thailand 186, 197 China 102, 140 African migrants in 130–9 emigration from 107–111, 229 entrepreneurship in 51, 52, 55, 79, 80, 83 global rankings of most-prized destinations for migrants and 76, 130–9, 145 One Belt One Road (OBOR) initiative 135–6 racism and 131–2 Uighurs in 139 Chirac, Jacques 51 Ciudad del Este, Paraguay 85–6 climate change 16–17, 19, 30–1, 90, 198, 200, 228 Africa and 90, 217 air travel and 217–18 Berenice Tompkins and 218–21, 223 cities, movement out of and 223 Covid-19 and 217–18 culture, demands a new kind of 58–9 carbon footprint of average environmentally conscious privileged liberal 216–17 conservatives and 219, 222 COP21 (United Nations climate change conference) 218 COP24 (United Nations climate change conference) 218 Davos and 30–1 denial 209 digital nomad and 195, 197, 198, 200 early humans and 147 ‘global economy’ phrase and 222 Great March for Climate Action 218–21 inequality and 216–17 IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) 215 liberals and 15, 31, 215, 216–21 migrants/refugees, climate 19, 159, 205, 215 optimism around, unwarranted 222 Othering, climate activists and 15 People’s Pilgrimage (climate march) 218–21 solutionism and 216 ultra-mobility and 215 US and 217–21 Coates, Ta-Nehisi 113–14 Collier, Paul: Refuge 174 conservatives anywheres-somewheres divide and 41 climate change and 219, 222 Othering and 15 problems of modern world, responses to 222 US and 3, 7, 14, 202 COP21 (United Nations climate change conference) 218 COP24 (United Nations climate change conference) 218 county supremacy doctrine, US 64 Covid-19 10, 16–17, 44, 146, 161, 228, 235, 236 climate change and 217–18 digital nomad and 184, 193, 198–9, 217, 218, 225 dual citizenship and 185–6 post-Covid era 223, 228, 238 WEF/Davos and 240, 241 Cylance 28 Dar Al Islam (French-language ISIS magazine) 25 Dar es Salaam, Tanzania 76, 80–1, 84, 85, 86, 88, 122 Davis, Carl 114, 115 Deborah (Spanish migrant in UK) 128–30 Demonbreun, Taylor 195 De Pecol, Cassie 195 Dewhirst, Isaac 70–1 Diabate, Abdramane ‘Abdi’ Black Elephant and 235, 238, 241 migration to US 1–8, 12, 13–14, 21–2, 47, 59, 68, 133, 218, 224, 232–4, 235, 238, 241 World Economic Forum in Davos (2017), attends 232–4 Diabate, Mamadou 2, 5–7 Diabate, Nouweizema 6 digital nomad 167, 182, 183–200, 225 competitive travel and 189–90 coronavirus pandemic and 184, 185, 186, 193, 198–9 ‘Davos man’ and 196 dual citizenship and 185–6 ecological cost of 195, 197, 198, 200 global elite and 188, 195–6 Gonzalo Sanchez Sarmiento’s experience as 190–4, 197, 199 hyper-nomad and 188 Jobbatical and 191–2 sense of community and 197, 199 location independence and 196–7 New Nomad, as prototype for 199–200 origins of 187–8 problems with 192–4, 197, 199–200 typical jobs 186 Diop, Medinatou Mohamed 132, 133 Dorling, Danny 100 dual citizenship 185–6 Dubai 76–9, 80, 110, 162 economic migration 122–47, 196 ‘Barrez-vous!’

…

Up until the moment I started writing, this book was going to be a rather predictable globalist ode to mobility. The rise of nativism, nationalism and populism was already a trend. As I saw it, nomadism was the perfect cure: personal and economic growth as the answer to nationalism and xenophobia. But something started shifting in my mind following the Brexit referendum and the election of Donald Trump. I came to Davos in January 2017 expecting those ‘Committed to improving the state of the world’5 to engage in intense soul-searching and to try to figure out what had gone wrong. After all, it was the Thatcherism-lite of Tony Blair and the centrism of Barack Obama, both celebrated in Davos as the pinnacle of political, economic and social development, which had led to these two earthquakes.

…

To this day, few things make me as uncomfortable as the bland, eerily detached atmosphere that one finds in the ‘co-working’ and ‘co-living’ spaces and the other trendy ghettos of today’s expats, themselves rebranded as ‘digital or global nomads’, that are popping up everywhere. The same goes for restaurant and coffee or clothing chains that look and feel the same in any mall or town high street around the world. A culture which isn’t locally grounded is hardly a culture at all. In the wake of the Brexit referendum, the political scientist David Goodhart offered a handy paradigm to understand what he saw as the new fundamental divide of British politics.9 The traditional haves vs have nots opposition has given way to a new one, between anywheres – self-perceived as mobile, educated and progressive – and somewheres – more grounded and ‘real’, conservatives rooted in the place of their birth.

Angrynomics by Eric Lonergan, Mark Blyth

AlphaGo, Amazon Mechanical Turk, anti-communist, Asian financial crisis, basic income, Ben Bernanke: helicopter money, Berlin Wall, Bernie Sanders, Big Tech, bitcoin, blockchain, Branko Milanovic, Brexit referendum, business cycle, Capital in the Twenty-First Century by Thomas Piketty, central bank independence, collective bargaining, COVID-19, credit crunch, cryptocurrency, decarbonisation, deindustrialization, diversified portfolio, Donald Trump, Erik Brynjolfsson, Extinction Rebellion, fake news, full employment, gig economy, green new deal, Greta Thunberg, hiring and firing, Hyman Minsky, income inequality, income per capita, Jeremy Corbyn, job automation, labour market flexibility, liberal capitalism, lockdown, low interest rates, market clearing, Martin Wolf, Modern Monetary Theory, precariat, price stability, quantitative easing, Ronald Reagan, secular stagnation, self-driving car, Skype, smart grid, sovereign wealth fund, spectrum auction, The Future of Employment, The Great Moderation, The Spirit Level, universal basic income

A bailout paid for by the already squeezed with the shift to austerity policies that in some cases saw 30 per cent cuts in local services.6 Meanwhile in the metropoles, banks went back to earning billions and house prices worked like magic ATMs. When politicians really needed to motivate electorates, they stopped making the case for deep-rooted economic change, and reverted to fear. In the euro crisis, populations were held in check by threats of renewed financial panic. In both the Scottish independence and Brexit referendums, the threat of losing what you have was used as a weapon to defend the status quo. Across central and eastern Europe, fear of migrants destroying “our” culture became the motivating meme. You can’t expect real people – neither synthetic representative agents nor imaginary median voters – to put up with these disconnects forever.

…

In the UK after the crisis real (inflation adjusted) government spending fell by 16 per cent per person. At the local level it fell by nearly a quarter, with some areas losing nearly half, yes half, of their budgets.15 You will not be shocked to know that the areas with the deepest cuts swung most heavily nationalist (to UKIP) at the time of the Brexit referendum. Given this, when we talk about the rise of tribal political parties emerging under angrynomics, we need to stress that this is absolutely not about reigniting a latent tribal political identity that is somehow genetically inherited. England, after all, has only been around in its modern form for a few hundred years.

…

I then want to make a claim – that how immigration is subjectively experienced varies across the income distribution – and then tie those observations together to suggest that immigration is both the political lightening rod for the tribal version of angrynomics while being a legitimate concern that needs to be addressed if we want the world to be less angry. For me the refrain that “the Brexit referendum was not about economics” is based on the fact that there was no obvious one-to-one correlation between the level of income of a given constituency and the desire to vote leave. This much is true. But it is also partial. Voting leave correlated with lower skill levels, which are a proxy for income, as well as hourly earnings, population density (cities are richer than towns and villages) and competition from imports, and a host of other economic negatives.

Protest and Power: The Battle for the Labour Party by David Kogan

Bear Stearns, Berlin Wall, Bernie Sanders, Boris Johnson, Bretton Woods, Brexit referendum, Brixton riot, centre right, crowdsourcing, Donald Trump, Etonian, F. W. de Klerk, falling living standards, financial independence, full employment, imperial preference, Jeremy Corbyn, means of production, Mikhail Gorbachev, Neil Kinnock, Nelson Mandela, Northern Rock, open borders, race to the bottom, Ronald Reagan, wealth creators, Winter of Discontent, Yom Kippur War

Within forty-eight hours of initially setting up this WhatsApp group, suddenly we watched on the news ten thousand people out demonstrating in Parliament Square. It was unbelievable. We came back after five days to ‘Keep Corbyn: Build Our Movement’. The whole thing was we needed to build this, and we needed to grow. Beth Foster-Ogg was supposed to be on her gap year. I left two days before the Brexit referendum. I was going to have five weeks in Cuba, come back, do a couple more weeks with Momentum, and then go to Uni. That was the plan. We got a text to say that Brexit had happened and my phone exploded. It was actually vibrating, because I’d been put in all these group chats about the coup. I rang Adam.

…

Index Abbott, Diane here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here Abrahams, Debbie here Adams, Gerry here Adonis, Andrew here, here Afghanistan war here, here, here, here Al Qaeda here Alexander the Great here Alexander, Sir Danny here Alexander, Douglas here, here Alexander, Heidi here Ali, Rushanara here Ali, Tariq here Alliance for Workers’ Liberty here, here, here Allied Union of Engineering Workers (AUEW) here, here all-women shortlists here, here, here Another Europe is Possible (AEIP) here, here, here, here, here, here antisemitism row here, here, here, here, here, here Arab Spring here Armstrong, Hilary here, here Article 50 here, here, here, here, here, here, here see also Brexit; EU referendum Ashdown, Paddy here Ashworth, Jonathan here, here, here, here, here, here, here al-Assad, Bashar here Association of London Government here, here Atkinson, Norman here, here Attlee, Clement here, here, here, here austerity here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here Austin, Ian here, here, here Baldwin, Tom here Balls, Ed here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here Bank of England here, here Banks, Tony here, here, here, here Barclay, Stephen here Barenboim, Daniel here Barnet council here Basnett, David here, here, here BBC here, here, here, here, here, here, here and Iraq war here Beckett, Margaret here, here, here, here, here, here Benn, Emily here Benn, Hilary here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here Benn, Tony here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here compared with Corbyn here death here, here deputy leadership election (1981) here, here, here, here, here, here, here economic programme and NEC here, here general election defeat (1983) here, here and Iraq war here, here and Kinnock leadership here, here, here, here and Kosovo intervention here and Northern Ireland here Berger, Luciana here, here, here, here, here, here Berlin Wall, fall of here Bermondsey by-election here, here, here Best for Britain here, here, here, here Beveridge, William here bin Laden, Osama here Bishops Stortford meeting here Black September group here Black, Ann here, here, here, here, here Black Wednesday here Blair, Tony here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and antisemitism row here and Brown here, here, here, here, here and Brown premiership here, here enters parliament here and EU referendum/Brexit here, here, here general election victory (1997) here, here, here and international events here and Iraq war here, here, here, here, here leadership election (1994) here, here, here leadership style here, here and London mayoral election here and Miliband leadership here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and New Labour here, here, here, here, here, here, here and public services here, here stands down as leader here and trade unions here vetoes Corbyn deselection here Blears, Hazel here Blunkett, David here Board of Deputies of British Jews here, here Bond, Jack here, here, here, here Bond, Pete here Bono here Brabin, Tracy here Bradshaw, Ben here Brady, Sir graham here Bretton Woods here Brexit here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here Irish border issue here, here, here, here, here, here, here see also Article here; EU referendum Brixton riots here Brooks, Rebekah here Brown, Gordon here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and antisemitism row here, here and Blair here, here, here, here, here and Blair leadership here, here economic policies here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and EU referendum here, here and financial crisis here, here general election defeat (2010) here, here Gillian Duffy incident here, here leadership election (1994) here, here leadership election (2007) here, here and Miliband leadership here, here, here, here, here, here, here and New Labour here, here, here, here, here, here, here parallels with Callaghan here, here parallels with Osborne here premiership here refuses to join Euro here, here, here, here and Scottish referendum here and trade unions here Brown, Ron here Burden, Richard here Burgon, Richard here, here, here Burnham, Andy here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here leadership election (2015) here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here Bush, George H.

The Hidden Half: How the World Conceals Its Secrets by Michael Blastland

air freight, Alfred Russel Wallace, banking crisis, Bayesian statistics, behavioural economics, Berlin Wall, Brexit referendum, central bank independence, cognitive bias, complexity theory, Deng Xiaoping, Diane Coyle, Donald Trump, epigenetics, experimental subject, full employment, George Santayana, hindsight bias, income inequality, Jeremy Corbyn, manufacturing employment, mass incarceration, meta-analysis, minimum wage unemployment, nudge unit, oil shock, p-value, personalized medicine, phenotype, Ralph Waldo Emerson, random walk, randomized controlled trial, replication crisis, Richard Thaler, selection bias, the map is not the territory, the scientific method, The Wisdom of Crowds, twin studies

But it is unquestionably going through a new and intense period of soul-searching about its methods and reliability. To any outsider, that is a shock. Even defenders seem to agree that we have recently laid bare huge scope for improvement. Controversy about experts flared up at the time of the UK’s Brexit referendum after a comment by a politician, Michael Gove, widely reported as: ‘people have had enough of experts’. To be fair, he didn’t simply throw a bucket of scorn at all experts. He was more careful than that, and actually said: ‘People have had enough of experts from organisations with acronyms saying that they know what is best and getting it consistently wrong.’

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Mansions of established wisdom have gone down like slum clearance lately. Take the many astounding events in politics: the elections of relative outsiders Donald Trump in the US and Emmanuel Macron in France; or the rise of a populist political right in many parts of Europe. Or consider the UK’s Brexit referendum, or the rise of Jeremy Corbyn, a left-wing Member of Parliament whose chances of the leadership of his party were rated zero by most observers, who then took firm control. Even democracy, some say, is suddenly in retreat.17 Political assumptions have fallen to the extent that one professor of politics wondered publicly if it was time she and colleagues tore up their lecture notes and started afresh.18 Then throw in economics and business, with their global banking and financial crises, deep recession, slow recovery and an enduring low-productivity puzzle in many OECD countries,19 plus a historically unprecedented stutter in the growth of average earnings in some leading economies – and all in all you have to wonder if this is a time for a large helping of what philosophers call epistemic humility (intellectual humble pie to the rest of us).

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This is the second problem. Economic data during what we now call austerity, following the 2008–9 recession, became a free-for-all of causal inference, as voices rose to interpret the latest small change in the figures in terms favourable (or not) to government policy. Economic data after the Brexit referendum suffered the same treatment. Low-ish GDP growth was evidence that even the prospect of Brexit – let alone the real thing – was already causing damage; high-ish growth was evidence that, oh no it wasn’t, we were fine. Some acknowledge that the figures are uncertain. They dig a little, taking care to emphasize that judgement is provisional and that the numbers are bound to vary a little from one quarter to another anyway.

Mindf*ck: Cambridge Analytica and the Plot to Break America by Christopher Wylie

4chan, affirmative action, Affordable Care Act / Obamacare, air gap, availability heuristic, Berlin Wall, Bernie Sanders, Big Tech, big-box store, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, British Empire, call centre, Cambridge Analytica, Chelsea Manning, chief data officer, cognitive bias, cognitive dissonance, colonial rule, computer vision, conceptual framework, cryptocurrency, Daniel Kahneman / Amos Tversky, dark pattern, dark triade / dark tetrad, data science, deep learning, desegregation, disinformation, Dominic Cummings, Donald Trump, Downton Abbey, Edward Snowden, Elon Musk, emotional labour, Etonian, fake news, first-past-the-post, gamification, gentleman farmer, Google Earth, growth hacking, housing crisis, income inequality, indoor plumbing, information asymmetry, Internet of things, Julian Assange, Lyft, Marc Andreessen, Mark Zuckerberg, Menlo Park, move fast and break things, Network effects, new economy, obamacare, Peter Thiel, Potemkin village, recommendation engine, Renaissance Technologies, Robert Mercer, Ronald Reagan, Rosa Parks, Sand Hill Road, Scientific racism, Shoshana Zuboff, side project, Silicon Valley, Skype, Stephen Fry, Steve Bannon, surveillance capitalism, tech bro, uber lyft, unpaid internship, Valery Gerasimov, web application, WikiLeaks, zero-sum game

We give the Republicans a few minutes to show up. They never do. It’s June 2018, and I’m in Washington to testify to the U.S. Congress about Cambridge Analytica, a military contractor and psychological warfare firm where I used to work, and a complex web involving Facebook, Russia, WikiLeaks, the Trump campaign, and the Brexit referendum. As the former director of research, I’ve brought with me evidence of how Facebook’s data was weaponized by the firm, and how the systems they built left millions of Americans vulnerable to the propaganda operations of hostile foreign states. Schiff leads the questioning. A former federal prosecutor, he is sharp and precise with his lines of inquiry, and he wastes no time getting to the heart of the matter.

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This was determined to be illegal by the U.K.’s Electoral Commission, with the scheme ending up as one of the largest and most consequential breaches of campaign finance law in British history. The office of the U.K.’s prime minister, 10 Downing Street, descended into communication crisis as the evidence of Vote Leave’s cheating emerged. The NCA and MI5 were later handed evidence of the Russian embassy’s direct relationship with the largest funders of pro-Brexit campaigns during the referendum. A week later, Facebook’s stock plummeted 18 percent, amounting to an $80 billion loss in valuation. The turbulence would continue, culminating in what still stands as the largest single-day loss in share value in U.S. corporate history. On March 27, 2018, I was called before Parliament for a live public hearing—something I’d get quite used to over the next several months.

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I had originally met Grimes through the Liberal Democrats, but he had become disenchanted when the party began to implode in the internal leadership race that followed its decimation in the 2015 elections. When Grimes decided to leave the Lib Dems, he asked me for an introduction to the Tories, so I introduced him to Parkinson. You’ve probably never heard of Grimes, but he would later become an accidental central player in Vote Leave’s victory in the Brexit referendum. Parkinson and I met several times before I left London, because he wanted to get my thoughts on data analytics. He did not say this at the time, but he knew about Cambridge Analytica and clocked how valuable such targeting tools would be for the Brexit campaign. He said that he wanted to introduce me to someone.

Moneyland: Why Thieves and Crooks Now Rule the World and How to Take It Back by Oliver Bullough

Alan Greenspan, banking crisis, Bernie Madoff, bitcoin, blood diamond, Bretton Woods, Brexit referendum, BRICs, British Empire, capital controls, central bank independence, corporate governance, cryptocurrency, cuban missile crisis, dark matter, diversification, Donald Trump, energy security, failed state, financial engineering, Flash crash, Francis Fukuyama: the end of history, full employment, Global Witness, high net worth, if you see hoof prints, think horses—not zebras, income inequality, joint-stock company, land bank, liberal capitalism, liberal world order, mass immigration, medical malpractice, Navinder Sarao, offshore financial centre, plutocrats, Plutonomy: Buying Luxury, Explaining Global Imbalances, rent-seeking, Richard Feynman, risk tolerance, Sloane Ranger, sovereign wealth fund, Suez crisis 1956, WikiLeaks

The anguish in the United States over Russia’s involvement in the 2016 presidential election is a remarkable testament to the destabilising impact of a relatively small amount of dirty money, even in a developed democracy. There is similar concern in Britain over murky donations into the Leave campaign during the Brexit referendum; and equivalent worries in other leading Western countries, particularly France and Germany. All money corrupts, and big money corrupts bigly. In one of the Harry Potter books, Mr Weasley warns his children: ‘Never trust anything that can think for itself if you can’t see where it keeps its brain.’

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At the very least, political parties should refuse to accept money from any entity if they can’t see where it keeps its brain. The widespread acceptance of this anonymous money into politics is contributing to a broad loss of trust in democratic processes. As I write, some eighteen months have passed since the Brexit referendum, and we still do not know who gave £425,000 to a body called the Constitutional Research Council, which passed it to Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party, which spent most of it on advertisements urging Britons to vote Leave. No rules were broken here, because of the special circumstances of Northern Ireland where party donors have their identities hidden for security reasons, but rules were very definitely bent.

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Oil companies had argued that the requirements put them at a disadvantage compared to foreign rivals, which was preventing them from expanding. ‘The energy jobs are coming back. Lots of people going back to work now,’ said Trump, after signing the documents to scrap the rules – a clear example of a democratic imperative clashing with an international initiative. Similarly, after the Brexit referendum, the UK government’s agenda to open up the offshore world to fight both tax dodging and corruption almost entirely halted. ‘The anti-corruption phone just stopped ringing,’ said Jon Benton, an ex-policeman who worked in the Cabinet Office as a senior adviser for the pre-referendum prime minister, David Cameron.

Where We Are: The State of Britain Now by Roger Scruton

bitcoin, blockchain, Brexit referendum, business cycle, Corn Laws, Donald Trump, Downton Abbey, Fellow of the Royal Society, fixed income, garden city movement, George Akerlof, housing crisis, invention of the printing press, invisible hand, Jeremy Corbyn, Khartoum Gordon, mass immigration, Naomi Klein, New Journalism, old-boy network, open borders, payday loans, Peace of Westphalia, sceptred isle, The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, Thorstein Veblen, too big to fail, Tragedy of the Commons, web of trust

Worse than this is the fact that we cannot question this publicly without risking the charge of ‘racism and xenophobia’, and therefore cannot begin the process of coming to terms with it by discussing what the costs and benefits might be. That is one reason why people no longer trust the political class. The Brexit referendum in Britain, the elections of Donald Trump and Emmanuel Macron, the rise of ‘outsider’ political parties in France, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, Spain, Sweden, Greece and Finland – all these unforeseen developments point to a breakdown in trust between the electorate and the political establishment.

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I return to this problem in the final chapter. For the moment, it is only necessary to recognize the trick – the invention of a word in order to ring-fence a favoured stance against discussion, and to silence the majority by ruining the reputation of anyone who speaks in its name. One positive result of the Brexit referendum is that, after the first flurry of the ‘racism and xenophobia’ meme, a moment of truth dawned on the British people, and even briefly illuminated the BBC. It was for a while evident to educated people that these labels designed to silence and to stigmatize are empty expletives, substitutes for thought, at a time when thought is more than ever needed.5 One or two people began to make comparative judgements, to conclude that Britain is, after all, when compared with other communities, not a racist society, even if there are racists scattered among us, some of whom put themselves on display in the course of the referendum.

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Decades of pusillanimity from the political establishment, and ‘virtue signalling’ from the liberal elite, have produced a situation in which whole sections of our cities seem to belong to some other country, while housing, healthcare and education are all in crisis from the pressure of incoming numbers. And the cost of this crisis is borne by the indigenous working class, whose assets have been redistributed among foreigners without so much as a by your leave. In the debates prior to the Brexit referendum, the experts came forward to warn the people of the threatened economic catastrophe, and the Confederation of British Industry (CBI) was prominent among them, telling the voters that the Single Market is indispensable to our prosperity. Many voters, however, were persuaded of only one thing, which is that the Single Market is a benefit to the CBI.

The New Class War: Saving Democracy From the Metropolitan Elite by Michael Lind

"World Economic Forum" Davos, affirmative action, anti-communist, basic income, Bernie Sanders, Boris Johnson, Bretton Woods, Brexit referendum, business cycle, Cambridge Analytica, capital controls, Cass Sunstein, central bank independence, centre right, collective bargaining, commoditize, corporate governance, cotton gin, crony capitalism, deindustrialization, disinformation, Doha Development Round, Donald Trump, Edward Snowden, export processing zone, fake news, future of work, gentrification, global supply chain, guest worker program, Haight Ashbury, illegal immigration, immigration reform, independent contractor, invisible hand, Jeremy Corbyn, knowledge economy, Les Trente Glorieuses, liberal world order, low skilled workers, low-wage service sector, manufacturing employment, Mark Zuckerberg, mass immigration, means of production, Michael Milken, moral panic, Nate Silver, new economy, offshore financial centre, oil shock, open borders, plutocrats, Ponzi scheme, purchasing power parity, Ralph Nader, regulatory arbitrage, rent-seeking, Richard Florida, Ronald Reagan, scientific management, Silicon Valley, SoftBank, The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, Thorstein Veblen, Timothy McVeigh, trade liberalization, union organizing, universal basic income, upwardly mobile, WikiLeaks, Wolfgang Streeck, working poor

—JAMES BURNHAM, The Machiavellians: Defenders of Freedom (1943) Introduction On the night of July 14, 1789, legend has it, news of the fall of the Bastille was brought by a duke to the king of France, Louis XVI. “Then it’s a revolt?” the king asked. The duke replied: “No, sire, it’s a revolution.” On June 23, 2016, a majority of British voters passed the Brexit referendum requiring the United Kingdom to leave the European Union. A few months after that political earthquake, on November 8, 2016, came an even more shocking event: the election of Donald Trump as president of the United States. Since then, throughout Europe, centrist parties have lost voters to outsider parties and politicians—sometimes on the left but more often on the populist and nationalist right.

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Support for her presidential bid “collapsed” (to use the pollster Nate Silver’s term) in the fifty counties with the lowest educational levels. Political differences correlated with education can be found among racial and ethnic minority populations as well.16 The same pattern is evident in Europe. In Britain, for example, the chief trait predicting support for the Leave side in the Brexit referendum in 2016 was lower educational qualifications—a trait that was more important than others, including race and ethnicity.17 Because the possession of a diploma tends to indicate birth into the economic elite, these figures manifest conflict among largely hereditary social classes, not a clash between knowledge and ignorance or intelligence and stupidity.

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In 2002, disaffected former mainstream party voters in addition to the tiny number of far-right voters permitted the anti-Semitic neofascist candidate Jean-Marie Le Pen to make it to the second round in the French presidential elections. The only reason there was a British referendum on membership in the European Union at all was the desire of British conservatives to appease a growing number of populist voters. Before the British “Leave” vote won the Brexit referendum in 2016, Dutch and French voters in 2005 and Irish voters in 2008 had rejected measures promoting greater centralization of the European Union in referendums. In all three countries, political elites later succeeded in maneuvers to ensure that the popular referendum results were nullified. As a political phenomenon, then, populism in the West is nothing new.

The Retreat of Western Liberalism by Edward Luce

"World Economic Forum" Davos, 3D printing, affirmative action, Airbnb, Alan Greenspan, basic income, Berlin Wall, Bernie Sanders, Boris Johnson, Branko Milanovic, bread and circuses, Bretton Woods, Brexit referendum, business cycle, call centre, carried interest, centre right, Charles Lindbergh, cognitive dissonance, colonial exploitation, colonial rule, computer age, corporate raider, cuban missile crisis, currency manipulation / currency intervention, disinformation, Dissolution of the Soviet Union, Doha Development Round, Donald Trump, double entry bookkeeping, driverless car, Erik Brynjolfsson, European colonialism, everywhere but in the productivity statistics, Evgeny Morozov, fake news, Fall of the Berlin Wall, Francis Fukuyama: the end of history, future of work, gentrification, George Santayana, gig economy, Gini coefficient, global pandemic, global supply chain, Great Leap Forward, illegal immigration, imperial preference, income inequality, independent contractor, informal economy, Internet of things, Jaron Lanier, knowledge economy, lateral thinking, Les Trente Glorieuses, liberal capitalism, Marc Andreessen, Mark Zuckerberg, Martin Wolf, mass immigration, means of production, meritocracy, microaggression, Monroe Doctrine, moral panic, more computing power than Apollo, mutually assured destruction, new economy, New Urbanism, Norman Mailer, offshore financial centre, one-China policy, opioid epidemic / opioid crisis, Peace of Westphalia, Peter Thiel, plutocrats, precariat, purchasing power parity, reserve currency, reshoring, Richard Florida, Robert Gordon, Robert Solow, Ronald Reagan, Second Machine Age, self-driving car, sharing economy, Silicon Valley, Silicon Valley billionaire, Skype, Snapchat, software is eating the world, South China Sea, Steve Bannon, Steve Jobs, superstar cities, telepresence, The Rise and Fall of American Growth, The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, Thomas L Friedman, Tyler Cowen, Tyler Cowen: Great Stagnation, universal basic income, unpaid internship, Washington Consensus, We are the 99%, We wanted flying cars, instead we got 140 characters, white flight, World Values Survey, Yogi Berra

Western cities, such as London and Chicago, have no such luxury. In 2011, Boris Johnson, then London’s mayor, saw the downside when the capital’s fringes went on the rampage for several days, smashing up shops and burning cars, looting what they could not have. Five years later Britain’s left-behinds vetoed London’s economic interests in the Brexit referendum. To the West’s economic losers, cities like London and Chicago are not so much magnets as death stars. One of the ironies of the West’s booming cities is how much lip service its more fortunate denizens pay to a progressive worldview. We really couldn’t ask for a nicer elite. Yet the effects of how they spend their money are hardly progressive.

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In San Francisco, an ideas factory for America’s most liberal social policies, more than six in ten homes are now worth more than $1 million. As Richard Florida says, ‘In the US your ZIP code is increasingly your destiny.’ It will be interesting to see if Sadiq Khan, who was elected London’s mayor on an inclusive mandate just weeks before the Brexit referendum, has better luck than Bill de Blasio. The odds are against him. The jobs market offers a snapshot of rising inequality. The fastest-rising area of blue-collar jobs growth is the security industry – the private guards, police and other uniformed occupations that keep the wealthy neighbourhoods safe.

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‘Liberals should bear in mind that the first identity movement in American politics was the Ku Klux Klan, which still exists,’ wrote Lilla. ‘Those who play the identity game should be prepared to lose it.’29 In one form or another, such brinkmanship now threatens almost every Western democracy. An eerily similar dialectic played out in Britain’s 2016 Brexit referendum. Winston Churchill once joked that Britain and America were divided by a common language; today blue-collar whites on both sides of the Atlantic are speaking in the same idiom. They yearn for the security of a lost age. Just as America believed it had entered a post-racial era, Britain persuaded itself it had become a classless society.

Hiding in Plain Sight: The Invention of Donald Trump and the Erosion of America by Sarah Kendzior

4chan, Bear Stearns, Berlin Wall, Bernie Sanders, Black Lives Matter, borderless world, Brexit referendum, Cambridge Analytica, Carl Icahn, Chelsea Manning, Columbine, corporate raider, desegregation, disinformation, don't be evil, Donald Trump, drone strike, Edward Snowden, Evgeny Morozov, fake news, Ferguson, Missouri, Francis Fukuyama: the end of history, gentrification, Golden arches theory, hiring and firing, illegal immigration, income inequality, Jaron Lanier, Jeff Bezos, Jeffrey Epstein, Julian Assange, junk bonds, Michael Milken, military-industrial complex, Mohammed Bouazizi, Naomi Klein, Nelson Mandela, new economy, Oklahoma City bombing, opioid epidemic / opioid crisis, payday loans, plutocrats, public intellectual, QAnon, Robert Hanssen: Double agent, Ronald Reagan, side hustle, Silicon Valley, Skype, Steve Bannon, Thomas L Friedman, trickle-down economics, Twitter Arab Spring, unpaid internship, white flight, WikiLeaks, Y2K, zero-sum game

The calculus of post–Cold War politics—that democracy spreads through engagement, that technology enhances freedom—was reversed. Hostile states used digital technology not only to attack their own citizens but to attempt to transform foreign democracies into dictatorships. We saw this with Russian influence operations in elections in the United States, France, and in the Brexit referendum, among others.10 The social media corporations that had once bragged of the internet’s liberating power now helped the hijackers of democracy. Networks like Facebook abetted, whether intentionally or not, the “iron triangles” of organized crime, state corruption, and corporate criminality, and they were aided by complicit Western actors content to let their own countries die while turning a profit

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In 2014, Russia invaded Crimea and then held an illegal referendum that allowed the Kremlin to annex Ukraine territory. In 2015, Russia committed war crimes in Syria and began its illicit influence operations in Western elections—not only in the United States, but in the United Kingdom prior to the Brexit referendum. Before and while this was happening, the Obama administration continued to cut funding for research on the former Soviet Union and did not behave as if its actions posed a serious threat to the United States. At the time, this negligence seemed of a piece with Obama’s lack of interest in the former USSR as well as his obligation to confront a cavalcade of other disasters: in particular, Syria, ISIS, and domestic crises like the recession and a sharp rise in gun violence.

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In January, I was flown to the United Kingdom for a conference on press freedom and disinformation, where some Brits told me horror stories of Brexit while others assured me that they would figure it out, they would keep calm and carry on, this idiotic crisis surely would not undo a millennium of British sovereignty. I was not so sure. Brexit was a direct precursor of the US election, featuring not only the same largely unexpected result, but the same players behind the scenes. In early 2017, a tenacious UK journalist, Carole Cadwalladr, had started to investigate the role of social media in the Brexit referendum, especially the company Cambridge Analytica and the interlocking parties who benefited from it—Nigel Farage, Steve Bannon, Jared Kushner. Eventually, she got a whistle-blower from Cambridge Analytica to come forward about the extent of their data-mining and election-influencing operation, and both the whistle-blower and Cadwalladr received scorn and threats.32 She was not alone.

It's Better Than It Looks: Reasons for Optimism in an Age of Fear by Gregg Easterbrook

affirmative action, Affordable Care Act / Obamacare, air freight, Alan Greenspan, Apollo 11, autonomous vehicles, basic income, Bernie Madoff, Bernie Sanders, Black Lives Matter, Boeing 747, Branko Milanovic, Brexit referendum, business cycle, Capital in the Twenty-First Century by Thomas Piketty, carbon tax, clean tech, clean water, coronavirus, Crossrail, David Brooks, David Ricardo: comparative advantage, deindustrialization, Dissolution of the Soviet Union, Donald Trump, driverless car, Elon Musk, Exxon Valdez, factory automation, failed state, fake news, full employment, Gini coefficient, Google Earth, Home mortgage interest deduction, hydraulic fracturing, Hyperloop, illegal immigration, impulse control, income inequality, independent contractor, Indoor air pollution, interchangeable parts, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), invisible hand, James Watt: steam engine, labor-force participation, liberal capitalism, longitudinal study, Lyft, mandatory minimum, manufacturing employment, Mikhail Gorbachev, minimum wage unemployment, Modern Monetary Theory, obamacare, oil shale / tar sands, Paul Samuelson, peak oil, plant based meat, plutocrats, Ponzi scheme, post scarcity, purchasing power parity, quantitative easing, reserve currency, rising living standards, Robert Gordon, Ronald Reagan, self-driving car, short selling, Silicon Valley, Simon Kuznets, Slavoj Žižek, South China Sea, Steve Wozniak, Steven Pinker, supervolcano, The Chicago School, The Rise and Fall of American Growth, the scientific method, There's no reason for any individual to have a computer in his home - Ken Olsen, Thomas Kuhn: the structure of scientific revolutions, Thomas Malthus, transaction costs, Tyler Cowen, uber lyft, universal basic income, War on Poverty, Washington Consensus, We are all Keynesians now, WikiLeaks, working poor, Works Progress Administration

Donald Trump would not have convinced American voters their nation is in the throes of decay unless they were already inclined to think so. This incongruous condition—the United States has never been better off, yet voters perceive disaster—was reached for reasons unrelated to Trump. In the same sense, the equally incongruous condition of the United Kingdom on the 2016 day of the Brexit referendum—never better off and voters mad as hell—was reached for reasons unrelated to the prime minister and Parliament of that year. One aspect of declinism looked the same in both nations in 2016: the new notion of majority victimhood. Roughly a generation ago, national leaders, along with colleges and public schools, began to come clean about disgraces in the American and British heritages.

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Those pulled from the water were not appreciative, rather, incensed at the lifeguard, because everyone along the beach saw them struggle and knew they had failed to look after themselves. By the same token, many voters are not grateful to federal programs for assisting them but cross, since needing assistance implies they are at fault. During the 2016 Brexit referendum, areas of the United Kingdom that are net recipients of European Union subsidies voted to leave, while areas that are net taxpayers to Brussels voted to remain. During the 2016 presidential election, in general the states that receive more in subsidies from Washington than they send in taxes voted for Trump—who promised to destroy the source of their subsidies—while states that pay more to Washington than they get back voted against Trump.

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See ObamaCare Africa disease in, 25, 39 food production in, 9–11 longevity in, 32 aging, 203, 271–272 air pollution, 236, 242 car emission controls and, 60–61, 147 in China, 19, 58 Clean Air Act and, 62 coal-fired power plants and, 58–59 death from, 30 in India, 19, 59 in Iran, 59 reformulation of fuel and, 59–60 in Seoul, 58 sulfur dioxide in, 49 in US, 60–63 See also acid rain; greenhouse gas air travel Boeing and, 64, 73, 276 intercontinental, 25 manufacturing improvements and, 73 safety of, 154 technology and, 154–155 Allison, Graham, 133 American Civil War, 18 anecdotes, 218–220 Angell, Norman, 131–132, 133–134 animals, 42, 47–48 asteroids, 279–280 Ausubel, Jesse, 15 on carbon dioxide, 235–236 resource use and, 161 speed of travel for, 162–163 on technology, 161–162 authoritarianism, 167–168, 182 Autor, David, 79 Bar-Tal, Daniel, 283–284 Bastiat, Frédéric, 104 Bazelon, Emily, 221 Beck, Ulrich, 141, 144, 147 Big Sort communities, 222–223 Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, 9–10 bird species, 42, 47–48 black-taggers, 264 Boeing, 64, 73, 276 Borlaug, Norman, 3 career of, 6 high-yield agriculture of, 7–8, 9 organic fertilizers for, 7 wheat cross-breeding by, 6–7 Brexit referendum, 204, 209, 217 buying power, 85–86, 87, 246, 249 capital punishment, 116, 155–156 carbon dioxide, 50, 231–232 Ausubel on, 235–236 public health and, 62 carbon tax, 240–242 Carnation Revolution, 165 cars, 52, 65, 141 developing world and, 142–143 drunken driving, 145 emission controls on, 60–61, 147 fossil fuels and, 147–148 gas mileage of, 147–150 greenhouse gas emissions for, 147, 148, 151 Honda manufacturing, 75 horsepower reduction for, 150–151 reformulation of fuel for, 59–60 road-rage behavior and, 151 self-driving, 152–154 Sivak on, 147–148, 149 technology and, 143–149, 152–154, 162 traffic deaths, 28, 142–143, 145–146 Carter, James, 56 catastrophism, 20–21, 221, 283 Cather, Willa, 225 CEO pay, 252–254 chemical and biological weapons, 26–27 China, 133–134, 283 air pollution in, 19, 58 coal-fired power plants in, 58–59 democracy and education in, 170 extreme-poverty in, 20 greenhouse emissions in, 50–51 inequality in, 245–246 internet in, 176 life expectancy in, 32 manufacturing employment in, 78 Paris Agreement and, 243 Shenzhen, 15–16 smoking in, 35 water in, 13 CIMMYT.

Routes to Rejoin by Stay European

Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, centre right, coronavirus, COVID-19, Dominic Cummings, Donald Trump, first-past-the-post, lockdown, Rishi Sunak

Britain’s place in the world 79 Conclusion: Rallying for rejoin 85 “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.” Margaret Mead 11 Introduction Britain has the biggest pro-EU movement in Europe – yet it is now further out of the EU than even the most ardent Brexiters advocated during the referendum campaign five years ago. Despite a narrow 52-48% win for Leave in the 2016 referendum and the crisis that followed, the government continues to pursue a policy not only of Brexit, but of the hardest of hard Brexits. While they hide behind the ‘will of the people’, there is not – and never has been – a majority in favour of this plan.

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For the nationalist/republican community, a border through Ireland would represent a threat to their Irish identity; for the loyalist/unionist community, a border through the UK represents a threat to their British identity. The Conservatives chose the latter of these options – embarrassingly for the Democratic Unionist Party, who supported Brexit in the referendum and even propped up the Tory government after the 2017 general election left Theresa May with a wafer-thin majority. Betraying their former allies, the Tories signed a deal putting the border in the Irish Sea – though bizarrely the government continues to claim that it has not done so. Naomi Long of the cross-community Alliance Party said: “They denied the existence of borders, even as those borders were being erected.

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While this would not mean immediately rejoining the EU, we believe it could be a key moment and, if we get the wind in our sails, a huge step towards rejoining by the end of the decade. A reckoning delayed As we consider the next few years – this book is being written in the summer of 2021 – one point is inescapable: we are yet to experience the vast majority of the effects of Brexit. Brexit since the referendum has been a story of delay, indecision, scattered attempts to cushion the impact, transition periods, implementation periods, grace periods, temporary exceptions to new rules, and further delays. Brexit is ‘going OK’ only and precisely to the extent that it still has not happened yet. The end of the transition period on 31 December 2020 was the clearest moment so far when a large number of new rules (though far from all of them) came into effect.

Radical Uncertainty: Decision-Making for an Unknowable Future by Mervyn King, John Kay

Airbus A320, Alan Greenspan, Albert Einstein, Albert Michelson, algorithmic trading, anti-fragile, Antoine Gombaud: Chevalier de Méré, Arthur Eddington, autonomous vehicles, availability heuristic, banking crisis, Barry Marshall: ulcers, battle of ideas, Bear Stearns, behavioural economics, Benoit Mandelbrot, bitcoin, Black Swan, Boeing 737 MAX, Bonfire of the Vanities, Brexit referendum, Brownian motion, business cycle, business process, capital asset pricing model, central bank independence, collapse of Lehman Brothers, correlation does not imply causation, credit crunch, cryptocurrency, cuban missile crisis, Daniel Kahneman / Amos Tversky, David Ricardo: comparative advantage, DeepMind, demographic transition, discounted cash flows, disruptive innovation, diversification, diversified portfolio, Donald Trump, Dutch auction, easy for humans, difficult for computers, eat what you kill, Eddington experiment, Edmond Halley, Edward Lloyd's coffeehouse, Edward Thorp, Elon Musk, Ethereum, Eugene Fama: efficient market hypothesis, experimental economics, experimental subject, fear of failure, feminist movement, financial deregulation, George Akerlof, germ theory of disease, Goodhart's law, Hans Rosling, Helicobacter pylori, high-speed rail, Ignaz Semmelweis: hand washing, income per capita, incomplete markets, inflation targeting, information asymmetry, invention of the wheel, invisible hand, Jeff Bezos, Jim Simons, Johannes Kepler, John Maynard Keynes: Economic Possibilities for our Grandchildren, John Snow's cholera map, John von Neumann, Kenneth Arrow, Kōnosuke Matsushita, Linda problem, Long Term Capital Management, loss aversion, Louis Pasteur, mandelbrot fractal, market bubble, market fundamentalism, military-industrial complex, Money creation, Moneyball by Michael Lewis explains big data, Monty Hall problem, Nash equilibrium, Nate Silver, new economy, Nick Leeson, Northern Rock, nudge theory, oil shock, PalmPilot, Paul Samuelson, peak oil, Peter Thiel, Philip Mirowski, Phillips curve, Pierre-Simon Laplace, popular electronics, power law, price mechanism, probability theory / Blaise Pascal / Pierre de Fermat, quantitative trading / quantitative finance, railway mania, RAND corporation, reality distortion field, rent-seeking, Richard Feynman, Richard Thaler, risk tolerance, risk-adjusted returns, Robert Shiller, Robert Solow, Ronald Coase, sealed-bid auction, shareholder value, Silicon Valley, Simon Kuznets, Socratic dialogue, South Sea Bubble, spectrum auction, Steve Ballmer, Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, Suez crisis 1956, Tacoma Narrows Bridge, Thales and the olive presses, Thales of Miletus, The Chicago School, the map is not the territory, The Market for Lemons, The Nature of the Firm, The Signal and the Noise by Nate Silver, The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, The Wisdom of Crowds, Thomas Bayes, Thomas Davenport, Thomas Malthus, Toyota Production System, transaction costs, ultimatum game, urban planning, value at risk, world market for maybe five computers, World Values Survey, Yom Kippur War, zero-sum game

But when a President is selected by an electoral college, or the composition of the government depends on results in individual constituencies, an additional modelling exercise is required. In two major elections of 2016 – the US presidential election and the Brexit referendum – the failure of the pollsters to anticipate the result was the consequence of the failure of their models to translate their raw data into an accurate prediction – a manifestation of the Viniar problem. 12 After the 2015 UK General Election, in which the Conservative Party defied predictions and won an outright majority, and the unanticipated outcome of the Brexit referendum, many pollsters in Britain tweaked their models further, recognising in particular that their procedures had underestimated Conservative strength.

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Misinformation about migration In 2004, ten countries, including eight former communist ones, joined the European Union and their citizens gained the right to work in other member states. The European Commission estimated that migration from acceding countries to other members would initially be between 70,000 and 150,000 a year, declining thereafter. The British government anticipated that between 5000 and 13,000 of these would come to the UK. 18 By the time of the Brexit referendum in 2016, no fewer than 1.6 million residents of the UK were immigrants from accession states. 19 Another 450,000 had come to the UK from Romania and Bulgaria, which joined the EU slightly later. 20 In Ireland, some 240,000 people – 5% of the Irish population – were migrants from these new EU members. 21 We are not concerned here to debate the pros and cons of such migration.

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Our interlocutors often seek this information not because they attach credence to the numbers, but because they wish for reassurance, or they need to fill in another cell in their own spreadsheets, or because having asked the question offers an excuse when their plans go wrong. Policy-makers and campaigners routinely invent numbers to support their assertions. Before the Brexit referendum in 2016, the Leave campaign drove a bus around the country bearing the message ‘We send the EU £350 million a week. Let’s fund our NHS instead’. George Osborne, Chancellor of the Exchequer, leading the Remain campaign, stood in front of a poster saying that leaving the EU would cost each UK household £4300 per year. 1 The precision of both figures is an indicator of their preposterous nature.

The Road to Unfreedom: Russia, Europe, America by Timothy Snyder

active measures, affirmative action, Affordable Care Act / Obamacare, American ideology, anti-globalists, Bellingcat, Bernie Sanders, Brexit referendum, centre right, Charles Lindbergh, crony capitalism, disinformation, Dissolution of the Soviet Union, Donald Trump, fake news, gentrification, hiring and firing, income inequality, Jeremy Corbyn, John Markoff, means of production, Mikhail Gorbachev, military-industrial complex, New Journalism, obamacare, offshore financial centre, opioid epidemic / opioid crisis, pill mill, Robert Mercer, sexual politics, Steve Bannon, Transnistria, W. E. B. Du Bois, WikiLeaks, women in the workforce, zero-sum game

Russian leaders could invite Europeans and Americans to eternity because Russia got there first. They understood American and European weaknesses, which they had first seen and exploited at home. For many Europeans and Americans, events in the 2010s—the rise of antidemocratic politics, the Russian turn against Europe and invasion of Ukraine, the Brexit referendum, the Trump election—came as a surprise. Americans tend to react to surprise in two ways: either by imagining that the unexpected event is not really happening, or by claiming that it is totally new and hence not amenable to historical understanding. Either all will somehow be well, or all is so ill that nothing can be done.

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In October 2015, Seumas Milne, having chaired Putin’s Valdai summit, became chief of communications for Jeremy Corbyn, the leader of Britain’s Labour Party. With Milne as his chief press officer, Corbyn proved a poor advocate for EU membership. British voters chose to leave, and Moscow celebrated. In July 2016, not long after the Brexit referendum, Donald Trump said, “Putin is not going into Ukraine, you can mark it down.” The Russian invasion of Ukraine had begun more than two years before, in February 2014, right after snipers murdered Ukrainians on the Maidan. It was thanks to that very set of events that Trump had a campaign manager.

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Russia also scanned the electoral websites of at least twenty-one American states, perhaps looking for vulnerabilities, perhaps seeking voter data for influence campaigns. According to the Department of Homeland Security, “Russian intelligence obtained and maintained access to elements of multiple U.S. state or local electoral boards.” Having used its Twitter bots to encourage a Leave vote in the Brexit referendum, Russia now turned them loose in the United States. In several hundred cases (at least), the very same bots that worked against the European Union attacked Hillary Clinton. Most of the foreign bot traffic was negative publicity about her. When she fell ill on September 11, 2016, Russian bots massively amplified the scale of the event, creating a trend on Twitter under the hashtag #Hillary Down.

After Europe by Ivan Krastev

affirmative action, bank run, Berlin Wall, Brexit referendum, central bank independence, classic study, clean water, conceptual framework, creative destruction, deindustrialization, Donald Trump, eurozone crisis, failed state, Fall of the Berlin Wall, Francis Fukuyama: the end of history, illegal immigration, job automation, mass immigration, meritocracy, moral panic, open borders, post-work, postnationalism / post nation state, public intellectual, Silicon Valley, Slavoj Žižek, The Brussels Effect, too big to fail, Wolfgang Streeck, World Values Survey, Y Combinator

In the German regional elections, more than 30 percent of that same group supported the reactionary Alternative for Germany. In the French regional elections in December 2015, the National Front reached 50 percent among working-class voters. And perhaps most surprisingly, those voting most defiantly for “leave” in the UK’s Brexit referendum were from traditional “safe” labor seats in the north of England. It is now clear that the post-Marxist working class, which today believes neither in its vanguard role nor in a global anticapitalist revolution, has no reason to be internationalist. The Left-Right division that was structurally fundamental for the European model of democratic politics has lost its power to represent societal divisions.

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After all, they have witnessed with Brexit the problems a successful anti-EU referendum invites. Their preferred strategy will likely be to insist that every election be an informal referendum on the EU rather than explicitly asking for an up-or-down vote on exit. Rather than fixating on a Brexit-type referendum, we need to focus on three other referendums that took place in 2016. In the manner of Sergio Leone’s classic spaghetti Western, let’s call them the Brave, the Mean, and the Ugly. The Brave was former Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi’s December referendum in Italy; the Mean, the Dutch referendum on the Ukrainian Association Treaty with the EU in April; and the Ugly, Viktor Orbán’s October referendum on the refugee policy of the EU.

Built on a Lie: The Rise and Fall of Neil Woodford and the Fate of Middle England’s Money by Owen Walker

activist fund / activist shareholder / activist investor, bank run, banking crisis, barriers to entry, Big bang: deregulation of the City of London, Black Monday: stock market crash in 1987, Brexit referendum, British Empire, buy and hold, call centre, carbon footprint, clean water, coronavirus, corporate governance, COVID-19, fixed income, G4S, Kickstarter, knowledge economy, liquidity trap, lockdown, mass affluent, popular capitalism, profit motive, regulatory arbitrage, shareholder value, short selling, Silicon Valley, sovereign wealth fund, stem cell, Steve Jobs, Winter of Discontent

A Freedom of Information request by the FT showed the FCA had no central database to monitor when funds suspended trading, so it could not keep track of how big a problem this was among the 3,200 investment funds that savers relied on it to police. By coincidence, at the same time the Woodford scandal was unravelling, the FCA was due to publish a report into the series of suspensions of UK property funds immediately following the Brexit referendum three years earlier. The funds were invested in bricks-and-mortar assets, such as shopping centres and office blocks. As investors became spooked that the UK property market would take a hit after the vote, they tried to withdraw their money and the fund managers were unable to sell the assets quickly enough to meet the redemption requests.

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Bell Bell, Sir John 133 Benevolent AI 132, 150, 153, 156, 164–5, 166, 167, 194, 196, 218 best-buy lists 16, 159–60, 161, 170, 173, 177, 181, 192, 202, 213–14 Bestinvest 90, 161, 214 Big Bang deregulation, City of London (1986) 27 Bilton, Anton 8, 151, 165, 188 biomass 75, 80, 84 biotech industry 68–73, 121–3, 131–2, 135, 144, 154, 184, 224 see also individual company names Black, Conrad 47 Black Monday market crash (1987) 30, 36 BlackRock 190, 198, 203, 206 Block, Carson 194 Bloomberg 131 Bolton, Anthony 41, 68 Brady, Charles 50, 52, 53, 54–5, 56, 58, 60 Brennan, David 73 Brewin Dolphin 90 Brexit 2, 3, 6, 136–7, 163–4, 175, 206, 209 British American Tobacco 26, 44, 82, 119, 136 British Biotech 68–9 British Gas 27, 28, 81 British Telecom 27, 83, 119, 132 Broadgate Mainland 97, 110, 111 Brown, Gordon 17 Brown, Scott 130 Brunt, Peter 172–3 BTG Management Services 131 Buffett, Warren 23, 111, 131, 216 Burford Capital 178, 194 Business, Innovation and Skills Select Committee, Parliament 77 Cable, Vince 14, 77, 181 Cameron, David 14, 17, 133 Capita 2, 90, 102, 119, 122, 144 Capita Asset Services 102–3, 108–9, 141, 148, 151 see also Link Fund Solutions Capital Economics 137 Carney, Mark 176, 185, 187–8, 205, 208, 210 Carrick Therapeutics 162 Causer, Paul 60 Cell Medica 162 Cenkos 71, 122 Centrica 81 CGNU 53 Channel Islands Stock Exchange 151 Charles Stanley Direct 155, 214 Chase Bank 53 Chatfeild-Roberts, John 112–13, 145–6 Chelsea Financial Services 90 China Construction Bank 206 Chu, Steven 84 Circassia Pharmaceuticals 130, 135–6, 178, 196 Citicorp 53 Citizens and Southern Bank 50 City of London 7, 22, 23, 27, 31, 32, 35, 37, 48, 57, 70, 71, 110, 113, 121–2, 138, 185, 203, 205, 224 Big Bang (1986) 27–9 Black Monday (1987) 30, 36 electronic trading introduced 27 Financial Services Act (1986) 28 Citywire 98, 144–5, 166, 224 Clarke, Ken 17 Clarke, Simon 186 coalition government, UK (2005–10) 77, 81 Cofunds 113–14 Conservative Party 22, 25, 26, 28, 29, 45, 50, 81, 180, 181, 186, 205, 206, 212 Cornick, Roger 34, 38, 39, 44, 50, 51 Crazy Bear, Stadhampton 116, 156 Croft, Andrew 215 Cunningham, Raymond 59 Daily Mirror 24 Daily Telegraph 18, 94, 110, 111 Dale, Simon 105–6, 108, 113, 121 Dampier, Mark 212 dotcom bubble, keeps faith with Woodford during 52 Equity Income and Income Focus removal from Hargreaves Lansdowne Wealth 150 list and 177 Hargreaves Lansdowne addition of Woodford IM to Wealth 150 list, endorsement of 115 Hargreaves Lansdowne discounted deal with Woodford IM and 114 Hargreaves Lansdowne, joins 15–16 Invesco Perpetual and 57, 68, 90 press investigate role in Woodford downfall 180–81 reservations about Woodford’s investment performance while still recommending funds 159–61, 164, 170–71, 202, 213, 215 Sanlam report and 83 sells shares in Hargreaves Lansdowne in days leading up to Equity Income suspension 171, 180–81, 202, 213 Treasury Select Committee investigation of Hargreaves Lansdowne and 213 visits headquarters of Woodford IM 124–5 wealth 180 ‘Woodford groupie’ 42 Darden, Thomas 127–8 Davies, Gareth 133 Davies, Peter 146 Day, Philip 155 Deer, Will 2, 5, 7, 8, 94, 105–6, 107, 108, 121, 170, 189 Deloitte 98 Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy 133 Diageo 136 disposition effect 150 Dominion 22–3, 24, 26 dotcom bubble/crash (1997–2003) 51–2, 56, 64, 74, 77, 136, 145, 216, 220 Drax Group 90 Dubens, Peter 92, 93 Duff & Phelps 126, 140–41, 163, 194 Duffield, John 58 Duke of York (Prince Andrew) 50 EADS 73 Eagle Star 26, 28, 205 Eagle Star Asset Management 28–31, 205 Edinburgh Investment Trust 83, 90 Elizabeth II, Queen 49, 76, 82 Elphicke, Charlie 187 Emba 125 Energy Catalyzer (E-Cat) 128 Ennis Lad (horse) 148 Equity & Law 35 Equity Income fund see Woodford IM e-Therapeutics 72, 120 euro 80 European Medicines Evaluation Agency 69 European Union 3, 129, 136–7, 175, 206 Eve Sleep 123, 178 Evofem 123–4, 190 Farrow, Paul 94, 110, 111 Ferguson, Iain 155 Fidelity Investments 41, 68, 97, 106–8 financial advisers, independent see independent financial advisers (IFAs) Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) 7, 88–9, 93, 94–5, 197, 198, 202–3 Arch Cru affair and 102–3 Bailey and see Bailey, Andrew belated attempts at showing control of Woodford situation 204–5 best-buy lists and 187, 214 Brexit referendum and 209–10 Capita, imposes as ACD on Woodford IM 208, 210–11 central database to monitor when funds suspend trading, lack of 209 Equity Income fund breach of trash ratio limit on unquoted holdings and 149–52, 209, 210, 211 Equity Income fund International Stock Exchange (Guernsey) listings and 151, 165–7, 171, 180, 186, 209, 210, 211 Equity Income fund suspension, investigation into 185–6, 187, 195, 204–5, 208, 209, 210–11 Hamilton and Smith departures from Woodford IM and 127, 209 Hargreaves Lansdowne best-buy lists, investigates 187 Invesco Perpetual, investigation into 88–9, 93, 112, 208 Link, monthly discussions with over liquidity in Equity Income fund 152, 163, 165–7 Link, outsources regulatory oversight to 208–9 Link, probe into role in Woodford downfall 195 London Capital & Finance collapse and 185, 208 Patient Capital equity swaps with Equity Income and 163 Provident Financial investigation 143 report into the series of suspensions of UK property funds immediately following the Brexit referendum 209–10 Treasury Select Committee investigates role in Woodford downfall 183, 185–7, 195, 209, 210, 213 Woodford IM collapse, overview of role in 208–12 Woodford IM launch and 94–6, 98, 99–103, 108–9, 112, 127, 129 Woodford IM valuation process and 140–41 financial crisis (2008) 4, 12, 63–4, 74, 77, 79, 102, 136, 175, 216, 220 Financial Services Act (1986) 28 Financial Services Authority (FSA) 89 Financial Times 7, 23, 34, 47, 68, 69, 72, 77, 86, 99, 110, 117, 130, 147, 158, 163, 164, 173–4, 177, 181, 192, 193, 196, 200, 202, 203, 207, 209, 214 First Allianz 26 Flanagan, Martin 61, 78, 87 Food and Drug Administration, US 143 Foreign & Colonial 22, 53 4D Pharma 144 Franklin Templeton 61 Fraser-Jones, Mitchell 94 FTI Consulting 190 FTSE All-Share Index 56, 74, 131, 139, 140l, 153, 168 100 13, 15, 30, 36, 63, 73, 81, 119, 134, 143, 177, 1987, 213 250 80, 162, 190, 196 fund supermarkets (investment platforms) 9, 14–15, 16, 107–8, 113–14, 147, 153, 159, 161, 177, 179, 181, 183, 212 see also individual fund supermarket names Fundscape 214 FundsNetwork 107 Gardhouse, Lee 113, 160, 170, 171, 212, 213 Genomics and Mission Therapeutics 150 G4S 90 Gigaclear 125, 153 GlaxoSmithKline 21, 47–8, 82, 90, 119, 132 Glaxo Wellcome 47 Glitnir 3–4 Goldman Sachs 68 Grant Thornton 179 Green, Paul 94 Griffiths, George 19 Grote, Daniel 166, 224 Guernsey stock exchange see International Stock Exchange (Guernsey) Halo-Source 144 Hamilton, Nick 61, 93–4, 95, 96, 98, 101, 103, 117, 125–6, 127, 134, 209 Hammond, Philip 17, 134 Hargreaves Lansdown 9, 151, 153, 204 best-buy lists 16, 159–60, 161, 170, 173, 177–8, 179, 181, 183, 187, 192, 202, 213–14 Dampier and see Dampier, Mark discount negotiated with Woodford IM for clients of 114, 182–3, 192, 212, 214 dotcom bubble, keeps faith with Woodford during 52 Equity Income fund, customers trapped in 186, 191–2, 202, 212–14 FCA investigate 183, 187, 204, 214 Income Focus fund, drops from multi-manager range 201–2 Invesco Perpetual and 57, 68, 83, 88, 90 Newman reaction to questions raised by representatives of 148, 170 origins of 15, 213 platform fees, waives 179 press investigate failings of 180–81 reservations about Woodford’s performance within while still recommending investment 159–61, 163, 166, 170–71, 173, 180–81, 213 Sanlam report and 83 share price hit by suspension of Equity Income 177–8, 180, 202 shares sold by Dampier and Gardhouse in days leading up to Equity Income suspension 171, 180–81, 202, 213 Treasury Select Committee investigates 182–3, 186, 187, 191–2, 213 unquoted holdings in Woodford funds, concerns over 159, 160–61, 163, 166, 170–71 Wealth 50 best-buy list, Equity Income and Income Focus removed from 177 Wealth 150 list, adds Equity Income fund to 114–15 Wealth Shortlist 214 Woodford IM, early backing for 107, 113, 114–15, 120, 124–5, 134 Woodford IM, unhealthily intertwined with 159–61, 212 Hargreaves, Peter 15, 212 Harris, Steven 130, 196 Heartwood Wealth Managers 90 hedge funds 56, 59, 92, 143, 146, 182, 185, 188, 194 Helphire 81 Henderson 97 Heritable 3–4 Heseltine, Michael 50 Heywood, Sir Jeremy 133 High Pay Centre 139 Hill, Chris 181, 182–3, 191–2 Hirsch, Glyn 165, 188 Hiscock, Fred 10–11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 17, 220–221 Hiscox 106 Hobbs, David 114 Hodges, Paul 43 Hogwood, Nick 190 Horizon Discovery 188 Host Capital 101 House of Lords Science and Technology Select Committee 69, 141 HSBC 63 Hymans Robertson 106 IHS Markit 194 Immunocore 166, 184, 206 Imperial College London 70, 130 Imperial Innovations 70, 119, 133, 135, 144 Imperial Tobacco 82–3, 90, 119, 136, 143, 167 Income Focus fund see Woodford IM income funds 36–7, 39–40, 60, 63 see also individual income fund names Independent/Independent on Sunday 47, 83, 124–5 independent financial advisers (IFAs) 10, 15, 16, 197–8 Arch Cru scandal and 102 dotcom bubble, lose faith with Woodford during 51, 52 Equity Income fund launch and 120 Invesco Perpetual and 54, 56–7, 60, 67, 74, 78, 79, 82, 83, 90, 97–8, 216 Perpetual and 34, 35, 39, 42–3, 44–5 Sanlam report and 82, 83 saver and, relationship between 9, 11–13 star fund managers and 42, 54–5 Woodford downfall, role in 180–81, 215–16 Woodford IM investment team, question due diligence of 135 Woodford IM launch and 96, 101, 104, 105, 107, 110, 119 Woodford’s ardent following of 43, 74, 216 see also Dampier, Mark Industrial Heat 127–8, 156, 165, 167, 194–5, 204 in-specie transfer 174 institutional investors 4, 76, 106, 147, 172, 219 Interactive Investor 192 International Stock Exchange (Guernsey) 6, 151, 165–7, 171, 180, 186, 188, 194, 209, 210, 211, 218, 224 cancels listings of Woodford IM holdings 194 FCA and Woodford IM listings on 151, 165–7, 171, 180, 186, 209, 210, 211 Link oversight of Woodford IM listings on 151, 165–7, 211 listings of previously unquoted Woodford IM holdings 6, 151, 165–7, 171, 180, 186 suspends listings of Woodford IM holdings 167, 171, 180, 186, 188, 194, 209, 211 Invesco 51, 54–5, 56, 58–60, 62–3, 67 Invesco Perpetual 4–5, 13, 54–91, 100, 116, 119, 120, 123, 124, 131, 140, 150–51, 178, 205, 214, 215, 216, 217, 219 American management, Woodford clashes with 78–80 birth of/Invesco Perpetual merger 54–8 Financial Conduct Authority investigates rule violations at 88–90, 93, 94, 112, 208 financial crisis and 63–4 Kent County Council investment in 4–5, 8, 106 Leadsom at 65–6, 78 Newman at 66–8, 79, 80, 85–7 private or unquoted companies, Woodford develops appetite for stakes in 71–3, 83–5, 87, 94, 96, 126 Sanlam report and 82–3 SJP and 83–4, 85–6, 88, 90–91, 103–5, 111–12, 115, 214–15 Woodford departs 13, 78, 86–91, 92, 93, 94, 97–8, 99, 101, 103–4, 105, 106, 107, 108, 109, 110, 111–13, 115, 142, 191 Woodford interest in small, science-based companies 68–71 Woodford IM launch and 112–13 Woodford private interventions and public outbursts while at 73–4, 80–82 Woodford team at 61–3, 65–7, 78–80, 94, 146, 153, 161, 189 Investment Association 153, 177 investment sector 16–17, 55, 114–15, 176, 224 Investors Chronicle 33 IP Group 70, 133, 146–7 ISAs 40, 49, 51, 51, 108, 115 Jenkin, Bernard 65 Jobs, Laurene Powell 128, 204 JPMorgan 53, 115 Jupiter 57, 58, 97, 112–13, 145, 146, 147 Kay, John 77 Kay Review 77–8, 81 Kent County Council 1–9, 86, 106, 169, 173–4, 182, 183–4, 187, 189, 211–12 Kier 174–5, 178, 179 King, Ian 73–4 Labour Party 24, 26, 49, 81, 202 Ladbrokes 33 Lamacraft, Paul 94, 116, 123 Lamacraft, Ross 94, 184 Lamacraft, Stephen 94, 98, 116, 123 Lamb, David 104, 142–3, 173, 178 Lamont, Norman 17 Landsbanki 3–4 Langan’s Brasserie, Mayfair 115 Lansdowne Partners 146, 147 Lansdown, Stephen 15, 151 Lawson, Nigel 17, 26, 28, 40 Leadsom, Andrea 65–6, 78 Legal & General 113–14 Legg Mason’s Capital Market Value Trust 41 Lehman Brothers 64 Le Poidevin, Fiona 180 Link Fund Solutions 152, 156, 192 Equity Income and Patient Capital asset swap deals and 162–3, 211 Equity Income investors, fees charged to 179 Equity Income, plans to replace Woodford as manager of 189–90 Equity Income, suspends trading in 8–9, 174–5, 176–7, 182, 184, 188, 194, 195, 196–7, 211, 212 Equity Income, winds down and lines up PJT and BlackRock to sell assets 197–9, 200, 201, 203, 206–7, 218–19 FCA investigation into suspension of Equity Income and 185, 186, 187, 195, 204–5, 208, 209, 210–11 FCA monthly discussions with over liquidity of Equity Income fund 152, 165–7 Income Focus fund, hands over to Standard Life Aberdeen 205 Income Focus fund, suspends trading in 201–2 Industrial Heat, valuation of 194–5, 204 International Stock Exchange (Guernsey), Woodford IM investment listings and 151, 165–7, 211 Patient Capital board orders to revalue unquoted assets 184, 194–5, 204 Project Oak (plan to package up unquoted Equity Income holdings and sell them) 185, 195 see also Capita Lloyds Bank 63 local authority pension funds 1–9, 86, 106, 169, 173–4, 182, 183–4, 187, 189, 211–12 London Business School 25 London Capital & Finance 185, 208 Lynch, Peter 41 Mackie, Terry 202 Magellan fund 41 Maidenhead Grammar School 19–21, 25, 219 Maidenhead RFC 25 Major, John 17 Makin, Louise 130–31 M&G 49, 52, 100, 153 Marimastat 69 market timing scandal 59–60, 90 Maxwell, Robert 24–5, 55 May, Theresa 65, 134 McDonnell, John 202–3 McGlashan, Scott 35, 57 Medoff, Marshall 84–5 Mercer 106 Mercury Asset Management 61 Merrill Lynch 53 Midl, Karl 174, 175, 189, 190, 197, 198 Miliband, Ed 81–2 Millar, Andrew 68–9 Miller, Bill 41 Mirror Group Newspapers 24, 55 Mishcon de Reya 93 mis-selling scandals 15 Morgan, John Pierpont 115 see also JPMorgan Morgan, Nicky 180, 181, 182–3, 186–7, 191, 192 Morningstar 88, 172–3 Mullen, Mark 191 Mustoe, Nick 78–9, 87 Myners, Paul 138–9 Neptune 97 New Labour 49 Newman, Craig 66–7, 79, 80, 85–7, 93, 94, 95, 96, 98–9, 106, 113, 114, 116, 117, 121, 126–7, 134, 137, 138, 159, 170, 189, 211, 217 bonuses, decision to scrap within Woodford IM and 138, 139 character 66–7, 126, 148 childhood 66–7 comeback plans 206, 219 direct relationship with investors in Equity Income fund, envisages 147–8 Invesco Perpetual career 66–7, 79, 80, 85–7 money, obsession with 66–7, 139, 182 Oakley and 93 pay/dividend payments 139, 142, 154–5, 168, 193–4, 201, 207–8, 217 property projects 154–5, 193 Rudd and 181–2 sales staff bonuses and 121 Smith/Hamilton warnings over Woodford investments, reaction to 125, 126, 127 suspension of Equity Income fund and 195, 196, 197 ‘violent transparency’, commitment to 119, 150, 152, 182 winding down of Equity Income fund and 197, 198, 200, 205 Woodford departure from Invesco Perpetual and 79, 80, 85–7 Woodford, ingratiates himself with 67–8 Woodford IM origins/launch and 93, 94, 95, 96, 97, 98, 99, 101, 103, 104, 106, 108–9, 113, 114, 116, 117–18, 119 Woodford Patient Capital Trust and 129–30 NewRiver Reit 163, 167, 178, 188 New Star 58 Newton 57 NEX exchange 164 Nexeon 130–31 N.

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Bell Bell, Sir John 133 Benevolent AI 132, 150, 153, 156, 164–5, 166, 167, 194, 196, 218 best-buy lists 16, 159–60, 161, 170, 173, 177, 181, 192, 202, 213–14 Bestinvest 90, 161, 214 Big Bang deregulation, City of London (1986) 27 Bilton, Anton 8, 151, 165, 188 biomass 75, 80, 84 biotech industry 68–73, 121–3, 131–2, 135, 144, 154, 184, 224 see also individual company names Black, Conrad 47 Black Monday market crash (1987) 30, 36 BlackRock 190, 198, 203, 206 Block, Carson 194 Bloomberg 131 Bolton, Anthony 41, 68 Brady, Charles 50, 52, 53, 54–5, 56, 58, 60 Brennan, David 73 Brewin Dolphin 90 Brexit 2, 3, 6, 136–7, 163–4, 175, 206, 209 British American Tobacco 26, 44, 82, 119, 136 British Biotech 68–9 British Gas 27, 28, 81 British Telecom 27, 83, 119, 132 Broadgate Mainland 97, 110, 111 Brown, Gordon 17 Brown, Scott 130 Brunt, Peter 172–3 BTG Management Services 131 Buffett, Warren 23, 111, 131, 216 Burford Capital 178, 194 Business, Innovation and Skills Select Committee, Parliament 77 Cable, Vince 14, 77, 181 Cameron, David 14, 17, 133 Capita 2, 90, 102, 119, 122, 144 Capita Asset Services 102–3, 108–9, 141, 148, 151 see also Link Fund Solutions Capital Economics 137 Carney, Mark 176, 185, 187–8, 205, 208, 210 Carrick Therapeutics 162 Causer, Paul 60 Cell Medica 162 Cenkos 71, 122 Centrica 81 CGNU 53 Channel Islands Stock Exchange 151 Charles Stanley Direct 155, 214 Chase Bank 53 Chatfeild-Roberts, John 112–13, 145–6 Chelsea Financial Services 90 China Construction Bank 206 Chu, Steven 84 Circassia Pharmaceuticals 130, 135–6, 178, 196 Citicorp 53 Citizens and Southern Bank 50 City of London 7, 22, 23, 27, 31, 32, 35, 37, 48, 57, 70, 71, 110, 113, 121–2, 138, 185, 203, 205, 224 Big Bang (1986) 27–9 Black Monday (1987) 30, 36 electronic trading introduced 27 Financial Services Act (1986) 28 Citywire 98, 144–5, 166, 224 Clarke, Ken 17 Clarke, Simon 186 coalition government, UK (2005–10) 77, 81 Cofunds 113–14 Conservative Party 22, 25, 26, 28, 29, 45, 50, 81, 180, 181, 186, 205, 206, 212 Cornick, Roger 34, 38, 39, 44, 50, 51 Crazy Bear, Stadhampton 116, 156 Croft, Andrew 215 Cunningham, Raymond 59 Daily Mirror 24 Daily Telegraph 18, 94, 110, 111 Dale, Simon 105–6, 108, 113, 121 Dampier, Mark 212 dotcom bubble, keeps faith with Woodford during 52 Equity Income and Income Focus removal from Hargreaves Lansdowne Wealth 150 list and 177 Hargreaves Lansdowne addition of Woodford IM to Wealth 150 list, endorsement of 115 Hargreaves Lansdowne discounted deal with Woodford IM and 114 Hargreaves Lansdowne, joins 15–16 Invesco Perpetual and 57, 68, 90 press investigate role in Woodford downfall 180–81 reservations about Woodford’s investment performance while still recommending funds 159–61, 164, 170–71, 202, 213, 215 Sanlam report and 83 sells shares in Hargreaves Lansdowne in days leading up to Equity Income suspension 171, 180–81, 202, 213 Treasury Select Committee investigation of Hargreaves Lansdowne and 213 visits headquarters of Woodford IM 124–5 wealth 180 ‘Woodford groupie’ 42 Darden, Thomas 127–8 Davies, Gareth 133 Davies, Peter 146 Day, Philip 155 Deer, Will 2, 5, 7, 8, 94, 105–6, 107, 108, 121, 170, 189 Deloitte 98 Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy 133 Diageo 136 disposition effect 150 Dominion 22–3, 24, 26 dotcom bubble/crash (1997–2003) 51–2, 56, 64, 74, 77, 136, 145, 216, 220 Drax Group 90 Dubens, Peter 92, 93 Duff & Phelps 126, 140–41, 163, 194 Duffield, John 58 Duke of York (Prince Andrew) 50 EADS 73 Eagle Star 26, 28, 205 Eagle Star Asset Management 28–31, 205 Edinburgh Investment Trust 83, 90 Elizabeth II, Queen 49, 76, 82 Elphicke, Charlie 187 Emba 125 Energy Catalyzer (E-Cat) 128 Ennis Lad (horse) 148 Equity & Law 35 Equity Income fund see Woodford IM e-Therapeutics 72, 120 euro 80 European Medicines Evaluation Agency 69 European Union 3, 129, 136–7, 175, 206 Eve Sleep 123, 178 Evofem 123–4, 190 Farrow, Paul 94, 110, 111 Ferguson, Iain 155 Fidelity Investments 41, 68, 97, 106–8 financial advisers, independent see independent financial advisers (IFAs) Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) 7, 88–9, 93, 94–5, 197, 198, 202–3 Arch Cru affair and 102–3 Bailey and see Bailey, Andrew belated attempts at showing control of Woodford situation 204–5 best-buy lists and 187, 214 Brexit referendum and 209–10 Capita, imposes as ACD on Woodford IM 208, 210–11 central database to monitor when funds suspend trading, lack of 209 Equity Income fund breach of trash ratio limit on unquoted holdings and 149–52, 209, 210, 211 Equity Income fund International Stock Exchange (Guernsey) listings and 151, 165–7, 171, 180, 186, 209, 210, 211 Equity Income fund suspension, investigation into 185–6, 187, 195, 204–5, 208, 209, 210–11 Hamilton and Smith departures from Woodford IM and 127, 209 Hargreaves Lansdowne best-buy lists, investigates 187 Invesco Perpetual, investigation into 88–9, 93, 112, 208 Link, monthly discussions with over liquidity in Equity Income fund 152, 163, 165–7 Link, outsources regulatory oversight to 208–9 Link, probe into role in Woodford downfall 195 London Capital & Finance collapse and 185, 208 Patient Capital equity swaps with Equity Income and 163 Provident Financial investigation 143 report into the series of suspensions of UK property funds immediately following the Brexit referendum 209–10 Treasury Select Committee investigates role in Woodford downfall 183, 185–7, 195, 209, 210, 213 Woodford IM collapse, overview of role in 208–12 Woodford IM launch and 94–6, 98, 99–103, 108–9, 112, 127, 129 Woodford IM valuation process and 140–41 financial crisis (2008) 4, 12, 63–4, 74, 77, 79, 102, 136, 175, 216, 220 Financial Services Act (1986) 28 Financial Services Authority (FSA) 89 Financial Times 7, 23, 34, 47, 68, 69, 72, 77, 86, 99, 110, 117, 130, 147, 158, 163, 164, 173–4, 177, 181, 192, 193, 196, 200, 202, 203, 207, 209, 214 First Allianz 26 Flanagan, Martin 61, 78, 87 Food and Drug Administration, US 143 Foreign & Colonial 22, 53 4D Pharma 144 Franklin Templeton 61 Fraser-Jones, Mitchell 94 FTI Consulting 190 FTSE All-Share Index 56, 74, 131, 139, 140l, 153, 168 100 13, 15, 30, 36, 63, 73, 81, 119, 134, 143, 177, 1987, 213 250 80, 162, 190, 196 fund supermarkets (investment platforms) 9, 14–15, 16, 107–8, 113–14, 147, 153, 159, 161, 177, 179, 181, 183, 212 see also individual fund supermarket names Fundscape 214 FundsNetwork 107 Gardhouse, Lee 113, 160, 170, 171, 212, 213 Genomics and Mission Therapeutics 150 G4S 90 Gigaclear 125, 153 GlaxoSmithKline 21, 47–8, 82, 90, 119, 132 Glaxo Wellcome 47 Glitnir 3–4 Goldman Sachs 68 Grant Thornton 179 Green, Paul 94 Griffiths, George 19 Grote, Daniel 166, 224 Guernsey stock exchange see International Stock Exchange (Guernsey) Halo-Source 144 Hamilton, Nick 61, 93–4, 95, 96, 98, 101, 103, 117, 125–6, 127, 134, 209 Hammond, Philip 17, 134 Hargreaves Lansdown 9, 151, 153, 204 best-buy lists 16, 159–60, 161, 170, 173, 177–8, 179, 181, 183, 187, 192, 202, 213–14 Dampier and see Dampier, Mark discount negotiated with Woodford IM for clients of 114, 182–3, 192, 212, 214 dotcom bubble, keeps faith with Woodford during 52 Equity Income fund, customers trapped in 186, 191–2, 202, 212–14 FCA investigate 183, 187, 204, 214 Income Focus fund, drops from multi-manager range 201–2 Invesco Perpetual and 57, 68, 83, 88, 90 Newman reaction to questions raised by representatives of 148, 170 origins of 15, 213 platform fees, waives 179 press investigate failings of 180–81 reservations about Woodford’s performance within while still recommending investment 159–61, 163, 166, 170–71, 173, 180–81, 213 Sanlam report and 83 share price hit by suspension of Equity Income 177–8, 180, 202 shares sold by Dampier and Gardhouse in days leading up to Equity Income suspension 171, 180–81, 202, 213 Treasury Select Committee investigates 182–3, 186, 187, 191–2, 213 unquoted holdings in Woodford funds, concerns over 159, 160–61, 163, 166, 170–71 Wealth 50 best-buy list, Equity Income and Income Focus removed from 177 Wealth 150 list, adds Equity Income fund to 114–15 Wealth Shortlist 214 Woodford IM, early backing for 107, 113, 114–15, 120, 124–5, 134 Woodford IM, unhealthily intertwined with 159–61, 212 Hargreaves, Peter 15, 212 Harris, Steven 130, 196 Heartwood Wealth Managers 90 hedge funds 56, 59, 92, 143, 146, 182, 185, 188, 194 Helphire 81 Henderson 97 Heritable 3–4 Heseltine, Michael 50 Heywood, Sir Jeremy 133 High Pay Centre 139 Hill, Chris 181, 182–3, 191–2 Hirsch, Glyn 165, 188 Hiscock, Fred 10–11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 17, 220–221 Hiscox 106 Hobbs, David 114 Hodges, Paul 43 Hogwood, Nick 190 Horizon Discovery 188 Host Capital 101 House of Lords Science and Technology Select Committee 69, 141 HSBC 63 Hymans Robertson 106 IHS Markit 194 Immunocore 166, 184, 206 Imperial College London 70, 130 Imperial Innovations 70, 119, 133, 135, 144 Imperial Tobacco 82–3, 90, 119, 136, 143, 167 Income Focus fund see Woodford IM income funds 36–7, 39–40, 60, 63 see also individual income fund names Independent/Independent on Sunday 47, 83, 124–5 independent financial advisers (IFAs) 10, 15, 16, 197–8 Arch Cru scandal and 102 dotcom bubble, lose faith with Woodford during 51, 52 Equity Income fund launch and 120 Invesco Perpetual and 54, 56–7, 60, 67, 74, 78, 79, 82, 83, 90, 97–8, 216 Perpetual and 34, 35, 39, 42–3, 44–5 Sanlam report and 82, 83 saver and, relationship between 9, 11–13 star fund managers and 42, 54–5 Woodford downfall, role in 180–81, 215–16 Woodford IM investment team, question due diligence of 135 Woodford IM launch and 96, 101, 104, 105, 107, 110, 119 Woodford’s ardent following of 43, 74, 216 see also Dampier, Mark Industrial Heat 127–8, 156, 165, 167, 194–5, 204 in-specie transfer 174 institutional investors 4, 76, 106, 147, 172, 219 Interactive Investor 192 International Stock Exchange (Guernsey) 6, 151, 165–7, 171, 180, 186, 188, 194, 209, 210, 211, 218, 224 cancels listings of Woodford IM holdings 194 FCA and Woodford IM listings on 151, 165–7, 171, 180, 186, 209, 210, 211 Link oversight of Woodford IM listings on 151, 165–7, 211 listings of previously unquoted Woodford IM holdings 6, 151, 165–7, 171, 180, 186 suspends listings of Woodford IM holdings 167, 171, 180, 186, 188, 194, 209, 211 Invesco 51, 54–5, 56, 58–60, 62–3, 67 Invesco Perpetual 4–5, 13, 54–91, 100, 116, 119, 120, 123, 124, 131, 140, 150–51, 178, 205, 214, 215, 216, 217, 219 American management, Woodford clashes with 78–80 birth of/Invesco Perpetual merger 54–8 Financial Conduct Authority investigates rule violations at 88–90, 93, 94, 112, 208 financial crisis and 63–4 Kent County Council investment in 4–5, 8, 106 Leadsom at 65–6, 78 Newman at 66–8, 79, 80, 85–7 private or unquoted companies, Woodford develops appetite for stakes in 71–3, 83–5, 87, 94, 96, 126 Sanlam report and 82–3 SJP and 83–4, 85–6, 88, 90–91, 103–5, 111–12, 115, 214–15 Woodford departs 13, 78, 86–91, 92, 93, 94, 97–8, 99, 101, 103–4, 105, 106, 107, 108, 109, 110, 111–13, 115, 142, 191 Woodford interest in small, science-based companies 68–71 Woodford IM launch and 112–13 Woodford private interventions and public outbursts while at 73–4, 80–82 Woodford team at 61–3, 65–7, 78–80, 94, 146, 153, 161, 189 Investment Association 153, 177 investment sector 16–17, 55, 114–15, 176, 224 Investors Chronicle 33 IP Group 70, 133, 146–7 ISAs 40, 49, 51, 51, 108, 115 Jenkin, Bernard 65 Jobs, Laurene Powell 128, 204 JPMorgan 53, 115 Jupiter 57, 58, 97, 112–13, 145, 146, 147 Kay, John 77 Kay Review 77–8, 81 Kent County Council 1–9, 86, 106, 169, 173–4, 182, 183–4, 187, 189, 211–12 Kier 174–5, 178, 179 King, Ian 73–4 Labour Party 24, 26, 49, 81, 202 Ladbrokes 33 Lamacraft, Paul 94, 116, 123 Lamacraft, Ross 94, 184 Lamacraft, Stephen 94, 98, 116, 123 Lamb, David 104, 142–3, 173, 178 Lamont, Norman 17 Landsbanki 3–4 Langan’s Brasserie, Mayfair 115 Lansdowne Partners 146, 147 Lansdown, Stephen 15, 151 Lawson, Nigel 17, 26, 28, 40 Leadsom, Andrea 65–6, 78 Legal & General 113–14 Legg Mason’s Capital Market Value Trust 41 Lehman Brothers 64 Le Poidevin, Fiona 180 Link Fund Solutions 152, 156, 192 Equity Income and Patient Capital asset swap deals and 162–3, 211 Equity Income investors, fees charged to 179 Equity Income, plans to replace Woodford as manager of 189–90 Equity Income, suspends trading in 8–9, 174–5, 176–7, 182, 184, 188, 194, 195, 196–7, 211, 212 Equity Income, winds down and lines up PJT and BlackRock to sell assets 197–9, 200, 201, 203, 206–7, 218–19 FCA investigation into suspension of Equity Income and 185, 186, 187, 195, 204–5, 208, 209, 210–11 FCA monthly discussions with over liquidity of Equity Income fund 152, 165–7 Income Focus fund, hands over to Standard Life Aberdeen 205 Income Focus fund, suspends trading in 201–2 Industrial Heat, valuation of 194–5, 204 International Stock Exchange (Guernsey), Woodford IM investment listings and 151, 165–7, 211 Patient Capital board orders to revalue unquoted assets 184, 194–5, 204 Project Oak (plan to package up unquoted Equity Income holdings and sell them) 185, 195 see also Capita Lloyds Bank 63 local authority pension funds 1–9, 86, 106, 169, 173–4, 182, 183–4, 187, 189, 211–12 London Business School 25 London Capital & Finance 185, 208 Lynch, Peter 41 Mackie, Terry 202 Magellan fund 41 Maidenhead Grammar School 19–21, 25, 219 Maidenhead RFC 25 Major, John 17 Makin, Louise 130–31 M&G 49, 52, 100, 153 Marimastat 69 market timing scandal 59–60, 90 Maxwell, Robert 24–5, 55 May, Theresa 65, 134 McDonnell, John 202–3 McGlashan, Scott 35, 57 Medoff, Marshall 84–5 Mercer 106 Mercury Asset Management 61 Merrill Lynch 53 Midl, Karl 174, 175, 189, 190, 197, 198 Miliband, Ed 81–2 Millar, Andrew 68–9 Miller, Bill 41 Mirror Group Newspapers 24, 55 Mishcon de Reya 93 mis-selling scandals 15 Morgan, John Pierpont 115 see also JPMorgan Morgan, Nicky 180, 181, 182–3, 186–7, 191, 192 Morningstar 88, 172–3 Mullen, Mark 191 Mustoe, Nick 78–9, 87 Myners, Paul 138–9 Neptune 97 New Labour 49 Newman, Craig 66–7, 79, 80, 85–7, 93, 94, 95, 96, 98–9, 106, 113, 114, 116, 117, 121, 126–7, 134, 137, 138, 159, 170, 189, 211, 217 bonuses, decision to scrap within Woodford IM and 138, 139 character 66–7, 126, 148 childhood 66–7 comeback plans 206, 219 direct relationship with investors in Equity Income fund, envisages 147–8 Invesco Perpetual career 66–7, 79, 80, 85–7 money, obsession with 66–7, 139, 182 Oakley and 93 pay/dividend payments 139, 142, 154–5, 168, 193–4, 201, 207–8, 217 property projects 154–5, 193 Rudd and 181–2 sales staff bonuses and 121 Smith/Hamilton warnings over Woodford investments, reaction to 125, 126, 127 suspension of Equity Income fund and 195, 196, 197 ‘violent transparency’, commitment to 119, 150, 152, 182 winding down of Equity Income fund and 197, 198, 200, 205 Woodford departure from Invesco Perpetual and 79, 80, 85–7 Woodford, ingratiates himself with 67–8 Woodford IM origins/launch and 93, 94, 95, 96, 97, 98, 99, 101, 103, 104, 106, 108–9, 113, 114, 116, 117–18, 119 Woodford Patient Capital Trust and 129–30 NewRiver Reit 163, 167, 178, 188 New Star 58 Newton 57 NEX exchange 164 Nexeon 130–31 N.

The Levelling: What’s Next After Globalization by Michael O’sullivan

"World Economic Forum" Davos, 3D printing, Airbnb, Alan Greenspan, algorithmic trading, Alvin Toffler, bank run, banking crisis, barriers to entry, Bernie Sanders, Big Tech, bitcoin, Black Swan, blockchain, bond market vigilante , Boris Johnson, Branko Milanovic, Bretton Woods, Brexit referendum, British Empire, business cycle, business process, capital controls, carbon tax, Celtic Tiger, central bank independence, classic study, cloud computing, continuation of politics by other means, corporate governance, credit crunch, CRISPR, cryptocurrency, data science, deglobalization, deindustrialization, disinformation, disruptive innovation, distributed ledger, Donald Trump, driverless car, eurozone crisis, fake news, financial engineering, financial innovation, first-past-the-post, fixed income, gentrification, Geoffrey West, Santa Fe Institute, Gini coefficient, Glass-Steagall Act, global value chain, housing crisis, impact investing, income inequality, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), It's morning again in America, James Carville said: "I would like to be reincarnated as the bond market. You can intimidate everybody.", junk bonds, knowledge economy, liberal world order, Long Term Capital Management, longitudinal study, low interest rates, market bubble, minimum wage unemployment, new economy, Northern Rock, offshore financial centre, open economy, opioid epidemic / opioid crisis, Paris climate accords, pattern recognition, Peace of Westphalia, performance metric, Phillips curve, private military company, quantitative easing, race to the bottom, reserve currency, Robert Gordon, Robert Shiller, Robert Solow, Ronald Reagan, Scramble for Africa, secular stagnation, Silicon Valley, Sinatra Doctrine, South China Sea, South Sea Bubble, special drawing rights, Steve Bannon, Suez canal 1869, supply-chain management, The inhabitant of London could order by telephone, sipping his morning tea in bed, the various products of the whole earth, The Rise and Fall of American Growth, The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, Thomas Kuhn: the structure of scientific revolutions, total factor productivity, trade liberalization, tulip mania, Valery Gerasimov, Washington Consensus

Another trend identified by Mair was the “Europeanization” of national politics, which he took to mean the penetration of “European rules, directives and norms into the domestic sphere” as individual states increasingly adopted laws “made in Brussels” to replace domestically agreed ones.45 Brexiteers are known to complain that the Europe Union regulates the size of British cucumbers, sausages, and pints of beer. This trend probably prefigured the counterreaction of British voters toward the European Union in the Brexit referendum. Even as Brexit passes, it looks like Britain will still be beholden to European law across a range of fields such as trade and services. Getting out of Europe is well-nigh impossible in practice. If we update many of the tables and data in the Mair book, the trends he described have become more pronounced.

…

Two other trends are worth mentioning: First, radical parties are attracting both ideologically committed voters and, it seems, voters who would not ordinarily have voted in elections. And in Ireland, two recent referenda on gay marriage and abortion have mobilized very large turnouts, suggesting that, second, when it comes to single-issue votes, many who do not ordinarily vote (i.e., in this case, younger voters) are politically very committed. In addition, in the Brexit referendum, three million people who had not voted in the prior three general elections came out to vote in the referendum. The practical consequence of dissatisfaction with the old political order in the developed world is that it causes apathy (as evidenced in lower turnout), rage, or political entrepreneurship.

…

In July 2018, Boris Johnson resigned as British foreign secretary. Britain no longer has an empire, but the office of foreign secretary is still respected. During his tenure, however, Johnson made a number of gaffes and was generally seen to have damaged rather than advanced Britain’s interests. Similarly, in the aftermath of the Brexit referendum, he was also seen as a natural leader of the Tory Party, but the way he has conducted himself since then has led many party colleagues to the view that, even by the standards of politicians, he is too self-serving, and he has lost support within his party. The day after Johnson resigned as foreign secretary, the death of Lord Carrington (at the age of ninety-nine) was announced.

This Land: The Struggle for the Left by Owen Jones

Berlin Wall, Bernie Sanders, Black Lives Matter, Boris Johnson, Boycotts of Israel, Brexit referendum, call centre, capitalist realism, collapse of Lehman Brothers, Corn Laws, coronavirus, COVID-19, deindustrialization, Dominic Cummings, Donald Trump, European colonialism, falling living standards, first-past-the-post, Francis Fukuyama: the end of history, George Floyd, gig economy, green new deal, housing crisis, Jeremy Corbyn, lockdown, market fundamentalism, Naomi Klein, Neil Kinnock, Nelson Mandela, offshore financial centre, open borders, quantitative easing, race to the bottom, rent control, short selling, The Spirit Level, War on Poverty

Smith responded that his platform would be based on agreeing with Corbyn on policy, but presenting himself as a competent alternative. And with Eagle lagging behind him in nominations, Smith duly became the standard-bearer of the anti-Corbyn resistance. With a significant number of Corbyn’s supporters disillusioned after the Brexit referendum result and the subsequent goings-on, Smith’s team were confident. Smith was further boosted by a High Court ruling that 130,000 new members, who had almost certainly overwhelmingly joined the Labour Party to vote for Corbyn, were ineligible to cast any votes unless their membership exceeded six months.

…

Lewis was far from ready, but then a general election was not expected for some time to come. There was another potential advantage: a new left-wing leader might learn from the experiences of Corbyn’s then-unprepared team and make a positive impression on the electorate from the outset. The attempted internal coup against Corbyn, following the June 2016 Brexit referendum, destroyed that fantasy timetable. So, too, did the rumours that the Tories planned to call a snap general election. That July, they had their own leadership contest in the wake of David Cameron’s departure, electing the former home secretary, Theresa May, who played to the media presentation of her as the new Margaret Thatcher6 by doing an impression of the Iron Lady in her first appearance in Parliament.

…

Having spent hours hammering out the wording of the motion, the shadow Brexit secretary felt duty bound to uphold its spirit. The problems stemmed from the motion itself, an indecisive stew of perspectives and qualifications; even those who had devised it didn’t seem to know what it stood for. The leadership interpreted it as Labour’s commitment to focus on delivering a soft Brexit, with a second referendum one of several distant alternative options, while Remainers would increasingly claim that the leadership was in violation of its own democratically agreed policy. It was, said a senior aide, ‘at that point people started to have no clue what our position was. It was a disaster.’ Shadow cabinet member Jon Trickett agrees.

Brexit Unfolded: How No One Got What They Want (And Why They Were Never Going To) by Chris Grey

"World Economic Forum" Davos, anti-communist, Berlin Wall, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, coronavirus, COVID-19, deindustrialization, Dominic Cummings, Donald Trump, failed state, Fall of the Berlin Wall, first-past-the-post, game design, global pandemic, imperial preference, Jeremy Corbyn, John Bercow, lockdown, non-tariff barriers, open borders, post-truth, reserve currency, Robert Mercer

Caroline Lucas MP Every organization of men, be it social or political, ultimately relies on man’s capacity for making promises and keeping them. Hannah Arendt, Crises of the Republic CONTENTS Title Page Epigraph Acknowledgements Acronyms Introduction: Unfolding Brexit Chapter One: Brexit Means Brexit From the 2016 referendum to the Lancaster House speech Chapter Two: Enemies of the People From the Lancaster House speech to the 2017 general election Chapter Three: The Road to Chequers From the 2017 general election to the Chequers proposal Chapter Four: Paralysis From the Chequers proposal to Theresa May’s resignation Chapter Five: Brexit Redux From Theresa May’s resignation to the 2019 general election Chapter Six: Brexit Gets Real From the 2019 general election to the end of the transition period Conclusion: Brexit in Retrospect and Prospect About the Author Endnotes Index Copyright ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS As I explain in the Introduction, this book grows out of the weekly blog I have written since 2016, so I am hugely grateful to all those who have read and publicised it, or in other ways helped to get an audience for my work on Brexit, and particularly to Sarah Murphy for her unflagging private and public support and encouragement, especially in the early days of building a readership for the blog.

…

If this persisted, and the vote were to leave when the referendum was held, then I warned it would be too late and the country would have voted for something without knowing what it was. This turned out to be prescient. Not only were all the models touted at different times by different advocates of Brexit during the referendum, but their differences were concealed, especially by persistent references to ‘single market access’ which could have meant any of them. The Vote Leave campaign did not specify which version of Brexit it advocated, and explicitly said that it would be for the government, not it, to do so if the vote were to leave.

…

I do not draw the same distinction amongst ‘remainers’ because remaining in the EU only took a single form in the Brexit process, i.e. to stay in the EU. I use ‘remainer’ to mean a voter for or advocate of staying in the EU, and I use ‘leading remainer’ to refer to a high-profile advocate of remaining in the EU in the same sense as for such advocates of Brexit. CHAPTER ONE BREXIT MEANS BREXIT From the 2016 referendum to the Lancaster House speech It is hard now to recreate the shock of the hours and days following the announcement of the 2016 referendum result. As the headlines went around the world, Boris Johnson and Michael Gove, the leading figures in the Vote Leave campaign, appeared on television seeming bemused and, to many eyes, frightened by their victory.

The Pyramid of Lies: Lex Greensill and the Billion-Dollar Scandal by Duncan Mavin

"World Economic Forum" Davos, activist fund / activist shareholder / activist investor, Adam Neumann (WeWork), air freight, banking crisis, Bernie Madoff, Big Tech, Boeing 737 MAX, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, British Empire, carbon footprint, coronavirus, corporate governance, COVID-19, Credit Default Swap, democratizing finance, Donald Trump, Eyjafjallajökull, financial engineering, fixed income, global pandemic, global supply chain, Gordon Gekko, Greensill Capital, high net worth, Kickstarter, lockdown, Long Term Capital Management, low interest rates, Masayoshi Son, means of production, Menlo Park, mittelstand, move fast and break things, NetJets, Network effects, Ponzi scheme, private military company, proprietary trading, remote working, rewilding, Rishi Sunak, rolodex, Silicon Valley, skunkworks, SoftBank, sovereign wealth fund, supply chain finance, Tim Haywood, Vision Fund, WeWork, work culture

Greensill, according to the former PM, was a saviour of small business, democratizing access to sophisticated forms of finance that had hitherto been the reserve of only the world’s most powerful corporations. And then, in a gear switch, Cameron launched into an analysis of the UK’s landmark Brexit referendum, the vote on European Union membership that had unseated Cameron, precipitating the end of his premiership. As the former prime minister sketched out his thoughts on a whiteboard, some Greensill executives were taken aback by his brazenness in explaining a referendum that had been a major black eye and an embarrassing, terminal defeat for Cameron’s government.

…

Lex and his new external public relations team, led by Craig Oliver – a former BBC journalist and Director of Communications for Cameron in Number 10 Downing Street – agreed to a call. Lex Zoomed in from his Cheshire home. Oliver, who had been knighted by Cameron in his resignation honours list following the Brexit referendum, was the latest in a long line of external Greensill PRs. He sat in his kitchen, hardly appearing to be paying any attention at all. Gabe Caillaux was also on the call, for moral support. They agreed that things were tougher than anticipated but insisted a planned fundraising – of up to $1 billion – was a sign their business was thriving.

…

Index Aar Tee Commodities ref1 Abengoa ref1, ref2 Accenture ref1, ref2 Agritrade ref1 Ahearn, John ref1 AIG ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Aigis Banca ref1, ref2 Allesch-Taylor, Stefan ref1, ref2 Allin, Patrick ref1 anti-money-laundering (AML) questions ref1 ANZ ref1 Apollo Global Management ref1, ref2 Apple ref1 Aramco ref1 ArcelorMittal ref1 Archegos ref1 Arthur Andersen ref1 Asda ref1 Atlantic 57 Consultancy ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Auditing Association of German Banks ref1 Augustus Asset Managers ref1 Austin, Jason ref1, ref2 Australia ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12, ref13, ref14, ref15, ref16, ref17, ref18, ref19 Australian Taxation Office ref1 Aviva ref1 BAE Systems ref1 Baer, Julius ref1, ref2 BaFin ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11 Bailey, Andrew ref1 Bank of America ref1 Bank of England ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Barclays ref1, ref2 Barnes, Rob ref1, ref2, ref3 Barrell, Neil ref1 Barron’s ref1, ref2, ref3 Bates, Chris ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Battershill, William ref1, ref2 Baylis, Natalie ref1 BBB see British Business Bank BBC News ref1 BBVA ref1 BCLP see Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner BDO ref1, ref2 Becker, Arthur ref1 Berkshire Hathaway ref1 Bethell, Richard, 6th Baron Westbury ref1, ref2 Bingera ref1 Bishop, Julie ref1, ref2 BlackRock ref1, ref2, ref3 Blackstone ref1 Blair, Tony ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Bloomberg ref1, ref2, ref3 Bloomberg News ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Bluestone Resources Inc. ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Blunkett, David ref1, ref2 BNP Paribas ref1 Boeing ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 737 Max 8 aircraft ref1 Bond and Credit Company, The (TBCC) ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7 Borbely, Barnabas ref1 Borneo ref1 Breedon, Tim ref1 Breedon report ref1 Brereton, Greg ref1 Brexit referendum ref1 Brierwood, David ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8 Brighthouse ref1 British Business Bank (BBB) ref1, ref2, ref3 British Gas ref1 Brown, Eliot ref1 Brown, Gordon ref1, ref2 Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner (BCLP) ref1 BSi Steel ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Buckingham Palace ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Buffett, Warren ref1 Bundaberg, Queensland, Australia ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10 Bunge ref1 Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy committee ref1 Cabinet Office ref1, ref2, ref3 Caillaux, Gabe ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6 Callahan, Mark ref1 Cameron, David ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 ‘Big Society’ policy ref1 and Earnd ref1 Greensill remuneration ref1 and Greensill’s collapse ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 hired as Greensill adviser ref1, ref2 lends credibility to Greensill ref1 and Lex ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9 and Mohammed Bin Salman ref1 and the pharmacy plan ref1 role at Greensill during the Covid-19 pandemic ref1 and The Bond and Credit Company ref1 Cameron, Samantha ref1 Cameron administration ref1, ref2 Cantor Fitzgerald ref1, ref2, ref3 Carillion ref1, ref2 ‘early payment facility’ ref1 Carlyle Group ref1 Carna ref1 Carnell, Kate ref1, ref2 Carney, Mark ref1 Carrington ref1 Carson Block ref1 Carusillo, Mickey ref1 Casey, Dame Louise ref1 ‘cash-less rolls’ ref1 Catfoss group ref1, ref2, ref3 central banks ref1 Chap (magazine) ref1 Charles, Prince ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Chase Manhattan ref1 CHBG Limited ref1 Chehaoduo ref1, ref2 Chelsea Group ref1 Chelsea Village ref1 Chicago Police Pension Fund ref1 Chilean mining ref1 Chubb ref1 Chuk ref1 CIMIC ref1, ref2 Citibank ref1 Citigroup ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12, ref13 City, the ref1 Clarke, Tracy ref1 Clearbrook Capital ref1 Cleland, Robert ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7 coal mining ref1, ref2, ref3 Coca-Cola ref1, ref2 CoFace ref1 Comerford, Robert J. ref1, ref2 Commerzbank ref1 Companies House ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Confederation of British Industry (CBI) ref1 Conservative government ref1, ref2 Copenhagen ref1 Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CBILS) ref1, ref2 Coronavirus Large Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CLBILS) ref1, ref2 corporate espionage ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Coupe, Mike ref1 Covid-19 Corporate Financing Facility (CCFF) ref1, ref2 Covid-19 pandemic ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11 government loan schemes ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 restrictions ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Crain’s (magazine) ref1 Credit Suisse ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8 and the Covid-19 pandemic ref1 and Greensill Capital ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12, ref13, ref14, ref15, ref16, ref17, ref18, ref19, ref20, ref21, ref22, ref23, ref24, ref25, ref26, ref27, ref28, ref29, ref30, ref31, ref32, ref33 and Sanjeev Gupta ref1 Crothers, Bill ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7 Crown Representatives programme ref1 Cunliffe, Sir Jon ref1 CWB ref1 de Botton, Alain ref1 de Botton, Gilbert ref1 de la Rue, Tom ref1 Deal Partners ref1, ref2, ref3 Degen, Michel ref1, ref2, ref3 Dell ref1 Deloitte ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Demica ref1 Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy ref1, ref2 Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs ref1 Department of Health ref1 Department of Health and Social Care ref1 Department of Work and Pensions ref1 Deutsche Bank ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6 Deutsche Börse ref1 Doordash ref1 Doran, James ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12 dotcom boom ref1, ref2 Dow Jones ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11 Downes, Brett ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Dragon Technology ref1, ref2, ref3 Eadie, Al ref1 Earnd ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Ecclestone, Bernie ref1 Edelman ref1 1860 Munich ref1 Ellis, Brett Easton, American Psycho ref1 Enterprise Investment Schemes (EISs) ref1 equity warrants ref1 Ernst & Young ref1 see also EY Euler Hermes ref1, ref2 European Banking Association ref1 Ewing, Fergus ref1 EY ref1, ref2 see also Ernst & Young Eyjafjallajökull ref1 factoring ref1, ref2, ref3 see also supply chain finance Fair Financial ref1, ref2, ref3 Fairmac Reality ref1 Fairymead ref1 Fan, Colin ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Farrell, Maureen ref1 FCA see Financial Conduct Authority ‘fee ramp agreements’ ref1 Feeney, Chuck ref1 Ferrin, Ronald ref1 Fidelity ref1 5th Finger ref1 Finacity ref1 Financial Accounting Standards Board ref1 Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10 Skilled Persons Reviews ref1, ref2 financial crisis 2008 ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 aftermath ref1, ref2, ref3 and central banks ref1 and fintechs ref1 tougher regulations following ref1, ref2 Financial News (banking publication) ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6 Financial Reporting Council ref1 Financial Times (newspaper) ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7 Finews (Swiss news site) ref1 ‘fintechs’ ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6 Fitch ref1 ‘flash title’ ref1 Fleetsolve ref1 Food Revolution Group ref1 Forbes (magazine) ref1 Ford ref1 Ford, Bill ref1 Formula One ref1 ‘Four Eyes Principle’ ref1 FreeUp ref1, ref2 Friedman, Alex ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7 Galligan, Shane ref1, ref2 GAM Greensill Supply Chain Finance fund (GGSCF) ref1, ref2 Gapper, John ref1 Garrod, Neil ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 GBM Banca ref1 General Atlantic (GA) ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12, ref13, ref14, ref15, ref16, ref17, ref18, ref19, ref20 General Mills ref1, ref2, ref3 Gentleman’s Journal (magazine) ref1 German Deposit Protection Authority ref1 Global Asset Management (GAM) ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12, ref13, ref14, ref15, ref16, ref17, ref18, ref19, ref20, ref21, ref22, ref23, ref24, ref25, ref26 Absolute Return Bond Fund (ARBF) ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9 regulators ref1 Global Supply Chain Finance Forum ref1 Global Trade Review (trade finance publication) ref1 Goldman Sachs ref1, ref2 Gorman, John ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Gottstein, Thomas ref1, ref2 government loans ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 ‘GovTech’ firms ref1 Grant Thornton ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Gray, Sue ref1 Green, Philip ref1, ref2 Greenbrier hotel ref1 Greene, Stephen ref1 Greensill, Alexander ‘Lex’ David ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 ambition ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 ascent ref1 Australian property investments ref1, ref2 Australian tax obligations ref1 awards ref1, ref2, ref3 CBE ref1, ref2, ref3 birth ref1 and Carillion ref1 celebrity status ref1 childhood ref1, ref2 at Citigroup ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9 on the Crown Representatives programme ref1 CV ref1 and Daniel Sheard ref1 and David Cameron ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9 directorships ref1 double down strategy ref1, ref2 and Downes ref1 dresses the part ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 and Duncan Mavin ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6 eager to own bank ref1, ref2 education ref1 legal studies ref1 MBA at the Alliance Manchester Business School ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6 and 5th Finger ref1 and Greensill Bank AG (formerly NoFi) ref1 and Greensill Capital ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 acquisitions ref1, ref2 aircraft leasing deals ref1 attempts to raise emergency finance ref1, ref2, ref3 avoids toughest regulators ref1 BaFin probe ref1 Bluestone ref1, ref2 BSi ref1 Covid-19 pandemic ref1, ref2, ref3 Credit Suisse involvements ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 demise ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8 Dragon Technology ref1 expansion ref1, ref2, ref3 ‘flak’ (PR advisers) ref1 General Atlantic ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6 Global Asset Management ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 harmful effect of SCF on small businesses ref1 insurance ref1, ref2, ref3 malpractice ref1 multi-obligor programmes ref1 National Health Service venture ref1, ref2 new category of loans ref1 payroll finance ref1 perilous state ref1 premier ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 sells company private jets ref1 Softbank dealings ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9 start-up ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Tower Trade ref1 Tradeshift Networks ref1, ref2 and Jeremy Heywood ref1 and John Gorman ref1 legal work ref1 marriage ref1 and Masayoshi Son ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 mentors ref1 mission statement, ‘helping out the little guy’ ref1 and Mohammed Bin Salman ref1 at Morgan Stanley ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12 remuneration ref1 moves to the UK ref1, ref2 at OzEcom ref1 and politics ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 ‘rewilding’ project ref1 risk-taking ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12 and Sanjeev Gupta ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10 and Saudi Arabia ref1 sits on Bank of England committee on SCF ref1 skiing ref1 spending ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6 takes loan from the Greensill family ref1 and Tim Haywood ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10 at TRM ref1, ref2 wealth ref1 billionaire status ref1, ref2 hits the big time ref1, ref2 Greensill, Andrew (Lex’s brother) ref1 Greensill, Judy (Lex’s mother) ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Greensill, Lloyd (Lex’s father) ref1, ref2, ref3 Greensill, Peter (Lex’s youngest brother) ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10 Greensill, Roy (Lex’s grandfather) ref1, ref2 Greensill, Victoria (Lex’s wife) ref1, ref2 Greensill Bank AG (formerly NoFi) ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7 and the Atlantic 57 loan ref1, ref2 and the BaFin probe ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 and the end ref1, ref2 and General Atlantic ref1 and government loans ref1 and Gupta ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7 private aircraft ref1 regulation ref1 and Softbank ref1, ref2 technology ref1 and trade credit insurance ref1, ref2 whistle-blower at ref1 Greensill Capital ref1, ref2 aircraft leasing deals ref1 allegations of corruption at ref1 and the Atlantic 57 loan ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 avoids toughest regulators ref1 and the BaFin probe ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9 and Bill Crothers ref1 billion dollar plus valuation ref1 and Bluestone ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 and BSi ref1 business cards ref1, ref2 cash burner ref1 client list ref1 collapse ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10 corporate events ref1 corporate governance ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7 and the Covid-19 pandemic ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6 and Credit Suisse ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12, ref13, ref14, ref15, ref16, ref17, ref18, ref19, ref20, ref21, ref22, ref23, ref24, ref25, ref26, ref27, ref28, ref29, ref30, ref31, ref32, ref33 Credit Suisse’s investigation into ref1, ref2, ref3 crisis mounts ref1, ref2, ref3 and David Cameron ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7 and David Solo ref1, ref2, ref3 defaults ref1, ref2 and Dragon Technology ref1 early backers ref1 early struggles ref1, ref2 evergreen loans ref1 ‘everyone wins’ pitches ref1 expansion ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9 external public relations ref1, ref2 EY investigation into ref1 fault lines ref1 as ‘fintech’ company ref1, ref2 fraud and misconduct allegations ref1 and General Atlantic ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12, ref13, ref14, ref15 and Global Asset Management ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12, ref13, ref14, ref15, ref16, ref17, ref18, ref19, ref20, ref21, ref22 gossipy culture ref1 and Greensill Bank ref1 and Griffin Coal ref1 and Gupta/Gupta Family Group ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12, ref13, ref14 harmful impact on small businesses ref1 headquarters on the Strand ref1 ‘High Risk Franchise Names’ document ref1 hits the big time ref1, ref2 illiquid investments ref1 insolvency ref1, ref2 investment protection ref1 investors abandon ref1, ref2 IPO ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8 and John Gorman ref1 and Katerra ref1 and the Lagoon Park SPV ref1 launch ref1, ref2 lavish spending at ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Lex’s claims about ref1 liquidity ref1, ref2 and Lloyds ref1 loan book ref1 losses ref1 and Maurice Thompson ref1 Morgan Stanley employees ref1 and the NHS ref1, ref2, ref3 obligors ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8 offices ref1, ref2, ref3 and payroll finance ref1 and Pemex ref1 perilous state ref1 and the pharmacy plan ref1 pre-IPO funding (‘Project Olive’) ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 profitability issues ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6 ‘reasonably permanent’ funding ref1 reducing the early risks of using ref1 remuneration ref1, ref2, ref3 retrenchment ref1, ref2 risk team ref1, ref2 risky ventures ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8 and Roland Hartley-Urquhart ref1 and Saudi Arabia ref1 as ‘shadow bank’ ref1 and SoftBank ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12, ref13, ref14, ref15, ref16, ref17, ref18, ref19, ref20, ref21, ref22, ref23, ref24 SPAC talks ref1 start-up style management ref1, ref2 takes loan from the Greensill Capital family ref1 technology ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 and Tim Haywood ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10 and Tower Trade ref1, ref2, ref3 and trade credit insurance ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12 ‘Unicorn’ status ref1 and the US capital markets ref1 whistle-blower allegations emerge ref1 and the Wickham SPV ref1 Greensill Corporation Pty ref1 Greensill Farming Group ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Greensill Trust ref1 Grenda Investments ref1 Griffin Coal ref1, ref2 Gross, Bill ref1 Guazi ref1 Gulf Petrochem (GP Global) ref1 Gupta, Nicola ref1 Gupta, Sanjeev ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12, ref13, ref14, ref15, ref16, ref17 Australian property ref1 and Bluestone ref1 and the demise of Greensill ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 and German steel ref1 and Grant Thornton ref1 and Greensill Bank ref1 Gupta Family Group (GFG) ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11 and Bluestone ref1 and government loans ref1 and Greensill ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11 and Greensill Bank ref1 Guttridge, Jane ref1, ref2 Guy, Toby ref1 Gymshark ref1 Haas, Lukas ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Hambro, Jay ref1 Hanafin, Dermot ref1 Hanafin, Sean ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Harris, Piers ref1 Harry, Prince ref1 Hart ref1 Hartley-Urquhart, Roland ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10 Havens, John ref1, ref2 Haywood, Tim ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5, ref6, ref7, ref8, ref9, ref10, ref11, ref12, ref13, ref14, ref15, ref16, ref17, ref18 Henkel ref1 Hewlett Packard ref1 Heywood, Jeremy ref1, ref2, ref3 Highways Agency ref1 HM Revenue & Customs ref1 HM Treasury ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Hobday, Neil ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4 Holmes, Elizabeth ref1 House of Lords ref1 HSBC ref1, ref2, ref3, ref4, ref5 Huawei ref1, ref2, ref3 Hutton Inquiry ref1 IAG see Insurance Australia Group ICBC Standard Bank ref1 Indonesia ref1 Industrial Cadets ref1 Inflexionpoint ref1 ING ref1 Insurance Australia Group (IAG) ref1, ref2, ref3 International Chamber of Commerce ref1 Intrepid Aviation ref1 ‘Iran Notices’ ref1 Iraq, UN weapons inspectors ref1 Isle of Dogs ref1 Jacob, David ref1, ref2, ref3 Jahama Highland Estates ref1 Jain, Anshu ref1 Jakarta ref1 Jardine Matheson ref1 Johnson, Boris ref1 Jones, Karen ref1 J.P.

We Need New Stories: Challenging the Toxic Myths Behind Our Age of Discontent by Nesrine Malik

"World Economic Forum" Davos, affirmative action, Affordable Care Act / Obamacare, barriers to entry, Bernie Sanders, Black Lives Matter, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, British Empire, centre right, cognitive dissonance, continuation of politics by other means, currency peg, disinformation, Donald Trump, fake news, feminist movement, financial independence, Francis Fukuyama: the end of history, gender pay gap, gentrification, ghettoisation, glass ceiling, illegal immigration, invisible hand, Jeremy Corbyn, mass immigration, moral panic, Nate Silver, obamacare, old-boy network, opioid epidemic / opioid crisis, Overton Window, payday loans, planetary scale, Ponzi scheme, public intellectual, race to the bottom, Ronald Reagan, Saturday Night Live, sexual politics, Steve Bannon, Steven Pinker, The Bell Curve by Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray, Thomas L Friedman, transatlantic slave trade

A lack of uniformity breeds dissent, and so it is logical that diversity of thought becomes a threat. By 2016, in the United States and the United Kingdom, the myth of political correctness had so taken hold that the grievance boil it had been nourishing for years finally burst. Grievance creation – Brexit: a referendum on PC culture If the United States’ large fault line is race, in the UK it is immigration. The myth of a PC crisis was successful in toxifying an immigration debate that had been gathering momentum since the late 1970s, when Margaret Thatcher stated that British people ‘might be rather swamped by people with a different culture’ before introducing a tougher immigration act in 1981.

…

The war against political correctness in Britain, as opposed to the United States, was less partisan. The country did not go through a similar civil rights/foreign policy activism era which set off a tussle between left and right. But a culture war was brewing around immigration, identity and class, one that deepened during the near decade of economic austerity preceding the UK’s Brexit referendum. The cracks became clear when the country split along the lines of EU membership. Now, the British public seems even more averse to such things as political correctness than Americans are. To the naked eye, what took five decades to develop in the US, took only about five years to come about in the UK.

…

This is clearly demonstrated by the continued paranoia on the part of some American and British voters who actually got what they wanted in electing Trump and bringing about the Brexit vote. Rather than enjoy the triumph of the huge upset they have managed to pull off by exercising their democratic will, they fixate on how their victory is constantly at threat of being usurped. The Prospect magazine–YouGov 2018 poll notes: ‘Despite Brexit voters winning the referendum and having a government committed to Brexit, they are more likely to think that people are not free to speak their mind on important issues. Their views have the political upper hand at the moment, yet it seems they still feel culturally embattled.’ This is the cornerstone of myth perpetuation, to convince those at the top of the totem pole, enabled and empowered, that they are weak and threatened by those with far less political capital.

Half In, Half Out: Prime Ministers on Europe by Andrew Adonis

banking crisis, Berlin Wall, Big bang: deregulation of the City of London, Boris Johnson, Bretton Woods, Brexit referendum, British Empire, centre right, colonial rule, congestion charging, Corn Laws, cuban missile crisis, Dominic Cummings, eurozone crisis, imperial preference, mass immigration, Neil Kinnock, oil shock, Suez crisis 1956

Noting that Samantha Cameron was with her husband, May turned to the only other person in the room at the time, her then media adviser at the Home Office, Joey Jones, and declared: ‘He’s going to go.’ She did not know until then that there would be a leadership contest in the immediate aftermath of a Brexit referendum. Even then she worked on the assumption, as many did in her party and beyond, that Boris Johnson would probably be the next Prime Minister. Only when Johnson withdrew from the contest did May realise she stood a very good chance. Suddenly she was Prime Minister when the only other candidate left standing, Andrea Leadsom, pulled out.

…

The Home Office tests many qualities in a politician, but it is not the best preparation for developing a rounded view of the European Union. The 2016 leadership contest was the immediate context against which May had to make speedy Brexit calculations. The summer of 2016 was an exceptionally febrile period, and the Brexit referendum was not the only indicator of the unhinged political mood. In unprecedented fashion, both major political parties held leadership contests at the same time. Both campaigns were deranged. The Labour Party contest lasted three months and they re-elected the same leader. The Conservatives’ equivalent lasted a few days and elected a new Prime Minister.

…

As the contest got underway she was not to know there would be no second round. As far as she then started to think intensely about Brexit in the days before becoming Prime Minister, she posed a single question: how to win a Conservative leadership contest when a majority of members were strongly pro-Brexit? Her early post-referendum discussions, which were confined to her then two special advisers, Nick Timothy and Fiona Hill, were largely focused on this narrow question: ‘How can we convince the party that we are deadly serious about Brexit?’ In reflecting on that question she began to frame answers that showed a willingness to aim for a Brexit in which the UK left the single market and the customs union.

The Euro and the Battle of Ideas by Markus K. Brunnermeier, Harold James, Jean-Pierre Landau

"there is no alternative" (TINA), Affordable Care Act / Obamacare, Alan Greenspan, asset-backed security, bank run, banking crisis, battle of ideas, Bear Stearns, Ben Bernanke: helicopter money, Berlin Wall, Bretton Woods, Brexit referendum, business cycle, capital controls, Capital in the Twenty-First Century by Thomas Piketty, Celtic Tiger, central bank independence, centre right, collapse of Lehman Brothers, collective bargaining, credit crunch, Credit Default Swap, cross-border payments, currency peg, currency risk, debt deflation, Deng Xiaoping, different worldview, diversification, Donald Trump, Edward Snowden, en.wikipedia.org, Fall of the Berlin Wall, financial deregulation, financial repression, fixed income, Flash crash, floating exchange rates, full employment, Future Shock, German hyperinflation, global reserve currency, income inequality, inflation targeting, information asymmetry, Irish property bubble, Jean Tirole, Kenneth Rogoff, Les Trente Glorieuses, low interest rates, Martin Wolf, mittelstand, Money creation, money market fund, Mont Pelerin Society, moral hazard, negative equity, Neil Kinnock, new economy, Northern Rock, obamacare, offshore financial centre, open economy, paradox of thrift, pension reform, Phillips curve, Post-Keynesian economics, price stability, principal–agent problem, quantitative easing, race to the bottom, random walk, regulatory arbitrage, rent-seeking, reserve currency, risk free rate, road to serfdom, secular stagnation, short selling, Silicon Valley, South China Sea, special drawing rights, tail risk, the payments system, too big to fail, Tyler Cowen, union organizing, unorthodox policies, Washington Consensus, WikiLeaks, yield curve

The deputy prime minister, Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg, said that the result was “bad for Britain.”35 Tony Barber, the Financial Times’s Europe correspondent, wrote, “The nation that prides itself on a Rolls-Royce diplomacy appears triumphantly capable, at critical moments of EU history, of driving itself straight into a ditch.”36 The “Brexit” Referendum In consequence, Cameron seemed to steer back and argued that the United Kingdom did not in any way want a “multispeed” or “two-tier” Europe and that his government was aiming at continuing to be at the heart of all the European discussions. The full aftermath became clear only one year later.

…

So the exit process that will be launched in a two-year frame by a NO vote would also begin the undoing of the 1707 Act of Union, which brought Scotland together with England and Wales. Indeed, in Scotland a clear majority of 62 percent voted to remain in the European Union. Just a few days after the Brexit referendum, the Scottish first minister announced a plan for how Scotland can remain in the European Union. Similarly, the future of Northern Ireland is also not clear, as the majority in Northern Ireland also voted to remain in the European Union. There is also a profound shock to the rest of Europe, which just like the United Kingdom could have its own unraveling.

…

The issue surfaced already during the Greek rescue package in 2015, when Cameron refused to participate in the financing via the EFSM, and Chancellor George Osborne emphasized that “the euro area needs to foot its own bill.”43 Great Britain’s position on most of the economic debates was intellectually close to that of the United States rather than to the European vision. But the United States also consistently pushed for the United Kingdom to play a constructively engaged role in Europe. The more the United Kingdom was willing to raise an existential challenge to Europe, the more distanced the United States became. With the Brexit referendum, the United States has to look for a different main strategic parter within the European Union. Germany is in the pole position for economic issues, while for security and military aspects France might play a more important role. China and Russia If the intellectual world of Great Britain and the United States is alien to Europeans and pushed an increasingly wider gap over the Atlantic and the Channel, there are forces that are both stranger and stronger operating in the world.

Future Politics: Living Together in a World Transformed by Tech by Jamie Susskind

3D printing, additive manufacturing, affirmative action, agricultural Revolution, Airbnb, airport security, algorithmic bias, AlphaGo, Amazon Robotics, Andrew Keen, Apollo Guidance Computer, artificial general intelligence, augmented reality, automated trading system, autonomous vehicles, basic income, Bertrand Russell: In Praise of Idleness, Big Tech, bitcoin, Bletchley Park, blockchain, Boeing 747, brain emulation, Brexit referendum, British Empire, business process, Cambridge Analytica, Capital in the Twenty-First Century by Thomas Piketty, cashless society, Cass Sunstein, cellular automata, Citizen Lab, cloud computing, commons-based peer production, computer age, computer vision, continuation of politics by other means, correlation does not imply causation, CRISPR, crowdsourcing, cryptocurrency, data science, deep learning, DeepMind, digital divide, digital map, disinformation, distributed ledger, Donald Trump, driverless car, easy for humans, difficult for computers, Edward Snowden, Elon Musk, en.wikipedia.org, end-to-end encryption, Erik Brynjolfsson, Ethereum, ethereum blockchain, Evgeny Morozov, fake news, Filter Bubble, future of work, Future Shock, Gabriella Coleman, Google bus, Google X / Alphabet X, Googley, industrial robot, informal economy, intangible asset, Internet of things, invention of the printing press, invention of writing, Isaac Newton, Jaron Lanier, John Markoff, Joseph Schumpeter, Kevin Kelly, knowledge economy, Large Hadron Collider, Lewis Mumford, lifelogging, machine translation, Metcalfe’s law, mittelstand, more computing power than Apollo, move fast and break things, natural language processing, Neil Armstrong, Network effects, new economy, Nick Bostrom, night-watchman state, Oculus Rift, Panopticon Jeremy Bentham, pattern recognition, payday loans, Philippa Foot, post-truth, power law, price discrimination, price mechanism, RAND corporation, ransomware, Ray Kurzweil, Richard Stallman, ride hailing / ride sharing, road to serfdom, Robert Mercer, Satoshi Nakamoto, Second Machine Age, selection bias, self-driving car, sexual politics, sharing economy, Silicon Valley, Silicon Valley startup, Skype, smart cities, Smart Cities: Big Data, Civic Hackers, and the Quest for a New Utopia, smart contracts, Snapchat, speech recognition, Steve Bannon, Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, Steven Levy, tech bro, technological determinism, technological singularity, technological solutionism, the built environment, the Cathedral and the Bazaar, The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere, The Wisdom of Crowds, Thomas L Friedman, Tragedy of the Commons, trolley problem, universal basic income, urban planning, Watson beat the top human players on Jeopardy!, work culture , working-age population, Yochai Benkler

It seems like the world isn’t in great shape—and that our public discourse has sunk to the occasion. Political élites are widely distrusted OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 26/05/18, SPi РЕЛИЗ ПОДГОТОВИЛА ГРУППА "What's News" VK.COM/WSNWS 4 FUTURE POLITICS and despised. Two recent exercises in mass democracy in the English-speaking world, the 2016 US presidential election and UK Brexit referendum, were rancorous even by the usual unhappy standards, with opposing factions vying not just to defeat their rivals but to destroy them. Both were won by the side that promised to tear down the old order. Neither brought closure or satisfaction. Increasingly, as Barack Obama noted at the end of his presidency, ‘everything is true, and nothing is true’.2 It’s getting harder for ordinary citizens (of any political allegiance) to separate fact from fraud, reality from rumour, signal from noise.

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One 2017 study estimates that 48 million (9 to 15 per cent of accounts) on Twitter are bots.17 In the 2016 US presidential election, pro-Trump bots using hashtags like #LockHerUp flooded social media, outgunning the Clinton campaign’s own bots by 5:1 and spreading a whopping dose of fake news. It’s estimated that around one-third of all traffic on Twitter in the buildup to the EU Brexit referendum came from bots. Almost all were for the Leave side.18 Not all bots are bad for deliberation: so-called HoneyPot bots distract human ‘trolls’ by using provocative messages to lure them into endless futile online debate.19 But by and large, bots’ impact so far has not been benign. Can Deliberative Democracy survive in a system where deliberation itself is no longer the preserve of human beings?

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Or for practical purposes, is what is ‘true’ and ‘false’, ‘right’ or ‘wrong’, simply what the multitude OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 26/05/18, SPi РЕЛИЗ ПОДГОТОВИЛА ГРУППА "What's News" VK.COM/WSNWS DEMOCRACY IN THE FUTURE 239 decides at any given time? This question has troubled many ­people since the election of Donald Trump and the Brexit referendum in the United Kingdom. The people have spoken—but could they be wrong? A related question is whether democracy should be seen as the process by which the community determines—on the basis of agreed underlying facts—what to do, or whether it should be seen as the process by which the community determines what the underlying facts themselves are?

Unknown Market Wizards by Jack D. Schwager

3D printing, algorithmic trading, automated trading system, backtesting, barriers to entry, Black Monday: stock market crash in 1987, Brexit referendum, buy and hold, commodity trading advisor, computerized trading, COVID-19, cryptocurrency, diversification, Donald Trump, eurozone crisis, family office, financial deregulation, fixed income, forward guidance, index fund, Jim Simons, litecoin, Long Term Capital Management, margin call, market bubble, Market Wizards by Jack D. Schwager, Nick Leeson, performance metric, placebo effect, proprietary trading, quantitative easing, Reminiscences of a Stock Operator, risk tolerance, risk-adjusted returns, Sharpe ratio, short squeeze, side project, systematic trading, tail risk, transaction costs

Sometimes, a related market can provide a better return/risk trade. For example, when the evolving voting returns increasingly pointed to a surprise win for the Brexit referendum, the straightforward trade would have been to sell the British pound. However, the problem was that the British pound was swinging wildly as the voting returns were coming in, meaning that a short British pound trade could easily get stopped out, even if the trade ultimately proved correct. Bargh surmised that another consequence of a surprise win for the Brexit referendum would be a market shift favoring risk-off positions. So, instead of selling the British pound, Bargh bought US Treasurys, which were far less volatile and could be traded with meaningful stops that required much less risk.

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This sense of discomfort led Bargh to change his exit strategy in a way that avoided this problem. 18. How a Trade Idea Is Implemented Is Critical One of Bargh’s biggest winning trades ever was a bet that the Brexit vote would pass. The obvious trade that would profit from a surprise approval of the Brexit referendum was a short in the British pound. The problem with this direct way of expressing a bet on the passage of Brexit was that the British pound was swinging wildly as vote results came in for each region. The direct trade of shorting the British pound risked getting stopped out at a substantial loss if the timing of the trade was slightly off.

Not Working: Where Have All the Good Jobs Gone? by David G. Blanchflower

90 percent rule, active measures, affirmative action, Affordable Care Act / Obamacare, Albert Einstein, bank run, banking crisis, basic income, Bear Stearns, behavioural economics, Berlin Wall, Bernie Madoff, Bernie Sanders, Black Lives Matter, Black Swan, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, business cycle, Capital in the Twenty-First Century by Thomas Piketty, Carmen Reinhart, Clapham omnibus, collective bargaining, correlation does not imply causation, credit crunch, declining real wages, deindustrialization, Donald Trump, driverless car, estate planning, fake news, Fall of the Berlin Wall, full employment, George Akerlof, gig economy, Gini coefficient, Growth in a Time of Debt, high-speed rail, illegal immigration, income inequality, independent contractor, indoor plumbing, inflation targeting, Jeremy Corbyn, job satisfaction, John Bercow, Kenneth Rogoff, labor-force participation, liquidationism / Banker’s doctrine / the Treasury view, longitudinal study, low interest rates, low skilled workers, manufacturing employment, Mark Zuckerberg, market clearing, Martin Wolf, mass incarceration, meta-analysis, moral hazard, Nate Silver, negative equity, new economy, Northern Rock, obamacare, oil shock, open borders, opioid epidemic / opioid crisis, Own Your Own Home, p-value, Panamax, pension reform, Phillips curve, plutocrats, post-materialism, price stability, prisoner's dilemma, quantitative easing, rent control, Richard Thaler, Robert Shiller, Ronald Coase, selection bias, selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI), Silicon Valley, South Sea Bubble, The Theory of the Leisure Class by Thorstein Veblen, Thorstein Veblen, trade liberalization, universal basic income, University of East Anglia, urban planning, working poor, working-age population, yield curve

Between 2015 and 2016 the number of prescriptions for antidepressants rose 6 percent, from 61 million to 65 million.13 The UK government noted this was the biggest single growth rate of any prescription medication. Vandoros and coauthors (2018) examined whether the number of prescriptions for antidepressants in the UK increased after the Brexit referendum, benchmarking them against other drug classes. They used general practitioners’ prescribing data to compile the number of defined daily doses per capita every month in each of the 326 voting areas in England over the period 2011–16. They found that antidepressant prescribing continued to increase after the referendum but at a slower pace.

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56 percent of respondents said “reduced a lot” and an additional 21 percent said “reduced a little.”16 But nearly three-quarters of those surveyed in the BSAS who were worried about immigration voted Leave, versus 36 percent who did not identify this as a concern. Roger Harding, head of the National Centre for Social Research, which examined the BSAS data, noted, “For leave voters, the vote was particularly about immigration and the social consequences of it.”17 One of the very striking things about the Brexit referendum was the distinction between the stock and flow elements of immigration. London, with a high immigrant stock, voted to remain, but Boston, with a low stock but high recent flow, voted to leave. Immigrants voted against Brexit. Immigrants voted against Trump. We can only speculate about the reasons for this, but two suggest themselves: the fear/shock of the new and the pressure on public services, particularly during a period of austerity.

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Data from the Social Mobility Commission (2016) and the Resolution Foundation show the East Midlands, West Midlands, Wales, and Yorkshire had the lowest pay levels, all of whom voted to Leave. Sasha Becker, who was a colleague of mine at the University of Stirling and is now at the University of Warwick, also found that the 2016 Brexit referendum result is tightly correlated with previous election results for the UK Independence Party, as well as those of the extreme right-wing British National Party (Becker, Fetzer, and Novy 2016). Becker and his colleagues found that fundamental characteristics of the voting population were key drivers of the Vote Leave share, especially their age and education profiles, the historical importance of manufacturing employment, and low income and high unemployment.

Cogs and Monsters: What Economics Is, and What It Should Be by Diane Coyle

3D printing, additive manufacturing, Airbnb, Al Roth, Alan Greenspan, algorithmic management, Amazon Web Services, autonomous vehicles, banking crisis, barriers to entry, behavioural economics, Big bang: deregulation of the City of London, biodiversity loss, bitcoin, Black Lives Matter, Boston Dynamics, Bretton Woods, Brexit referendum, business cycle, call centre, Carmen Reinhart, central bank independence, choice architecture, Chuck Templeton: OpenTable:, cloud computing, complexity theory, computer age, conceptual framework, congestion charging, constrained optimization, coronavirus, COVID-19, creative destruction, credit crunch, data science, DeepMind, deglobalization, deindustrialization, Diane Coyle, discounted cash flows, disintermediation, Donald Trump, Edward Glaeser, en.wikipedia.org, endogenous growth, endowment effect, Erik Brynjolfsson, eurozone crisis, everywhere but in the productivity statistics, Evgeny Morozov, experimental subject, financial deregulation, financial innovation, financial intermediation, Flash crash, framing effect, general purpose technology, George Akerlof, global supply chain, Goodhart's law, Google bus, haute cuisine, High speed trading, hockey-stick growth, Ida Tarbell, information asymmetry, intangible asset, Internet of things, invisible hand, Jaron Lanier, Jean Tirole, job automation, Joseph Schumpeter, Kenneth Arrow, Kenneth Rogoff, knowledge economy, knowledge worker, Les Trente Glorieuses, libertarian paternalism, linear programming, lockdown, Long Term Capital Management, loss aversion, low earth orbit, lump of labour, machine readable, market bubble, market design, Menlo Park, millennium bug, Modern Monetary Theory, Mont Pelerin Society, multi-sided market, Myron Scholes, Nash equilibrium, Nate Silver, Network effects, Occupy movement, Pareto efficiency, payday loans, payment for order flow, Phillips curve, post-industrial society, price mechanism, Productivity paradox, quantitative easing, randomized controlled trial, rent control, rent-seeking, ride hailing / ride sharing, road to serfdom, Robert Gordon, Robert Shiller, Robert Solow, Robinhood: mobile stock trading app, Ronald Coase, Ronald Reagan, San Francisco homelessness, savings glut, school vouchers, sharing economy, Silicon Valley, software is eating the world, spectrum auction, statistical model, Steven Pinker, tacit knowledge, The Chicago School, The Future of Employment, The Great Moderation, the map is not the territory, The Rise and Fall of American Growth, the scientific method, The Signal and the Noise by Nate Silver, the strength of weak ties, The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, total factor productivity, transaction costs, Uber for X, urban planning, winner-take-all economy, Winter of Discontent, women in the workforce, Y2K

Perhaps economic efficiency is not the societal goal in all contexts, so other people’s idea of a good outcome might be different from even the most balanced, open-minded economist. In the current conjuncture, in the post-GFC, deglobalisation, mid-pandemic, western economies, economists claiming to be technocrats are very definitely taking political positions. As the prominent UK politician Michael Gove notoriously expressed the populist position in the 2016 Brexit referendum campaign, ‘People have had enough of experts.’ Or at least experts whose conclusions they disagree with. Some people even distrust medical expertise, on issues like vaccines or coronavirus treatments, even though their distrust could be lethal. What hope for the impartial, scientific economist?

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The experiments with which this chapter began highlighted the relevance of context if we want to understand the ‘is’ of economic decisions; the time has come to abandon the separation protocol and think properly about the way context also affects the ‘ought’, and what kind of society we want to live in. Intermission What Chapter Three did not explicitly discuss was the changing political environment. In 2016, the ‘Leave’ campaigners won the UK’s Brexit referendum, Donald Trump had won the US presidential election, and across the West populist parties were gaining a significant share of votes even where they lost the election. Political shifts of this kind never have a single cause, but economic disadvantage was certainly involved: studies of different votes have mapped the correlation between populist vote shares and places ‘left behind’ (the term in vogue) by economically-thriving big urban centres.

Failures of State: The Inside Story of Britain's Battle With Coronavirus by Jonathan Calvert, George Arbuthnott

Boeing 747, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, Bullingdon Club, centre right, collapse of Lehman Brothers, contact tracing, contact tracing app, coronavirus, COVID-19, data science, disinformation, Dominic Cummings, Donald Trump, Etonian, gig economy, global pandemic, high-speed rail, Jeremy Corbyn, Kickstarter, lockdown, nudge unit, open economy, Rishi Sunak, Ronald Reagan, Skype, social distancing, zoonotic diseases

It raised questions over whether he really believed in protecting whistle-blowers in the NHS or whether such policies were just convenient soundbites for a politician on the rise. It also raised concerns about his ability to hear and heed warnings when a major crisis was on the horizon. But he had other things on his mind that year, which he perhaps deemed more important. In the Brexit referendum, Hancock had voted to remain and he was a staunch supporter of Theresa May after she became prime minister in 2016. It had done his career no harm. But when May resigned in May 2019, it was time for Hancock to release his naked ambition and go for the top job. Lined up against him was Johnson, the clear favourite in the Conservative leadership contest.

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Whereas the politicians’ failure to take responsibility in the UK left the country in a ‘grey area where nothing is happening’, he said. But the Downing Street adviser was even more critical of the politicians. According to the adviser, Brexiteers at the top of government instilled a culture in which the views of scientists were often dismissed out of hand, a practice developed during the Brexit referendum after multiple experts had argued in favour of the UK remaining in the European Union. ‘Whereas the government used to stop play and listen to the scientists, now they had lost the ability to hear expertise,’ the adviser said. ‘A pandemic was always the one that I wondered about the most in terms of would they stop everything and hear the experts.

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He had made many enemies in his previous spells working for the Conservatives, but he appeared not to care and was happy to point out the intellectual inferiority of colleagues in the party – once unkindly calling the then Brexit secretary David Davis ‘as thick as mince’. Even those who disliked him would have to admit that he was a formidable political strategist who, as the co-founder and chief architect of the Vote Leave campaign, had taken a central role in the defeat of those who supported Remain in the 2016 Brexit referendum. He was depicted as an intense, if socially awkward, political savant bursting with ideas in a television drama depicting his role in the campaign, in which he was played by the actor Benedict Cumberbatch. Johnson had hired him as a master tactician to cut through the thicket of Westminster obstacles that were preventing his government from delivering the Brexit it had promised and Cummings certainly lived up to his reputation.

Crashed: How a Decade of Financial Crises Changed the World by Adam Tooze

"there is no alternative" (TINA), "World Economic Forum" Davos, Affordable Care Act / Obamacare, Alan Greenspan, Apple's 1984 Super Bowl advert, Asian financial crisis, asset-backed security, bank run, banking crisis, Basel III, Bear Stearns, Berlin Wall, Bernie Sanders, Big bang: deregulation of the City of London, bond market vigilante , book value, Boris Johnson, bread and circuses, break the buck, Bretton Woods, Brexit referendum, BRICs, British Empire, business cycle, business logic, capital controls, Capital in the Twenty-First Century by Thomas Piketty, Carmen Reinhart, Celtic Tiger, central bank independence, centre right, collateralized debt obligation, company town, corporate governance, credit crunch, Credit Default Swap, credit default swaps / collateralized debt obligations, currency manipulation / currency intervention, currency peg, currency risk, dark matter, deindustrialization, desegregation, Detroit bankruptcy, Dissolution of the Soviet Union, diversification, Doha Development Round, Donald Trump, Edward Glaeser, Edward Snowden, en.wikipedia.org, energy security, eurozone crisis, Fall of the Berlin Wall, family office, financial engineering, financial intermediation, fixed income, Flash crash, forward guidance, friendly fire, full employment, global reserve currency, global supply chain, global value chain, Goldman Sachs: Vampire Squid, Growth in a Time of Debt, high-speed rail, housing crisis, Hyman Minsky, illegal immigration, immigration reform, income inequality, interest rate derivative, interest rate swap, inverted yield curve, junk bonds, Kenneth Rogoff, large denomination, light touch regulation, Long Term Capital Management, low interest rates, margin call, Martin Wolf, McMansion, Mexican peso crisis / tequila crisis, military-industrial complex, mittelstand, money market fund, moral hazard, mortgage debt, mutually assured destruction, negative equity, new economy, Nixon triggered the end of the Bretton Woods system, Northern Rock, obamacare, Occupy movement, offshore financial centre, oil shale / tar sands, old-boy network, open economy, opioid epidemic / opioid crisis, paradox of thrift, Peter Thiel, Ponzi scheme, Post-Keynesian economics, post-truth, predatory finance, price stability, private sector deleveraging, proprietary trading, purchasing power parity, quantitative easing, race to the bottom, reserve currency, risk tolerance, Ronald Reagan, Savings and loan crisis, savings glut, secular stagnation, Silicon Valley, South China Sea, sovereign wealth fund, special drawing rights, Steve Bannon, structural adjustment programs, tail risk, The Great Moderation, Tim Cook: Apple, too big to fail, trade liberalization, upwardly mobile, Washington Consensus, We are the 99%, white flight, WikiLeaks, women in the workforce, Works Progress Administration, yield curve, éminence grise

Immediately, two Tory heavyweights—mayor of London Boris Johnson and education minister Michael Gove—broke away to launch the “mainstream” Tory wing of the Brexit campaign in the referendum that was now set for June 23, 2016. II When confronting Syriza the year before, German finance minister Schäuble had declared that as far as he was concerned, elections could not be allowed to interfere with the fundamentals of economic policy. Greece’s economy accounted for 1 percent of the EU’s GDP. In the Brexit referendum a simple majority would decide over the future of a country whose economy accounted for 17 percent of the whole. For the UK the stakes were enormous.

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The banking union and a fiscal union were unacceptable to a broad swath of opinion in Britain, not just the Europhobes. If deeper eurozone integration was a matter not of whether but of when, London would have to force Brussels to openly embrace the model of a multispeed and multitiered Europe. It is easy to forget in retrospect, but the Brexit referendum was not conceived as an in-out choice on UK membership in the EU “as is.” Nor was it merely a means to extract minor concessions. London operated from the hubristic assumption that Britain could change the EU’s course. While the euro countries continued on their path toward deeper integration, Britain would force Brussels to formally recognize not just a multispeed but a multidirectional model.

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Brexit revived that fear. As a spokeswoman for Moody’s commented: “The downside risks to global growth stem not from the possibility of a recession in the UK, but from the possibility that developments in the UK may give rise to increased political risk elsewhere in the EU.”84 Marine Le Pen hailed the Brexit referendum as a “dazzling lesson in democracy.”85 The right-wing nationalist Geert Wilders in the Netherlands called for a “Nexit” vote. Would a nationalist, Europhobic wave spread from Britain, Poland and Hungary to the rest of Europe? For almost a year after Brexit, that risk seemed all too real. And the stakes were high.

The Dawn of Eurasia: On the Trail of the New World Order by Bruno Macaes

active measures, Berlin Wall, Brexit referendum, British Empire, computer vision, deep learning, Deng Xiaoping, different worldview, digital map, Donald Trump, energy security, European colonialism, eurozone crisis, failed state, Francis Fukuyama: the end of history, gentrification, geopolitical risk, global value chain, illegal immigration, intermodal, iterative process, land reform, liberal world order, Malacca Straits, mass immigration, megacity, middle-income trap, open borders, Parag Khanna, savings glut, scientific worldview, Silicon Valley, South China Sea, speech recognition, Suez canal 1869, The Brussels Effect, trade liberalization, trade route, Transnistria, young professional, zero-sum game, éminence grise

Panic ensues and political leaders are forced to step in – not in order to replace the rule of autonomous rules, but to repair the system, as engineers rather than politicians, before stepping aside once again. By temperament and training, German leaders are perfectly suited for this engineering role. We were all asking if the current situation could be maintained when the UK ‘Brexit’ referendum happened. Here the incursion of an unpredictable event seemed to be coming from the inside. The Leave camp insisted on one idea, which it turned into an incessant slogan: Take Back Control. It was as if some of the passengers of a common automated vehicle had decided to assume control of the wheel.

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Much of the distress had to do with the fact that the revolt against some of the basic principles of the global order was coming not from the periphery but from the very centre of world power. Not from the distant provinces, which wealth and ideas could not reach, but from the capital, or rather from the imperial palace standing at the very centre of the capital. Something like that was not supposed to happen. What was remarkable about the Brexit referendum was that the country which had invented free trade and taken it to the four corners of the world was now refusing to be part of the largest and freest economic bloc ever created. As for Trump, he has come to symbolize a precipitous retreat from the previous American foreign policy consensus.

The Great Demographic Reversal: Ageing Societies, Waning Inequality, and an Inflation Revival by Charles Goodhart, Manoj Pradhan

asset-backed security, banks create money, Berlin Wall, bonus culture, Boris Johnson, Branko Milanovic, Brexit referendum, business cycle, capital controls, carbon tax, central bank independence, commodity super cycle, coronavirus, corporate governance, COVID-19, deglobalization, demographic dividend, demographic transition, Deng Xiaoping, en.wikipedia.org, Fall of the Berlin Wall, financial independence, financial repression, fixed income, full employment, gig economy, Gini coefficient, Greta Thunberg, housing crisis, income inequality, inflation targeting, interest rate swap, job automation, Kickstarter, long term incentive plan, longitudinal study, low interest rates, low skilled workers, manufacturing employment, Martin Wolf, mass immigration, middle-income trap, non-tariff barriers, offshore financial centre, oil shock, old age dependency ratio, open economy, paradox of thrift, Pearl River Delta, pension reform, Phillips curve, price stability, private sector deleveraging, quantitative easing, rent control, savings glut, secular stagnation, shareholder value, special economic zone, The Great Moderation, The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, total factor productivity, working poor, working-age population, yield curve, zero-sum game

Although the question of whether inward migration has had any significant deleterious effect on the jobs and wages of domestic, local workers, remains a contentious issue in the professional literature (Mayda 2019, for example, points to its beneficial effects), an ounce of personal experience is worth several pounds of abstract expert advice. Moreover, it is the fear of what enhanced migration might do, rather than its actuality, that tends to drive opinion. Thus, in the Brexit referendum, there was a negative relationship between the level of prior migrants in each constituency and the vote to leave, but a positive relationship between the percentage change in recent migration and the vote to leave. So, while people in practice tend to adapt relatively smoothly to different cultural and ethnic differences in due course, it is the fear of cultural and social and economic change that drives opinion, especially among the elderly, though Comertpay et al. (2019) state that in the European Union attitudes towards immigration are a U shaped function of age.

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Bonus Border taxes Border taxes, adverse effect on certain categories of population Border taxes, DBCFT, no loss of revenue Border taxes, introduction equivalent to temporary devaluation Border taxes, make tax avoidance harder Border taxes, volatile and procyclical Borella, M. Borio, C. Börsch-Supan, A. Brand, C. Bratsberg, B. Brazil Brazil Pension reform Brexit referendum British public, keen to see immigration reduced Brotherhood of man Brunnermeier, M.K. Bubble bursts in 1991–92 Bulgaria Button, P. Buy-backs Buying houses C Caballero, R.J. Canada Cancer Capital Capital account Capital account liberalisation Capital accumulation Capital Adequacy Ratios (CARs) Capital control Capital costs, falling Capital flows, uphill Capital inflows Capitalism, ‘substantially broken’ Capitalist class Capitalist economies, governance problems Capitalist heaven Capital, misallocation of Capital, returns to Capital-labour Capital-labour ratios Capital misallocation Capital per worker in Japanese manufacturing, rising Capital stock Carbon tax Care, eligibility criteria for public funding Care homes Care(rs) Carers, cost of support by ‘Care Supplement’ Care workers Care workers, need for increase in Japan Caribbean Caring expenses, rising Caring services, hard to raise productivity Cash, abolition of Cash flow Cavendish, Camilla, Extra Time The Cavendish Review CBO Report Centenarians, high risk of dementia Central Bank Central Bank Independence (CBI) Central Bank Independence, a ‘paper tiger’ Central Bank Independence, a surety of financial rectitude Central Bank Independence, its glory years Central Bank Independence, populist backlash against Central Bank Independence, under threat Central banks, best friends of Ministers of Finance Central banks, constraints on raising interest rates Central banks, create money Central banks, inflation targets of Central banks, recently best friends of Ministers of Finance Central banks, reverting to normal policies Central bank inflation target Central Bank targets Certificate of Fundamental Care Changing life cycle Cheap labour Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Chief Executive Officer, has information and power Chief officers Child rearing, age of delayed Children Children, age of having Children, staying at home longer Chile China China’s ascent China’s ascent, benefiting AEs China, absence of welfare state China, administration China, ageing population China, ascent in 1990s China, bank deposits of China, big four state-owned banks China, capable of debt cancelation China, continuing strong investment China, corporate debt with lower risk of default China, credit growth unsustainable China, current account balance declining China, current account surplus peak China, debt conversion into equity China, debt is misguided the conventional wisdom China, debt less likely to lead to a crisis China, demographic reversal China, developed coastal regions of China, early stage of development China, educated labour force China, entry of foreign banks China, excess capacity China, financial markets China, focus on raising productivity China, growth decline China, growth decline in 2018/19 China, high personal sector saving China, internal migration, dominated by Eastern Region China, investment ratio China, labour force dynamics changing direction China, land subsidized China, leverage ratio China, low interest rates as a tax on households China, manufacturing sector China, no longer a deflationary force China, one child policy China, past contribution to global growth China population China, property sector China, rapidly ageing population China, remarkable demographic dynamics China, shrinking workforce China, social safety net insufficient China, special economic zones China, surging credit growth China, trade balance with USA China, under-developed interior regions China, unit labour costs China, upgrading technology China, urban savings reduced as interest rates fall China, WTO membership after long negotiations Chinese bonds Chinese elderly care Chinese, more than Americans Chinese seniors Civil Service Climate change Cognitive decline, a common story Cognitive impairment Colombia Commodity price Commodity price shocks Commodity prices, rising Commodity producers Commodity supercycle Communism The Communist Manifesto See alsoEngels, Friedrich; Marx, Karl Communist Party Comparative bargaining power Compertpay, R.

The Light That Failed: A Reckoning by Ivan Krastev, Stephen Holmes

active measures, Affordable Care Act / Obamacare, Andrei Shleifer, anti-communist, anti-globalists, bank run, Berlin Wall, Black Lives Matter, borderless world, Brexit referendum, corporate governance, David Brooks, deglobalization, deindustrialization, Deng Xiaoping, disinformation, Dissolution of the Soviet Union, Donald Trump, failed state, fake news, Fall of the Berlin Wall, Francis Fukuyama: the end of history, illegal immigration, Kickstarter, knowledge economy, kremlinology, liberal world order, mass immigration, Mikhail Gorbachev, Neil Armstrong, nuclear winter, obamacare, offshore financial centre, open borders, post-truth, postnationalism / post nation state, reserve currency, Ronald Reagan, shared worldview, South China Sea, Steve Bannon, the market place, Thorstein Veblen, too big to fail, Twitter Arab Spring, WikiLeaks

Superficially, the fault lay with a series of profoundly destabilizing political events: the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center in New York, the second Iraq War, the 2008 financial crisis, Russia’s annexation of Crimea and intervention in Eastern Ukraine, the impotence of the West as Syria descended into a humanitarian nightmare, the 2015 migration crisis in Europe, the Brexit referendum, and the election of Donald Trump. Liberal democracy’s post-Cold War afterglow has also been dimmed by the Chinese economic miracle, orchestrated by a political leadership that is unapologetically neither liberal nor democratic. Attempts to salvage the good name of liberal democracy by contrasting it favourably with non-Western autocracy have been undercut by the feckless violation of liberal norms, as in the torture of prisoners, and the evident malfunctioning of democratic institutions inside the West itself.

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A recent study has revealed that in the last decade trust in democracy has declined in the West’s developed democracies, and that levels of mistrust towards democracy as a political system are highest among younger people.102 A central pillar of Putin’s anti-Western policy is to nourish these seeds of doubt, giving American and European citizens ever more reasons to disbelieve that periodic elections in the West work to the public’s advantage. That the people’s voice was heard in the Brexit referendum, for example, does not mean that the consequences of the decision were thought through in advance. Whether Russian interference in Western elections has had a significant influence on outcomes is debatable. But the West now shares Russia’s post-Cold War fears of polarization, ungovernability and disintegration.

There Is Nothing for You Here: Finding Opportunity in the Twenty-First Century by Fiona Hill

2021 United States Capitol attack, active measures, Affordable Care Act / Obamacare, algorithmic bias, barriers to entry, Berlin Wall, Bernie Sanders, Big Tech, Black Lives Matter, blue-collar work, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, British Empire, business climate, call centre, collective bargaining, company town, coronavirus, COVID-19, crony capitalism, cuban missile crisis, David Brooks, deindustrialization, desegregation, digital divide, disinformation, Dissolution of the Soviet Union, Donald Trump, Fall of the Berlin Wall, financial independence, first-past-the-post, food desert, gender pay gap, gentrification, George Floyd, glass ceiling, global pandemic, Great Leap Forward, housing crisis, illegal immigration, imposter syndrome, income inequality, indoor plumbing, industrial cluster, industrial research laboratory, informal economy, Jeff Bezos, Jeremy Corbyn, Kickstarter, knowledge economy, lockdown, low skilled workers, Lyft, Martin Wolf, mass immigration, meme stock, Mikhail Gorbachev, new economy, oil shock, opioid epidemic / opioid crisis, Own Your Own Home, Paris climate accords, pension reform, QAnon, ransomware, restrictive zoning, ride hailing / ride sharing, Right to Buy, Ronald Reagan, self-driving car, Silicon Valley, single-payer health, statistical model, Steve Bannon, The Chicago School, TikTok, transatlantic slave trade, Uber and Lyft, uber lyft, University of East Anglia, urban decay, urban planning, Washington Consensus, WikiLeaks, Winter of Discontent, women in the workforce, working poor, Yom Kippur War, young professional

The second referendum focused on changing the British electoral system from “first-past-the-post” to an alternative voting system. This proposal was roundly rejected. The stakes were high for the third, given the daunting prospects of withdrawing from forty years of deeply entrenched formal economic and political relationships and trade networks. The Brexit, or “Leave,” referendum campaign followed a pattern similar to that of the 2016 U.S. presidential election. It dominated UK politics for months. It was well-funded and led by an insurgent figure from outside the political mainstream, Nigel Farage, the charismatic head of the UK Independence Party (UKIP). Farage’s UKIP was a movement rather than a party, with little representation outside of the European Parliament and no accountability in British politics.

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The government, and UK pollsters initially presumed the British electorate would continue to see the benefits of EU membership and vote to remain by a small but comfortable margin. They were wrong. They had not factored in the opinions and sentiments of all the people living in the UK’s forgotten places, like County Durham. Referenda attract voters who stay home during normal elections. In the case of the Brexit referendum, 72 percent of the British electorate turned out, including large numbers of people who had not previously participated in national elections—from medium-sized cities, small towns, rural areas, and impoverished districts of major cities, including in the North East of England. These voters had not been captured by earlier exit polls, so they were not featured in pollsters’ existing data sets and projections.

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In Bishop Auckland, 61 percent of voters opted for Brexit, even though EU structural funds had underpinned some of the town’s fitful attempts at regeneration since the 1980s and that money would clearly now be lost. The eventual winner of the 2016 U.S. election, Donald Trump, was in the United Kingdom during the Brexit referendum. He happened to be playing golf at a resort he owned at Turnberry in Scotland. Trump immediately grasped the British dynamic. His pollsters had been busy at home surveying the American electorate and saw similar patterns. Trump predicted that the U.S. would have its own “Brexit moment” in November—a prediction that proved to be true, again to many people’s surprise, and thanks in large part to his campaign’s ability to draw out disaffected and low-income voters in similar regions in the United States.

Small Men on the Wrong Side of History: The Decline, Fall and Unlikely Return of Conservatism by Ed West

Affordable Care Act / Obamacare, anti-communist, assortative mating, battle of ideas, Beeching cuts, Berlin Wall, Black Lives Matter, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, British Empire, Broken windows theory, Bullingdon Club, centre right, clean water, cognitive dissonance, Corn Laws, David Attenborough, David Brooks, deindustrialization, delayed gratification, desegregation, different worldview, Donald Trump, Elon Musk, en.wikipedia.org, Etonian, Fall of the Berlin Wall, Ferguson, Missouri, future of work, gender pay gap, George Santayana, Herbert Marcuse, illegal immigration, Jeremy Corbyn, labor-force participation, laissez-faire capitalism, lump of labour, mass immigration, means of production, megacity, meta-analysis, moral hazard, moral panic, Neil Kinnock, Nelson Mandela, Norman Mailer, obamacare, opioid epidemic / opioid crisis, Overton Window, pattern recognition, Ralph Nader, replication crisis, rising living standards, Ronald Reagan, Scientific racism, Social Justice Warrior, Stephen Fry, Steve Bannon, Steven Pinker, TED Talk, Thomas Malthus, Tragedy of the Commons, Turing test, twin studies, urban decay, War on Poverty, Winter of Discontent, zero-sum game

On almost any non-economic issue most of my friends hitting forty were more progressive than in their early twenties; they might resent paying more tax or even dislike trade unions, but that didn’t make them conservative. Among my contemporaries in the 35–44 age group, some 50 per cent voted for Corbyn in 2017 and even if many did not entirely support his particular interpretation of the Left they were nevertheless totally repulsed by conservatism. Indeed the Brexit referendum had helped to expose how much the Tory party’s brand was entirely built around its reputation for economic competence, a reputation now largely pissed against the wall; it exposed just how unpopular conservative philosophy actually was once financial considerations were removed. This sense of revulsion was felt not just by a large proportion of young and middle-aged Britons, but by the overwhelming majority of the most educated and influential.

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Dating site OkCupid says that since 2016 the number of women who prioritised shared political views over enjoyable sex had doubled, a shift the company described as ‘unprecedented’.47 Dating sites now openly use this as a selling point, the Guardian ‘Soul Mates’ promising ‘to play Cupid for the ideologically suited’. Of course, the same pattern is developing in Britain, too, so from 2008 to 2016 the proportion who said they would be upset by a child marrying a member of the other main party doubled, although Labour supporters were more hostile (28 Labour v. 19 per cent Tory).48 The gaps opened by the Brexit referendum are even worse, and rising; in 2016, some 18 per cent of Remainers said they would be unhappy with a Leave-voting in-law, compared to just 3 per cent of Leavers.49 By 2019, this figure had risen to 37 per cent of Remainers, and 11 per cent of the other side.50 This huge gap could partly reflect snobbery, although some form of asymmetrical tribalism is the most likely explanation.

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Norton, 1979). 25 http://anepigone.blogspot.com/2018/06/centrists-find-politics-boring-wish-it.html. 26 https://medium.com/@ryanfazio/politics-are-not-the-sum-of-a-person-378102f25334. 27 Burton Egbert Stevenson, The Macmillan Book of Proverbs, Maxims, and Famous Phrases (London: Macmillan, 1948) INDEX 28 Days Later (2002) 185 Abbott, Jack 121 abortion 166, 168, 202, 217, 241, 363 Abortion Act 217 Abramson, Lyn Yvonne 30 academia 7–8, 12, 16–17, 136–8, 319–26 activism 7, 316–17, 326 actors 186–7 Adam 33, 219 Adam, Corinna 18 Adams, Henry 90–1 Adams, John 281 Adams, Samuel 281, 331 Adorno, Theodor 135 The Authoritarian Personality 104–7, 143 Aesop’s Fables 260 Africa 15 Agamemnon 187 Agnew, Spiro 154 agnostics 216 agreeableness 108 Aids 125 Ailes, Roger 313, 346 al-Qaida 13, 125, 201 al-Sahaf, Mohammed Saeed 353 alcohol consumption 112–13, 133 Aldred, Ebenezer 61 Alexander, Scott 118, 315–16, 342–3 Allen, William 92 Allen, Woody 102 Alloy, Lauren 30 ‘Alt-Right’ 345, 347 Altemeyer, Bob 107, 333 American Beauty (1999) 106, 184 American Civil Liberties Union 201–2 American constitution 345 American independence 53, 55, 305 American National Election Studies 303 American Political Science Association 300 ‘American Religion’ 222 American Revolution 55, 280–1 Amnesty International 99, 201, 202, 212 ANC 16, 89, 189 ancien régime 178, 333, 358–9 Andrews, Helen 176 Anglicanism 13, 37, 64, 65, 202, 214, 222 Communion 220 High Church 50, 51 norms 79 supremacy 292 anti-apartheid movement 16 anti-Catholicism 232 anti-communism 22, 211 anti-humanitarianism 74 anti-social behaviour orders (ASBOs) 163 Antichrist 64 Antonia, Lady Fraser 42 apartheid 89, 174 Apollo 29 Aquinas, Thomas 326 Arabs 362 Arbuthnot, Norman 312 aristos 31 Arnold, Matthew 279 art, degenerate 98 Arts Council 197 Aryans 89 ASBOs see anti-social behaviour orders Ashley Madison website 107 Asquith, Robert 168 atheism 52–3, 214–16, 292, 294 see also New Atheism Athelstan, King 126 Athens 31 Atlantic magazine 341, 348, 366 Attenborough, David 195 Attlee, Clement 175 Attlee era 177 Augustine of Hippo 31–3, 35, 349 Augustine, St 110, 291 Auschwitz 98 authoritarian personality 104–7, 118, 334 authoritarianism 140, 148, 208, 262, 329–30, 333–4, 338, 350 autism 138 Ayres, Bill 236 Babeuf, François-Noël 60–1 baby boomers 44, 83, 131, 155 Bad Religion 102 bad-thinkers 144–5, 146, 150, 152 Baldwin, Alec 24 Balfour, Arthur 265 Bank of England 331 Bannon, Steven 152, 309, 347 Baptists 59, 145 barbarism 65, 66, 84 barbarians 12, 131 Bargh, John 115 Barlow, Joel 109 Baron-Cohen, Sacha 333 Barrès, Maurice 95 Basics, Baxter (Viz character) 86, 267 Bastille, storming of the 55, 59, 331 Batbie, Anselme 274 Batek 131 BBC 3, 149, 165, 186, 190–7, 265, 266, 313–14, 337 Beatles 166, 287 beatnik poetry 127 Becker, Ernest 115 Beeching Axe 285 Belgium 303 Belle Époque era 126, 175, 184–5 Benedict, St 373 Benedict XVI, Pope 218, 232, 233 Benn, Tony 18, 21, 42 Bentham, Jeremy 78, 92, 223–4 Berenger, Tom 110 Berlin 20–1, 23, 41–2 Berlin Wall 21, 22, 23, 86 Betjeman, John 285 Bevan, Nye 230 Beyoncé 24 Beyond the Fringe 191 Bible 50, 219, 229, 294 Bible Belt 228 Big Five personality traits 108–13, 137, 363 ‘Big Sort, The’ 295 Bill of Rights 305–6 biological determinism 139 birth control 364 birth rates 362–4 Bishop, Bill 295 Black Death 34–5 Black Lives Matter 338 Black Wednesday 154 Blackadder 331 Blair, Tony 21, 24, 79, 153, 156, 158–61, 163–4, 183, 189, 192, 213, 266–7, 270 Blair era 167, 203–4, 205, 281 ‘Blob, the’ 271 Bloom, Allan 98 Bloom, Paul 321 Bloomsbury 18 ‘blue wave’ 2006 274 Blumenberg, Hans 67 Boas, Franz 133–4 ‘Bobo’ (bohemian bourgeois) 244, 308 Bogart, Humphrey 24 Bolshevik Revolution 303 Bolshevism 226, 246 Borat 333 Bosnia 214 bourgeois 132, 246 bourgeoisie 9, 97, 127, 135 see also Ruling Class Boy Scouts 197 Bradbury, Malcolm 39 brain 116–17 Brando, Marlon 24, 341 Brazil 164 Brecht, Bertolt 186 Breitbart (website) 308, 309, 314, 315, 317–18, 347 Breitbart, Andrew 181, 308 Brennan, Mr 47 Brent, David 192 Brexit 4, 26–7, 103, 186, 195, 270, 346, 353–60, 365, 370 Brexit Referendum (2016) 3, 173, 222, 270, 275, 302, 354–5, 357, 359 Brief Encounter (1945) 162, 168 British Army 9 British Empire 57 British National Party 87 British Potato Council 203 ‘broken windows’ theory 69 Brook 241 Brooke, Heather 298 Brooker, Charlie 249 Brooks, Arthur 82, 191, 299 Who Really Cares 237 Brooks, David 244 ‘brotherhood of man’ 71, 100 Brown, Dan 213 Brown, Gordon 203, 265, 281 Brown era 203–4 Bruinvels, Peter 194 B’Stard, Alan 89 Buchanan, Pat 154–9, 313 Buckley, William F. 68, 295–6, 313 Bullingdon Club 267 Burke, Edmund 47, 53–5, 57–9, 61–3, 65, 66, 68, 70–2, 82, 89–90, 159, 163, 181, 190, 191, 198, 230, 274, 279, 280, 345, 365 Burleigh, Michael 88 Bush, George, Sr 86, 156 Bush, George W. 27, 201, 236, 248, 313 buttons 34–5 Byrne, Liam 266 C2DE social class 5 cable TV 311 Cafod 233 California 4, 320 Calvin, John (Jean) 48, 49, 293 Calvinism 45, 49, 64 Cambridge 49 Cambridge University 52, 55, 145, 151, 326, 348 Camden Labour Party 18 Cameron, David 237, 265, 266, 267, 270, 272, 359 Cameron faction 266, 270, 359 Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) 81 Campbell, Alistair 159–60 Camus, Albert 226 Canada 178, 201 capitalism 15, 64, 78, 93, 97, 280, 339 Caplan, Bryan 275 Capra, Frank 123 Captain America comics 237 Carlson, Tucker 365 Carlyle, Thomas 41, 75, 76 cars 285–6 Cash, Johnny 24 Cassandra 28–9, 62, 373 Catharism 254–5 Cathedral, the 202–3, 271 Catholic Church 48, 116, 212, 212–14, 217–18, 232, 233, 269, 333 Catechism 137 Catholic Emancipation Act 289 Catholic Herald (newspaper) 212, 213, 216, 219, 233, 241, 272, 307, 339 Catholicism 11–13, 33, 37, 41–3, 45, 49, 51–2, 54, 57, 62, 64, 75, 134–5, 142, 155, 158, 176, 199, 202, 211–13, 217–18, 222, 230–1, 241, 243, 272–3, 291–2, 294, 296, 339, 363 see also anti-Catholicism Cato Institute 324 Cavaliers 53, 57 Ceauşecu 46 censorship 148, 166, 188–9, 290, 331 Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) 61 ‘centrist dad’ 8 Chagnon, Napoleon 147 Change 3 Change UK 3 Channel 4 168, 232 charities 57, 199–202, 233, 237 Charles I 49, 55 Charles II 36, 37, 52 Charles-Roux, Fr Jean-Marie 210–11 Chartists 175 Chelsea FC 47 Chesterton, G.

Grave New World: The End of Globalization, the Return of History by Stephen D. King

"World Economic Forum" Davos, 9 dash line, Admiral Zheng, air freight, Alan Greenspan, Albert Einstein, Asian financial crisis, bank run, banking crisis, barriers to entry, Berlin Wall, Bernie Sanders, bilateral investment treaty, bitcoin, blockchain, Bonfire of the Vanities, borderless world, Bretton Woods, Brexit referendum, British Empire, business cycle, capital controls, Capital in the Twenty-First Century by Thomas Piketty, central bank independence, collateralized debt obligation, colonial rule, corporate governance, credit crunch, currency manipulation / currency intervention, currency peg, currency risk, David Ricardo: comparative advantage, debt deflation, deindustrialization, Deng Xiaoping, Doha Development Round, Donald Trump, Edward Snowden, eurozone crisis, facts on the ground, failed state, Fall of the Berlin Wall, falling living standards, floating exchange rates, Francis Fukuyama: the end of history, full employment, George Akerlof, global supply chain, global value chain, Global Witness, Great Leap Forward, hydraulic fracturing, Hyman Minsky, imperial preference, income inequality, income per capita, incomplete markets, inflation targeting, information asymmetry, Internet of things, invisible hand, Jeremy Corbyn, joint-stock company, Kickstarter, Long Term Capital Management, low interest rates, Martin Wolf, mass immigration, Mexican peso crisis / tequila crisis, middle-income trap, moral hazard, Nixon shock, offshore financial centre, oil shock, old age dependency ratio, paradox of thrift, Peace of Westphalia, plutocrats, post-truth, price stability, profit maximization, quantitative easing, race to the bottom, rent-seeking, reserve currency, reshoring, rising living standards, Ronald Reagan, Savings and loan crisis, Scramble for Africa, Second Machine Age, Skype, South China Sea, special drawing rights, technology bubble, The Great Moderation, The Market for Lemons, the market place, The Rise and Fall of American Growth, trade liberalization, trade route, Washington Consensus, WikiLeaks, Yom Kippur War, zero-sum game

By 2015, membership was up to 28 nations, with many Eastern European countries – formerly under the Soviet yoke – now part of a Union with a total population of over 500 million citizens, making it the third most populated ‘country’ in the world after China and India. A year later, the EU suffered its first major membership reversal, following the outcome of the UK ‘Brexit’ referendum. TWELVE MUSKETEERS The third essential building block was the one with teeth. The North Atlantic Treaty was signed in April 1949. The 12 founding nations10 adopted a Three Musketeers approach to their collective defence, with Article 5 of the Treaty stating that ‘an armed attack against one or more of them … shall be considered an attack against them all’.

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Globalization might work, but it hasn’t worked for everyone.3 This, in turn, has led to a sense of exclusion, triggering a breakdown in trust between the elite and the rest within the Western world. One telling example comes from an opinion poll conducted a few days before the 23 June 2016 UK Brexit referendum. Those who intended to vote to leave the European Union were much more likely to take the view that ‘it’s wrong to rely too much on so-called experts who often make predictions and recommendations that turn out to be wrong: it’s often better to reply on the wisdom of ordinary people and a bit of common sense’.

Capitalism Without Capital: The Rise of the Intangible Economy by Jonathan Haskel, Stian Westlake

23andMe, activist fund / activist shareholder / activist investor, Airbnb, Alan Greenspan, Albert Einstein, Alvin Toffler, Andrei Shleifer, bank run, banking crisis, Bernie Sanders, Big Tech, book value, Brexit referendum, business climate, business process, buy and hold, Capital in the Twenty-First Century by Thomas Piketty, carbon credits, cloud computing, cognitive bias, computer age, congestion pricing, corporate governance, corporate raider, correlation does not imply causation, creative destruction, dark matter, Diane Coyle, Donald Trump, Douglas Engelbart, Douglas Engelbart, driverless car, Edward Glaeser, Elon Musk, endogenous growth, Erik Brynjolfsson, everywhere but in the productivity statistics, Fellow of the Royal Society, financial engineering, financial innovation, full employment, fundamental attribution error, future of work, gentrification, gigafactory, Gini coefficient, Hernando de Soto, hiring and firing, income inequality, index card, indoor plumbing, intangible asset, Internet of things, Jane Jacobs, Jaron Lanier, Jeremy Corbyn, job automation, Kanban, Kenneth Arrow, Kickstarter, knowledge economy, knowledge worker, laissez-faire capitalism, liquidity trap, low interest rates, low skilled workers, Marc Andreessen, Mother of all demos, Network effects, new economy, Ocado, open economy, patent troll, paypal mafia, Peter Thiel, pets.com, place-making, post-industrial society, private spaceflight, Productivity paradox, quantitative hedge fund, rent-seeking, revision control, Richard Florida, ride hailing / ride sharing, Robert Gordon, Robert Solow, Ronald Coase, Sand Hill Road, Second Machine Age, secular stagnation, self-driving car, shareholder value, sharing economy, Silicon Valley, six sigma, Skype, software patent, sovereign wealth fund, spinning jenny, Steve Jobs, sunk-cost fallacy, survivorship bias, tacit knowledge, tech billionaire, The Rise and Fall of American Growth, The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, Tim Cook: Apple, total factor productivity, TSMC, Tyler Cowen, Tyler Cowen: Great Stagnation, urban planning, Vanguard fund, walkable city, X Prize, zero-sum game

Another dimension is rising inequality of place, even within developed countries. There is nothing new about industrial decline making once rich places poorer, least of all in Britain, where it was a problem for most of the twentieth century. Nor is there anything new about certain places being hotbeds of economic activity. But events like the 2016 Brexit referendum in the UK, where thriving cities voted one way and the rest of England another, and the election of Donald Trump on the back of a surge of votes from so-called left-behind communities away from America’s prosperous coastal cities, make this divide more salient. Figure 6.2. Inequality between the generations, UK.

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Inequality between the generations, UK. Data are absolute poverty rates after housing costs (share of group below 60 percent of real median income in 2010–11). Source: Data from Institute for Fiscal Studies, Belfield et al. 2014, https://www.ifs.org.uk/uploads/publications/comms/R107.pdf. The divides revealed by the UK’s Brexit referendum and the election of Donald Trump also point to a different form of inequality, one that economists typically focus on little, if at all. That is inequality of esteem. The reasons for the rise of populist political movements around the world, from the supporters of Donald Trump in the United States, to Britain’s United Kingdom Independence Party, to the Five Star Movement in Italy are many and varied.

How to Stand Up to a Dictator by Maria Ressa

2021 United States Capitol attack, activist lawyer, affirmative action, Affordable Care Act / Obamacare, airport security, anti-communist, Asian financial crisis, Big Tech, Brexit referendum, business process, business process outsourcing, call centre, Cambridge Analytica, citizen journalism, cognitive bias, colonial rule, commoditize, contact tracing, coronavirus, COVID-19, crowdsourcing, delayed gratification, disinformation, Donald Trump, fake news, future of journalism, iterative process, James Bridle, Kevin Roose, lockdown, lone genius, Mahatma Gandhi, Mark Zuckerberg, Marshall McLuhan, Menlo Park, Milgram experiment, move fast and break things, natural language processing, Nelson Mandela, Network effects, obamacare, performance metric, QAnon, recommendation engine, Sheryl Sandberg, Shoshana Zuboff, Silicon Valley, Steven Levy, surveillance capitalism, the medium is the message, The Wisdom of Crowds, TikTok, Twitter Arab Spring, work culture

Facebook didn’t only provide a platform for those propagandists’ speech or even only enable them; in fact, it gave them preferential treatment because anger is the contagious currency of Facebook’s profit machine. Only anger, outrage, and fear led to greater numbers of people using Facebook more times a day. Violence has made Facebook rich. It was only in 2018, after the Cambridge Analytica scandal, the Brexit referendum, the 2016 elections of Donald Trump and Rodrigo Duterte, and more, that Facebook began high-profile post takedowns in the Philippines and around the world, which included limiting the reach of Mocha Uson’s page and taking down the network built by Duterte’s social media campaign manager. By then, of course, it was too late.

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Carole Cadwalladr, a Pulitzer Prize–nominated reporter and feature writer for the Observer, the sister publication of the Guardian, had collaborated with the New York Times to expose how the political consulting company Cambridge Analytica had illicitly harvested data from millions of Facebook accounts to better target voters and advance political campaigns, including Brexit and Donald Trump’s successful 2016 presidential bid.21 The country with the largest number of compromised accounts was the United States. The second largest? The Philippines.22 Cambridge Analytica did the same during the Brexit referendum and, we would discover, in campaigns in the Philippines.23 All of those had been corrupted, and what enabled it was Facebook. Partly because of Carole’s tenacity, the US Congress called Mark to testify. The Federal Trade Commission then fined Facebook $5 billion, the largest penalty ever levied against a tech company.

Them and Us: How Immigrants and Locals Can Thrive Together by Philippe Legrain

affirmative action, Albert Einstein, AlphaGo, autonomous vehicles, Berlin Wall, Black Lives Matter, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, British Empire, call centre, centre right, Chelsea Manning, clean tech, coronavirus, corporate social responsibility, COVID-19, creative destruction, crowdsourcing, data science, David Attenborough, DeepMind, Demis Hassabis, demographic dividend, digital divide, discovery of DNA, Donald Trump, double helix, Edward Glaeser, en.wikipedia.org, eurozone crisis, failed state, Fall of the Berlin Wall, future of work, illegal immigration, immigration reform, informal economy, Jane Jacobs, job automation, Jony Ive, labour market flexibility, lockdown, low cost airline, low interest rates, low skilled workers, lump of labour, Mahatma Gandhi, Mark Zuckerberg, Martin Wolf, Mary Meeker, mass immigration, moral hazard, Mustafa Suleyman, Network effects, new economy, offshore financial centre, open borders, open immigration, postnationalism / post nation state, purchasing power parity, remote working, Richard Florida, ride hailing / ride sharing, Rishi Sunak, Ronald Reagan, Silicon Valley, Skype, SoftBank, Steve Jobs, tech worker, The Death and Life of Great American Cities, The future is already here, The Future of Employment, Tim Cook: Apple, Tyler Cowen, urban sprawl, WeWork, Winter of Discontent, women in the workforce, working-age population

In 2019 Walter Lübcke, a German politician who supported his country’s welcoming of refugees, was also killed; the mayors of Cologne and Altena have been stabbed for similar reasons but fortunately survived.5 Overall, far-right terrorists murdered 109 people in the US between 11 September 2001 and September 2019 – slightly more than Islamist jihadi ones did6 – and caused 70 percent of terrorism deaths between 2009 and 2018.7 Police in the UK say the fastest-growing terrorist threat is from the far right, which was associated with seven of the twenty-two plots to cause mass casualties between March 2017 and September 2019.8 Globally, there were thirty-eight fatal far-right terrorist attacks in 2018, up from nine in 2013.9 In the West, there were more than twice as many far-right terrorist attacks in 2018 than Islamist ones.10 While violence remains rare, the international debate about immigration is also increasingly inflamed. In the final days of the Brexit referendum campaign, leading Leave campaigner Nigel Farage stood before a poster depicting a huge line of non-white refugees and warned that Europe was at ‘breaking point’. Viktor Orbán, Hungary’s nationalist prime minister, claims Muslim migrants threaten Europe’s Christian identity and are ‘the Trojan horse of terrorism’.

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And as Hungary’s example shows – which Orbán has turned into a corrupt, authoritarian state where the press is muzzled, the judiciary is politicised, helping refugees is criminalised and he can now indefinitely rule by decree – populist nationalists ultimately threaten liberal democracy itself.17 Even out of government, far-right populists can wield huge political influence. Witness how then prime minister David Cameron called the Brexit referendum to stave off the perceived threat from Farage. While the collapse of Farage’s successive political outfits has left Britain without a viable far-right party, Prime Minister Boris Johnson is often opportunistically Trump-like. Having long insisted Europeans were welcome to stay in Britain after Brexit, during the 2019 election campaign he said they should no longer be able to ‘treat the country as their own’.18 The coronavirus crisis has provided new ammunition to immigrant-haters.

Uncharted: How to Map the Future by Margaret Heffernan

"World Economic Forum" Davos, 23andMe, Affordable Care Act / Obamacare, Airbnb, Alan Greenspan, Anne Wojcicki, anti-communist, Atul Gawande, autonomous vehicles, banking crisis, Berlin Wall, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, chief data officer, Chris Urmson, clean water, complexity theory, conceptual framework, cosmic microwave background, creative destruction, CRISPR, crowdsourcing, data science, David Attenborough, discovery of penicillin, driverless car, epigenetics, Fall of the Berlin Wall, fear of failure, George Santayana, gig economy, Google Glasses, Greta Thunberg, Higgs boson, index card, Internet of things, Jaron Lanier, job automation, Kickstarter, Large Hadron Collider, late capitalism, lateral thinking, Law of Accelerating Returns, liberation theology, mass immigration, mass incarceration, megaproject, Murray Gell-Mann, Nate Silver, obamacare, oil shale / tar sands, passive investing, pattern recognition, Peter Thiel, prediction markets, RAND corporation, Ray Kurzweil, Rosa Parks, Sam Altman, scientific management, Shoshana Zuboff, Silicon Valley, smart meter, Stephen Hawking, Steve Ballmer, Steve Jobs, surveillance capitalism, TED Talk, The Signal and the Noise by Nate Silver, Tim Cook: Apple, twin studies, University of East Anglia

They shouldn’t mistake the gritty realism of numbers for anything more than informed guesswork, rife with assumptions, ideology and bias. When you assess a forecast can make a decisive difference to seeing it as true or false. The future doesn’t unfold evenly but often reveals new information long after it looks like the story’s over. When, in the days and weeks following the Brexit referendum, the British economy appeared to defy the predictions of imminent decline, it was easy to conclude that dire warnings from those campaigning to remain in Europe had been bad, stupid and wrong. After all, in the days and weeks after the 2016 referendum, the UK had remained the fastest growing economy in the G7.

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How DARE you invoke the sacrifices of those [who] fought one.’ 11 More recently, Mervyn King, a former governor of the Bank of England, compared Theresa May’s Brexit deal to Chamberlain’s appeasement of Hitler in the 1930s too: ‘In the 1930s, with appeasement; in the 1970s, when the British economy was the “sick man” of Europe and the government saw its role as managing decline; and now, in the turmoil that has followed the Brexit referendum. In all three cases, the conventional wisdom of the day was wrong’, www.bbc.co.uk/­news/­business-46446105, accessed 5 December 2018 12 ‘From the Berlin Wall to the Arab Spring’, www.counterpart.org/­stories/­from-the-berlin-wall-to-the-arab-spring 13 ‘Medvedev compares “Arab Spring” to fall of Berlin Wall’, www.expatica.com/­ru/news/­country-news/­Medvedev-compares-Arab-Spring-to-fall-of-Berlin-Wall_274177.html, accessed 30 November 2018 14 Remarks by the President on the Middle East and North Africa, obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/­the-press-office/­2011/05/19/­remarks-president-middle-east-and-north-africa, accessed 2 May 2018 15 In Egypt, even as Tahrir Square filled, analysts started to question the revolutionary thesis.

Greater: Britain After the Storm by Penny Mordaunt, Chris Lewis

"World Economic Forum" Davos, 2021 United States Capitol attack, 3D printing, accelerated depreciation, Ada Lovelace, Airbnb, banking crisis, battle of ideas, behavioural economics, Bernie Madoff, bitcoin, Black Lives Matter, blockchain, Bob Geldof, Boeing 747, Boris Johnson, Bretton Woods, Brexit referendum, British Empire, carbon footprint, Charles Babbage, collective bargaining, Corn Laws, corporate social responsibility, COVID-19, credit crunch, crowdsourcing, data is not the new oil, data is the new oil, David Attenborough, death from overwork, Deng Xiaoping, Diane Coyle, Donald Trump, Downton Abbey, driverless car, Elon Musk, en.wikipedia.org, experimental economics, failed state, fake news, Firefox, fixed income, full employment, gender pay gap, global pandemic, global supply chain, green new deal, happiness index / gross national happiness, high-speed rail, impact investing, Jeremy Corbyn, Khartoum Gordon, lateral thinking, Live Aid, lockdown, loss aversion, low skilled workers, microaggression, mittelstand, moral hazard, Neil Kinnock, Nelson Mandela, Ocado, off-the-grid, offshore financial centre, Panamax, Ponzi scheme, post-truth, quantitative easing, remote working, road to serfdom, Salesforce, Sheryl Sandberg, Skype, smart cities, social distancing, South China Sea, sovereign wealth fund, Steve Jobs, Steven Pinker, surveillance capitalism, transaction costs, transcontinental railway

NOTES 1 Sadly, they themselves both disappeared in January 2021 and May 2020 from cancer and Covid respectively. 2 http://www.bbcamerica.com/anglophenia/2013/10/10-places-brits-love-to-live-in-america 3 https://www.businessinsider.com/british-expats-most-population-destinations-2015-9#4-spain--381025-expats-spain-is-still-high-on-the-list-where-brits-go-for-the-cheap-booze-sunny-weather-and-relatively-easy-integration-into-the-culture-14 INTRODUCTION Three great storms engulfed Britain in the ten years between 2010 and 2020: the financial crisis, the Brexit referendum and the global pandemic. They were similar in the following respects: they were unlike anything in living memory; they derailed longer-term government plans; they required unprecedented, profound and prolonged intervention; they were all eclipsed by each other; they exposed vulnerable communities; they revealed the British character; and they happened because Britain was more connected to the world than ever before.

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Many appointments are political, made with a view to those members regularly attending Parliament and perhaps taking on front-bench work as spokespersons or whips. The Archbishop of Canterbury, who will have been sitting on the bishops’ benches anyway, is usually made a life peer on the occasion of stepping down from the role, as are former Speakers of the Commons. During the Brexit referendum and its aftermath, British politics received a great deal of scrutiny. Many were frustrated at how unaccountable and unresponsive it appeared to be, especially when implementing the decision of the people. This is why Parliament needs to modernise. After all, it would be a supreme irony if a country where the majority of parliamentarians are unelected left the European Union because of a lack of democracy.

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INDEX Acheson, Dean 1 Adebowale, Victor 1 age and government debt 1 and social mobility 1 and view of democracy 1 and voter preference 1 and voter turnout 1 Ames, Elizabeth 1 Anderson, Michael 1 apologising 1 Arctic Monkeys 1 Association of British Insurers 1 attitude, importance of 1 Audit Commission 1 Barber, Michael 1 Barry, Charles 1 Barwell, Gavin 1 BBC 1, 2, 3 Beam 1 Bell, Torsten 1 Belt and Road Initiative 1, 2, 3 Benn, Tony 1 Best Countries report 1, 2 Beveridge, William 1, 2 ‘Beyond Business Rates’ (Centre for Cities) 1 Biden, Joe 1 Big Society 1 Blair, Tony 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 Blake’s 1 2 Blind Veterans UK (BVUK) 1 Blink (Gladwell) 1 Blue Peter 1 Boyle, Danny 1 Brexit see EU referendum Brit(ish) (Hirsch) 1 British characteristics apologising 1 complicated rules 1 crown of 1 double entendres 1 etiquette 1 euphemisms 1 fairness 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 frugality 1 inventiveness 1 love of underdogs 1, 2, 3, 4 ‘make do and mend’ 1 nostalgia 1, 2 pluckiness 1, 2 pubs 1 queues 1 recycling 1 sense of humour 1 similarity to United States 1 sports rules 1 suspicion of sudden change 1, 2 British Election Study 1 British Medical Association (BMA) 1 British Social Attitudes Survey 1 British strengths/weaknesses celebration of 1 colonial past 1 compassion 1 constitution 1 creativity 1 environment 1 fairness 1 financial resilience 1 generosity 1 global leadership 1 health and well-being 1 international trade 1, 2 inventiveness 1 opportunity 1 potential 1 racism 1, 2 role in world 1 safety 1 social fabric 1 tracking of 1 trustworthiness 1, 2, 3 wealth 1 Brokenshire, James 1 Brook, Sam 1 Brown, Gordon 1, 2 Bubb, Stephen 1 Business Growth Fund 1 Cameron, David 1, 2, 3, 4 Camus, Albert 1 capitalism and climate change 1 and data 1 and democracy 1 efficiency of 1 forward-looking nature of 1 German model of 1 and globalisation 1 Japanese model of 1 and mutuality 1 regulation of 1 Caplin, Nick 1 Capra, Frank 1 Carry on films 1 Castañeda, Juan 1 Centre for Cities 1 Centre for Public Impact 1 Centre for Social Justice 1, 2 Centre for Towns 1 Chamorro-Premuzic, Tomas 1 charitable giving 1, 2, 3 charities 1, 2 Charities Aid Foundation 1 Charity Commission 1 Charles I, King 1, 2, 3 China authoritarianism in 1 and Belt and Road Initiative 1, 2, 3 British trade with 1 challenge to dominance 1 competitiveness of 1 comparison with United States 1 control of data in 1 debt in 1, 2 environment in 1 inequality in 1 inflation in 1 infrastructure in 1 inventiveness in 1 mistakes about 1 natural resources in 1, 2 population of 1 reasons for success 1 trustworthiness of 1, 2 view of democracy 1, 2 China Daily 1 Chorley, Matt 1 Civil Service World 1 climate change 1, 2, 3 Clinton, Hillary 1 coalition building 1 Colbert, Jean-Baptiste 1 Collier, Paul 1 Collins, Tim 1 colonial past 1 Commonwealth Fund 1 ‘Community Capital’ (Centre for Social Justice) 1 community-led regeneration 1 community-led services 1 Community Life Survey 1 compassion 1 complicated rules 1 Confederation of British Industry 1 Connolly, Billy 1 Conservative Party 1 constitution 1 Cooper, Cary 1 Cooper, Christabel 1 COP (Conference of the Parties) 1 2 Corbyn, Jeremy 1, 2 Covid pandemic and cultural change 1 and domestic violence 1 productivity during 1 and queueing 1 and social care 1 and social divisions 1 and technical change 1 Coyle, Diane 1 creative industries 1, 2, 3 Cribbins, Bernard 1 cricket 1 crime 1 Croft, David 1 Cromwell, Oliver 1 croquet 1 Crown Prosecution Service 1 cultural identities 1 Cusick, Raymond 1 D10 alliance 1, 2 Daily Telegraph 1, 2 Dalai Lama 1 Damazer, Mark 1 Damper, Carole 1 Darrow, Paul 1 data in capitalism 1 for planning 1 Davie, Tim 1 debt 1, 2 democracy 1 and age 1, 2 and capitalism 1 China’s view of 1, 2 challenges to 1 diversity of 1 and EU referendum 1, 2 and parliamentary majorities 1 and planning 1 problems with 1 support for 1 in United States 1, 2 and voter turnout 1 Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy 1 Department for Education (DfE) 1 devolution of financial powers 1 disabilities 1 Doctor Who 1, 2 domestic violence 1 double entendres 1 Early Bird, The 1 EC Roberts Centre 1 economic growth 1 Economist Intelligence Unit Democracy Index 1 Economist, The 1 education 1, 2, 3 Edward the Confessor 1 Edwards, Eddie ‘The Eagle’ 1 Eisenhower, Dwight 1 elections see democracy England: An Elegy (Scruton) 1, 2 Enham Alamein 1 Entrepreneurial State, The (Mazzucat) 1 Entwhistle, George 1 environment in Britain 1 in China 1 equality and business 1 in China 1 complexity in solving 1 as continuing issue 1 gender 1, 2 and health 1 and inclusion 1 language of 1 and leadership models 1 and legal system 1 as minority issue 1 and minority perspectives 1 and modernisation 1, 2 as political issue 1 and racial discrimination 1 and social mobility 1 Equality of Experience Survey 1 etiquette 1 EU referendum bitterness of campaign 1 and democracy 1, 2 and Parliament 1, 2 as public priority 1, 2 and trustworthiness 1 fairness 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 Farage, Nigel 1 Fawkes, Guy 1 Federation of Small Businesses 1 Fehr, Jacqueline 1 Ferguson, Niall 1 films 1 financial resilience 1 Financial Times 1 flags as symbols 1 football 1 Forbes 1 Forbes, Steve 1 Forgotten Veterans UK (FVUK) 1 Fox, Kate 1, 2 fraud prevention 1 freedom of speech 1 frugality 1 Full English ritual 1 gender equality 1, 2 generosity 1 George, Robert P. 1 Germany 1 ‘Giving a Sense of Place’ (Charities Aid Foundation) 1 Gladwell, Malcolm 1 Global Competitiveness Index 1 Global Creativity Index 1 Global Impact Investing Network (GIIN) 1 Global Innovation Index 1 global leadership 1 Global Resilience Index 1 Goleman, Dan 1 Gomes, Renata 1 Good Life, The 1 Goodhart, David 1, 2 Goodwood Revival 1, 2, 3 government see also Parliament business culture in 1 community-led 1, 2 complexity of 1 corporate involvement in 1 debt of 1 devolution of financial powers 1 and economic growth 1 and expenditure rules 1 fraud prevention in 1 and Green Book 1 institutions of 1 and investment levels 1 local government 1 local taxation 1 and localism 1 responsibility in 1 size of 1, 2 and social value 1 state involvement 1 third sector role 1 volunteering support 1, 2 Grant, Adam 1 Green Book 1 Green Investment Bank 1 Greenway, Andrew 1 Guardian, The 1, 2, 3 Guerin, Orla 1 Halfon, Robert 1 Hayek, Friedrich 1 health 1 Hill, Benny 1 Hirsch, Afua 1 Hobson’s Choice 1 home ownership 1 homelessness 1 homophobia 1 honours system 1 HOPE Not Hate 1 household sizes 1 House of Lords 1, 2, 3 House of St Barnabas 1 How Capitalism Will Save Us (Forbes and Ames) 1 How to Run a Government: So that Citizens Benefit and Taxpayers Don’t Go Crazy (Barber) 1 Hoyle, Lindsay 1 human rights 1 Hundred Year Marathon, The (Pillsbury) 1, 2 Hutton, Barbara 1 immigration and EU referendum 1 pull factors 1, 2 inclusion 1, 2 India comparison with China 1, 2 and democracy 1 inequality see equality inflation 1 Institute of Economic Affairs 1 Institute for Fiscal Studies 1 Institute for Government (IfG) 1, 2, 3, 4 Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP) 1, 2 Integrated Communities Action Plan 1 international trade 1, 2 inventiveness in Britain 1, 2 in China 1 investment and developing world 1 role of government 1 IQAir report 1 Isaacs, Jeremy 1 It Ain’t Half Hot, Mum 1 It’s a Wonderful Life 1 Jackson, Tim 1 Jacques, Hattie 1 James, Clive 1 James, Sid 1 Japan 1, 2 Javid, Sajid 1 Jenkins, Simon 1, 2 Johnson & Johnson 1 Johnson, Boris 1, 2 Johnson, Robert ‘Woody’ 1, 2 Jones, Carwyn 1 Joseph Rowntree Foundation 1 Kamall, Syed 1 Kendal, Felicity 1 Keynes, John Maynard 1 Kinnock, Neil 1 Labour Party 1, 2, 3, 4 leadership models 1 Lean, David 1 legal system 1, 2, 3, 4 Lester, Richard 1 Lilla, Mark 1 Little Platoons (Skelton) 1 Littlewood, Mark 1, 2 Livingstone, Ken 1, 2 local government 1 London 1, 2, 3, 4 London Eye 1 McConnell, Jack 1 McGuinness, Martin 1 Made in Scotland (Connolly) 1 Major, John 1 ‘make do and mend’ 1 Marshall, Tim 1 Martin, Fiona 1 Masty, Stephen 1 Maude, Francis 1 May, Theresa 1, 2, 3 Mazzucato, Mariana 1, 2 Meades, Jonathan 1 Meyer, Erin 1 Mill, John Stuart 1 Mitchell, Austin 1 modernisation and coalition building 1 and equality 1, 2 and ethics 1 free market system 1 honours system 1 of infrastructure 1 of institutions 1 need for 1 of Parliament 1, 2, 3, 4 as political mission 1 Money Charity 1 Mouse on the Moon, The 1, 2 Mowlam, Mo 1 Mpanga, George (George the Poet) 1 Murray, Al 1 Nagpaul, Chaand 1 National Centre for Computing Education 1 National Crime Agency 1 National Health Service (NHS) 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 national identities 1 National Literacy Trust 1 National Security and Investment Bill (2020) 1 News of the World 1 ‘No Quick Fix’ (Centre for Social Justice) 1 Northern Ireland 1, 2 Northern Powerhouse 1 nostalgia 1, 2 OECD (Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development) 1, 2, 3, 4 Office for Civil Society 1 Office for National Statistics (ONS) 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 Olivier, Laurence 1 Olympic Games (2012) 1 Once and Future Liberal, The (Lilla) 1 One Foot in the Grave 1 Only Fools and Horses 1 Onward 1, 2 Opinions and Lifestyle Survey 1 opportunities in Britain 1 Order of the British Empire (OBE) 1 Osborne, George 1 Pagel, Christina 1 Paisley, Ian 1 Panayiotis, Michael 1 Parliament see also government and character of nation 1 diversity of MPs 1 electronic voting 1 and equality 1 expenses scandal 1 House of Lords 1, 2, 3 inefficiencies of 1 majorities in 1 and modernisation 1, 2, 3, 4 pay and privileges of MPs 1 procedure in 1 public perceptions of 1 qualifications for being an MP 1 as representative of nation 1, 2 traditions of 1 trustworthiness of 1 work of MPs 1 patriotism 1 Paxman, Jeremy 1 Perry, Jimmy 1 pessimism 1 Pick for Britain campaign 1 Pickles, Eric 1 Pillsbury, Michael 1, 2 Pinker, Steven 1 Plague, The (Camus) 1 planning and coalition building 1 data for 1 and democracy 1 and modernisation of institutions 1 and modernisation of Parliament 1 need for long-term 1, 2 tracking strengths 1 pluckiness 1, 2 police and crime commissioners (PCCs) 1 ‘Politics of Belonging’ (Onward) 1 Portcullis House 1 potential in Britain 1 poverty 1 Power to Change 1 Prescott, John 1 Prisoners of Geography (Marshall) 1 productivity 1 Prosperity Without Growth (Jackson) 1 public priorities 1 pubs 1 Pugin, Augustus 1 queues 1 Race Disparity Audit 1 Race Forward 1 racism/racial discrimination 1, 2, 3 Raffles, Stamford 1 recycling 1 refugees 1 Renke, Sam 1 responsibility in government 1 risk management and compliance 1 and trustworthiness 1 Robinson, Arnold 1 Rowling, J.

The Lost Decade: 2010–2020, and What Lies Ahead for Britain by Polly Toynbee, David Walker

banking crisis, battle of ideas, bike sharing, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, Bullingdon Club, call centre, car-free, centre right, collective bargaining, congestion charging, corporate governance, crony capitalism, Crossrail, David Attenborough, Dominic Cummings, Donald Trump, Downton Abbey, energy transition, Etonian, financial engineering, first-past-the-post, G4S, gender pay gap, gig economy, Gini coefficient, global village, green new deal, Greta Thunberg, high net worth, housing crisis, income inequality, industrial robot, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), James Dyson, Jeremy Corbyn, Large Hadron Collider, low interest rates, manufacturing employment, mass immigration, moral panic, mortgage debt, North Sea oil, offshore financial centre, opioid epidemic / opioid crisis, payday loans, pension reform, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, quantitative easing, Right to Buy, Saturday Night Live, selection bias, smart meter, Uber for X, ultra-processed food, urban renewal, working-age population

The gap between the size of the potential electorate and those actually on the register continued to grow: Democratic Audit said it could be as high as 8 million people. The 2010 coalition deal specified a referendum on fairer voting for the House of Commons. This, too, turned out to be a form of control people did not want to take back. Opposing change, the demon team who won the Brexit referendum cut their incisors on this one and practised their dishonesty. Not that they needed to. Extraordinarily, in the light of subsequent party fragmentation, fairer voting was not what the people wanted and only two out of five bothered to turn out, with 68 per cent of those who did backing the status quo.

…

The UK’s International Standing Reputation may not be immortal, as Shakespeare had Cassio say, but quickly destroyed it may take for ever to rebuild. The national self-image was dealt a heavy blow in terms of how others saw us. The observation by the Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte that Britain was ‘a waning country, too small to appear on the world stage on its own’ might have been made before Brexit. The referendum result then accelerated a (some would say necessary and overdue) process of belittlement. Yet, after the vote, repeated ad nauseam was the boast that the UK would rise again, entering glowingly advantageous trade deals across the globe. In the world of Trump and China, this was psychiatric-grade delusion.

Fall Out: A Year of Political Mayhem by Tim Shipman

banking crisis, Beeching cuts, Bernie Sanders, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, centre right, Clapham omnibus, Corn Laws, corporate governance, Dominic Cummings, Donald Trump, drone strike, Etonian, eurozone crisis, fake news, Gordon Gekko, greed is good, high-speed rail, iterative process, Jeremy Corbyn, John Bercow, Kickstarter, kremlinology, land value tax, low interest rates, mutually assured destruction, Neil Kinnock, new economy, non-tariff barriers, offshore financial centre, open borders, public intellectual, quantitative easing, Ronald Reagan, Snapchat, Steve Bannon, working poor

PART FOUR: CATHARSIS 26 Shellshock 27 The Four Horsemen 28 Florence and the Maychine Malfunction Conclusion: May Was Weak in June Appendix 1: Results of the 2017 Local Elections Appendix 2: Results of the 2017 General Election Appendix 3: Chris Wilkins’ Strategy Appendix 4: Lynton Crosby’s Strategy Appendix 5: Seumas Milne’s Strategy List of Illustrations Picture Section Notes Also by Tim Shipman About the Author About the Publisher Acknowledgements This is the second book I never intended to write. Just as with All Out War, my 2016 book on the Brexit referendum campaign, Fall Out is the product of extraordinary events. The original intention was to add a few chapters to All Out War to bring the Brexit story up to date with the declaration of Article 50 in the spring of 2017. Then Theresa May called a general election and the inexorable logic of writing a sequel overwhelmed me.

…

In their first huddle after the election was called LOTO collectively agreed that they would stand or fall on their beliefs, primarily that the programme of austerity that began in 2010 should be consigned to history. ‘We had thirty years of extreme market liberalism or neoliberalism,’ a Corbyn aide said. ‘Almost every working-age group in society is worse off in terms of living standards and stagnant wages and cuts. Those in charge have lost control, as the Brexit referendum demonstrated. And we recognised there is an underlying volatility in British politics since the financial crisis with the rise of the Lib Dems, the rise of Ukip. So, there was a whole set of thinking from which you could derive your strategy that wasn’t just, “We would like to do nice things, so we will say that we will do nice things and everybody will think that it’s nice.”’

…

Woolfe publicly declared that he would vote for May, not Nuttall, to be prime minister. ‘I have no choice,’ he said. As chief rifleman in the circular firing squad, Banks rounded on Nuttall for opening his general election campaign with a push on Muslim issues rather than treating the election as ‘a second Brexit referendum’, pronounced Ukip dead and announced that he and Farage would start a new movement in the autumn. In an extraordinary statement emailed to political journalists, Banks said, ‘Tory-leaning Ukip voters rightly concluded this is about delivering Brexit and the other issues just don’t matter in this election.

News and How to Use It: What to Believe in a Fake News World by Alan Rusbridger

airport security, basic income, Bellingcat, Big Tech, Black Lives Matter, Bletchley Park, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, call centre, Cambridge Analytica, Chelsea Manning, citizen journalism, Climategate, cognitive dissonance, coronavirus, correlation does not imply causation, COVID-19, Credit Default Swap, crisis actor, cross-subsidies, crowdsourcing, disinformation, Dominic Cummings, Donald Trump, Edward Snowden, end-to-end encryption, fake news, Filter Bubble, future of journalism, George Floyd, ghettoisation, global pandemic, Google Earth, green new deal, hive mind, housing crisis, Howard Rheingold, illegal immigration, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Jeff Bezos, Jeffrey Epstein, Jeremy Corbyn, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Julian Assange, Kickstarter, lockdown, Mark Zuckerberg, Murray Gell-Mann, Narrative Science, Neil Kinnock, Nelson Mandela, New Journalism, Nicholas Carr, ocean acidification, offshore financial centre, post-truth, profit motive, public intellectual, publication bias, Seymour Hersh, Snapchat, social distancing, Social Justice Warrior, Steve Bannon, tech baron, the scientific method, TikTok, universal basic income, WikiLeaks, yellow journalism

They were – as they saw it – on the same side. And they were in the majority. If you added up the total monthly reach of the Sun, Mail, Express, Telegraph and Daily Star, there was a 30 million gap in readers between the consumers of Brexit papers (110 million) over Remain papers (80 million). The eventual Brexit referendum margin of victory was 1.3 million. Whose will was being expressed in this campaign to lever Britain out of the European Union, and how did they do it? This becomes an unbridgeable chicken and egg question. Most pro-Brexit editors would reply that they simply read the public mood right. The country had fallen out of love with Europe.

…

We tended to hear less from what we might term the rational centre, or from the Gove-despised ‘experts’. Entire programmes were so obsessed with the splits within one tribe that other voices – including bewildered European allies and colleagues – were pushed to the margins or remained unheard. When it came to the post-Brexit referendum election of 2019 one or two skilled backroom manipulators (we can guess who) studied Trump’s ability to persuade enough people that black is white and, rather than recoil in disgust, came to the opposite conclusion: it works. Coin one unforgettable message and stick to it. ‘Get Brexit done’ was brilliant, never mind that the meaning of two of those words (‘Brexit’ and ‘done’) was far from clear: this was an age of simplicity, not complexity.

The Glass Half-Empty: Debunking the Myth of Progress in the Twenty-First Century by Rodrigo Aguilera

"Friedman doctrine" OR "shareholder theory", "World Economic Forum" Davos, activist fund / activist shareholder / activist investor, Alan Greenspan, Anthropocene, availability heuristic, barriers to entry, basic income, benefit corporation, Berlin Wall, Bernie Madoff, Bernie Sanders, bitcoin, Boris Johnson, Branko Milanovic, Bretton Woods, Brexit referendum, Capital in the Twenty-First Century by Thomas Piketty, capitalist realism, carbon footprint, Carmen Reinhart, centre right, clean water, cognitive bias, collapse of Lehman Brothers, Colonization of Mars, computer age, Corn Laws, corporate governance, corporate raider, creative destruction, cryptocurrency, cuban missile crisis, David Graeber, David Ricardo: comparative advantage, death from overwork, decarbonisation, deindustrialization, Deng Xiaoping, Doha Development Round, don't be evil, Donald Trump, Doomsday Clock, Dunning–Kruger effect, Elon Musk, European colonialism, fake news, Fall of the Berlin Wall, first-past-the-post, Francis Fukuyama: the end of history, fundamental attribution error, gig economy, Gini coefficient, Glass-Steagall Act, Great Leap Forward, green new deal, Hans Rosling, housing crisis, income inequality, income per capita, index fund, intangible asset, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), invisible hand, Jean Tirole, Jeff Bezos, Jeremy Corbyn, Jevons paradox, job automation, job satisfaction, John Maynard Keynes: Economic Possibilities for our Grandchildren, joint-stock company, Joseph Schumpeter, karōshi / gwarosa / guolaosi, Kenneth Rogoff, Kickstarter, lake wobegon effect, land value tax, Landlord’s Game, late capitalism, liberal capitalism, long peace, loss aversion, low interest rates, Mark Zuckerberg, market fundamentalism, means of production, meta-analysis, military-industrial complex, Mont Pelerin Society, moral hazard, moral panic, neoliberal agenda, Network effects, North Sea oil, Northern Rock, offshore financial centre, opioid epidemic / opioid crisis, Overton Window, Pareto efficiency, passive investing, Peter Thiel, plutocrats, principal–agent problem, profit motive, public intellectual, purchasing power parity, race to the bottom, rent-seeking, risk tolerance, road to serfdom, Robert Shiller, Robert Solow, savings glut, Scientific racism, secular stagnation, Silicon Valley, Silicon Valley ideology, Slavoj Žižek, Social Justice Warrior, Social Responsibility of Business Is to Increase Its Profits, sovereign wealth fund, Stanislav Petrov, Steven Pinker, structural adjustment programs, surveillance capitalism, tail risk, tech bro, TED Talk, The Spirit Level, The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, too big to fail, trade liberalization, transatlantic slave trade, trolley problem, unbiased observer, universal basic income, Vilfredo Pareto, Washington Consensus, Winter of Discontent, Y2K, young professional, zero-sum game

Before expanding this idea, a disclaimer: in the UK there is a current backlash against direct democracy following the Brexit referendum that is not entirely unjustified. Although ultimately it reflected the “will of the people” at the time, the fact that the majority of the British political class opposed it made it clear why representative democracy exists to prevent such acts of citizen self-harm. It is also not inconceivable that populist demagogues could pervert the aims of direct democracy to erode democracy further. However, the type of direct democracy exemplified by the Brexit referendum is not an institutionalized one. It was a terribly conceived one-off decision intended to appease a radical faction of the ruling Tory party before the 2015 election.

Can It Happen Here?: Authoritarianism in America by Cass R. Sunstein

active measures, affirmative action, Affordable Care Act / Obamacare, airline deregulation, anti-communist, anti-globalists, availability heuristic, behavioural economics, Black Lives Matter, Brexit referendum, business cycle, Cambridge Analytica, Cass Sunstein, cognitive load, David Brooks, disinformation, Donald Trump, driverless car, Edward Snowden, Estimating the Reproducibility of Psychological Science, failed state, fake news, Filter Bubble, Francis Fukuyama: the end of history, Garrett Hardin, ghettoisation, illegal immigration, immigration reform, Isaac Newton, job automation, Joseph Schumpeter, Long Term Capital Management, microaggression, Nate Silver, Network effects, New Journalism, night-watchman state, nudge theory, obamacare, Paris climate accords, post-truth, Potemkin village, random walk, Richard Thaler, road to serfdom, Ronald Reagan, seminal paper, Steve Bannon, TED Talk, the scientific method, Tragedy of the Commons, Tyler Cowen, War on Poverty, WikiLeaks, World Values Survey

After the Iraq War, the financial crisis of 2008, the derailing of the Arab Spring, economic dynamism in China where pro-democracy protesters are routinely charged with subversion, electoral victories of xenophobic authoritarians in East Central Europe, increasing support for anti-immigrant and anti-EU movements in Western Europe, the senseless Brexit referendum, the fraying of the Atlantic alliance, and the upset political victory of the forty-fifth president of the United States, the prospects for liberal democracy are once again in doubt. The unthinkable is not yet probable, but neither can it be casually ruled out. Wherever we are headed, we need to look seriously again at the conditions under which democratic government, hollowed out from within, might gradually sicken and suddenly die.

…

I will look sequentially at a miscellany of factors that have cumulatively undermined public and elite confidence in the genius of democratic politics across many advanced democracies, including the United States. First, one currently salient cause for widespread doubt about democracy is illustrated by the Brexit referendum and, once again, the election of Donald Trump. If a decisive vote is held two months earlier or later, the outcome can be completely different. This raises the question: what exactly do electoral tallies measure? Snapshot elections and referenda presumably register the preferences of the voters who go to the polls on a specific date.

21 Lessons for the 21st Century by Yuval Noah Harari

"World Economic Forum" Davos, 1960s counterculture, accounting loophole / creative accounting, affirmative action, Affordable Care Act / Obamacare, agricultural Revolution, algorithmic trading, augmented reality, autonomous vehicles, Ayatollah Khomeini, basic income, behavioural economics, Bernie Sanders, bitcoin, blockchain, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, call centre, Cambridge Analytica, Capital in the Twenty-First Century by Thomas Piketty, carbon tax, carbon-based life, Charlie Hebdo massacre, cognitive dissonance, computer age, computer vision, cryptocurrency, cuban missile crisis, decarbonisation, DeepMind, deglobalization, disinformation, Donald Trump, Dr. Strangelove, failed state, fake news, Filter Bubble, Francis Fukuyama: the end of history, Freestyle chess, gig economy, glass ceiling, Google Glasses, illegal immigration, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Internet of things, invisible hand, job automation, knowledge economy, liberation theology, Louis Pasteur, low skilled workers, Mahatma Gandhi, Mark Zuckerberg, mass immigration, means of production, Menlo Park, meta-analysis, Mohammed Bouazizi, mutually assured destruction, Naomi Klein, obamacare, pattern recognition, post-truth, post-work, purchasing power parity, race to the bottom, RAND corporation, restrictive zoning, Ronald Reagan, Rosa Parks, Scramble for Africa, self-driving car, Silicon Valley, Silicon Valley startup, TED Talk, transatlantic slave trade, trolley problem, Tyler Cowen, Tyler Cowen: Great Stagnation, universal basic income, uranium enrichment, Watson beat the top human players on Jeopardy!, zero-sum game

Democracy assumes that human feelings reflect a mysterious and profound ‘free will’, that this ‘free will’ is the ultimate source of authority, and that while some people are more intelligent than others, all humans are equally free. Like Einstein and Dawkins, an illiterate maid also has free will, hence on election day her feelings – represented by her vote – count just as much as anybody else’s. Feelings guide not just the voters, but also the leaders. In the 2016 Brexit referendum the Leave campaign was headed together by Boris Johnson and Michael Gove. After David Cameron resigned, Gove initially supported Johnson for the premiership, but at the very last minute Gove declared Johnson unfit for the position and announced his own intention to run for the job. Gove’s action, which destroyed Johnson’s chances, was described as a Machiavellian political assassination.4 But Gove defended his conduct by appealing to his feelings, explaining that ‘In every step in my political life I have asked myself one question: “What is the right thing to do?

…

Abbasid caliphs 94 Abraham, prophet 182–3, 186, 187, 274 advertising 36, 50, 53, 54, 77–8, 87, 97, 113, 114, 267 Afghanistan 101, 112, 153, 159, 172, 210 Africa 8, 13, 20, 58, 76, 79, 100, 103–4, 107, 139, 147, 150–1, 152, 168, 182, 184, 223, 226, 229, 239 see also under individual nation name African Americans 67, 150, 152, 227 agriculture 171, 185; animals and 71, 118–19, 224; automation of jobs in 19–20, 29; climate change and modern industrial 116, 117; hierarchical societies and birth of 73–4, 185, 266–7; religion and 128–30 Aisne, third Battle of the (1918) 160 Akhenaten, Pharaoh 191 Al-Aqsa mosque, Jerusalem 15 al-Baghdadi, Abu Bakr 98 Algeria 144, 145 algorithms see artificial intelligence (AI) Ali, Husayn ibn 288 Alibaba (online retailer) 50 Allah 104, 128, 130, 204, 271–2, 289 AlphaZero 31, 123 al-Qaeda 162, 168 Amazon (online retailer) 39, 40, 50, 52, 91, 267–8 Amazon rainforest 116 Amos, prophet 188 Amritsar massacre (1919) 10 Andéol, Emilie 102 animals xi, 73, 86, 98–9, 182, 190, 218, 245; distinct social behaviours 94–5; ecological collapse and 71, 116, 118–19, 224; farm animals, subjugation of 71, 118–19, 224; morality and 187–8, 200; religious sacrifice of 190 anti-Semitism 142, 143, 194, 195, 235–6 see also Jews Apple (technology company) 91, 178 Arab Spring xi, 91 Arjuna (hero of Bhagavadgita) 269–70, 271, 299 art, AI and 25–8, 55–6, 182 artificial intelligence (AI) xiii, xiv; art and 25–8, 55–6, 182; authority shift from humans to 43, 44–72, 78, 268; biochemical algorithms and 20, 21, 25–8, 47–8, 56, 59, 251, 299; cars and see cars; centaurs (human-AI teams) 29, 30–1; communism and 35, 38; consciousness and 68–72, 122, 245–6; creativity and 25–8, 32; data ownership and 77–81; dating and 263; decision-making and 36–7, 50–61; democracy and see democracy; digital dictatorships and xii, 43, 61–8, 71, 79–80, 121; discrimination and 59–60, 67–8, 75–6; education and 32, 34, 35, 38 39, 40–1, 259–68; emotional detection/manipulation 25–8, 51–2, 53, 70, 79–80, 265, 267; equality and xi, 8, 9, 13, 41, 71–2, 73–81, 246; ethics and 56–61; free will and 46–9; games and 29, 31–2, 123; globalisation and threat of 38–40; government and xii, 6, 7–9, 34–5, 37–43, 48, 53, 61–8, 71, 77–81, 87, 90, 121, 267, 268; healthcare and 22–3, 24–5, 28, 48–9, 50; intuition and 20–1, 47; liberty and 44–72; manipulation of human beings 7, 25–8, 46, 48, 50–6, 68–72, 78, 79–80, 86, 96, 245–55, 265, 267, 268; nationalism and 120–6; regulation of 6, 22, 34–5, 61, 77–81, 123; science fiction and 245–55, 268; surveillance systems and 63–5; unique non-human abilities of 21–2; war and 61–8, 123–4 see also war; weapons and see weapons; work and 8, 18, 19–43 see also work Ashoka, Emperor of India 191–2, 286 Ashura 288, 289 Asia 16, 39, 100, 103, 275 see also under individual nation name Assyrian Empire 171 Athenian democracy, ancient 95–6 attention, technology and human 71, 77–8, 87, 88–91 Australia 13, 54, 116, 145, 150, 183, 187, 232–3 Aztecs 182, 289 Babri Mosque, Ayodhya 291 Babylonian Empire 188, 189 Baidu (technology company) 23, 40, 48, 77, 267–8 Bangladesh 38–9, 273 bank loans, AI and 67 behavioural economics 20, 147, 217 Belgium 103, 165, 172 Bellaigue, Christopher de 94 Berko, Anat 233 bestiality, secular ethics and 205–6 bewilderment, age of xiii, 17, 215, 257 Bhagavadgita 269–70, 271, 299 Bhardwaj, Maharishi 181 Bible 127, 131–2, 133, 186–90, 198, 199, 200, 206, 233, 234–5, 240, 241, 272, 298 Big Data xii, 18, 25, 47, 48, 49, 53, 63, 64, 68, 71–2, 268 biometric sensors 23, 49, 50, 52, 64, 79, 92 biotechnology xii, xiv, 1, 6, 7, 8, 16, 17, 18, 21, 33–4, 41, 48, 66, 75, 80, 83, 88, 109, 121, 122, 176, 211, 251–2, 267 see also under individual area of biotechnology bioterrorism 167, 169 Bismarck, Otto von 98–9 bitcoin 6 Black Death 164 Blair, Tony 168 blockchain 6, 8 blood libel 235–6 body, human: bioengineered 41, 259, 265; body farms 34; technology and distraction from 88–92 Bolshevik Revolution (1917) 15, 248 Bonaparte, Napoleon 96, 178, 231, 284 Book of Mormon 198, 235, 240 Book of the Dead, Egyptian 235 Bouazizi, Mohamed xi brain: biochemical algorithms of 20, 21, 47, 48; brain-computer interfaces 92, 260; brainwashing 242–4, 255, 267, 295; decision-making and 50, 52; equality and 75, 79; flexibility and age of 264–5; free will and 250–2, 255; hominid 122; marketing and 267; meditation and 311, 313–14, 316, 317 Brazil 4, 7, 12, 76, 101, 103, 118, 130 Brexit referendum (2016) 5, 9, 11, 15, 45–6, 93, 99, 115 Brihadaranyaka Upanishad 283–4, 302–3 Britain 5, 9, 10, 11, 13, 15, 44–5, 94, 99, 108, 115, 139, 143, 150, 165, 172, 178, 182, 232–3, 243 Brussels bombings (March, 2016) 160 Buddha/Buddhism 58, 102, 136, 183, 184, 186, 190, 196, 278, 291, 302–6, 315 Bulgaria 169, 195, 227 Burma 304–5 Bush, George W. 4, 168, 176, 178 Caesar, Julius 96, 179 California, U.S. 8, 39, 85, 88, 148, 172, 177, 178, 200, 266 Cambridge Analytica 80, 86 Cambridge University 12, 45, 194 Cameron, David 45, 46 Canaan 189, 190, 289, 291 Canada 13, 38, 74, 107 capitalism xii, 11, 16, 35, 38, 55, 68, 76, 77, 96, 105–6, 108, 113, 130, 131, 132, 134, 135, 148, 210, 217, 245, 273, 292, 309 carbon dioxide 117 care industry 24–5 Caro, Rabbi Joseph 195 cars 133, 135; accidents and 23–4, 54, 56–7, 114, 159, 160; choosing 78; GPS/navigation and 54; self-driving 22, 23–4, 33, 41, 56–7, 58–9, 60–1, 63, 168 Catalan Independence 124, 125 Catholics 108, 132, 133, 137, 213, 292, 299 centaurs (human-AI teams) 29, 30 Chad 103, 119 Chaucer, Geoffrey: Canterbury Tales 235–6 Chemosh 191 chess 29, 31–2, 123, 180 Chigaku, Tanaka 305 child labour 33, 224 chimpanzees 94–5, 98, 122, 187–8, 200, 242 China xi, 4, 5, 8, 9, 10, 12, 13, 15, 64, 76, 100, 104, 105, 106, 107, 109, 113, 114, 115, 118, 119, 120, 121, 135, 145, 150, 151, 159, 168, 169, 171, 172–3, 175, 176, 177–8, 180, 181, 182, 183, 184, 185, 186, 193, 201, 227–8, 232, 251, 259–60, 262, 274, 284–5 Chinese Communist Party 5 Christianity 13, 55, 58, 96, 98, 126, 128–30, 131, 132, 133, 134–5, 137, 142, 143, 148, 183, 184–6, 187, 188, 189–90, 191, 192, 193, 194, 196, 199, 200, 203, 204, 208, 212–13, 233, 234–5, 236, 253, 282, 283, 288, 289, 291, 294, 296, 308; Orthodox 13, 15, 137, 138, 183, 237, 282, 308 Churchill, Winston 53, 108, 243 civilisation, single world xi, 5, 92, 95–109, 110, 138; ‘clash of civilisations’ thesis and 93–8; economics and 105–6; European civilisation and 95–6, 108–9; human tribes and 98–100; science and 107–8 ‘clash of civilisations’ 93–4 climate change x, xi, 15, 75–6, 78, 108, 109, 116–20, 121, 122–3, 124, 127, 128, 130, 133, 138, 168, 195, 219, 223, 228, 244, 265 Clinton, Bill 4, 168, 176 Clinton, Hillary 8, 97, 236 Cnut the Great, King of the Danes 105 Coca-Cola 50, 238, 267 Coldia (fictional nation) 148–50, 152–4 Cold War (1947–91) 99, 100, 113, 114, 131, 176, 180 communism xii, 3, 5, 10, 11, 14, 33, 35, 38, 74, 87, 95, 131, 132, 134, 176–7, 209–10, 251, 262, 273, 277, 279 Communities Summit (2017) 85 community 11, 37, 42, 43, 85–92, 109, 110, 135, 143–4, 201, 230, 241; breakdown of 85–7; Facebook and building of global xiii, 81, 85–91 compassion 62, 63, 71, 186; Buddhism and 305–6; religion and 186, 200, 201–2, 204, 208–9, 234, 305–6; secular commitment to 200, 201–2, 204–6, 208–9, 210 Confucius 15, 136, 181, 190, 260, 284–5 consciousness ix; AI and 36, 68–72, 122; intelligence and 68–70, 245–6; meditation and 315, 316; religion and 197 Conservative Party 45 conservatives: conservation and 219–20; embrace liberal world view 44–5 conspiracy theories 222, 229 Constantine the Great, Roman Emperor 192 Constantius II, Roman Emperor 192 cooperation 12, 29, 134; fictions and mass 134, 137, 233–42, 245; human-AI 29, 31; morality and 47, 187; nationalism and 134, 137, 236–8; religion and 134, 137, 233–6 corruption 12, 13, 15, 188–9 Council of Religion and the Homosexual (CRH) 200 creativity 25–8, 31, 32, 75, 182, 234, 262, 299 Crimea 174–5, 177, 179, 231, 238 Croats 282 Crusades 96, 165, 184, 199, 212, 213, 296 cryptocurrency 6 Cuba 9–10, 11, 114, 176 Cuban Missile Crisis (1962) 114 cultures, differences between 147–55 culturism 150–4 cyberwarfare 127, 176, 178, 179 cyborgs 8, 76–7, 212, 278 Czech Republic 200 Daisy advertisement: US presidential election (1964) and 113, 114 Darwin, Charles 194; On the Origin of Species 98–9 Darwinism 213 data: Big Data xii, 18, 25, 47, 48, 49, 53, 63, 64, 68, 71–2, 268; liberty and 44–72; ownership regulation 77–81, 86 see also artificial intelligence (AI) Davos World Economic Forum 222 Dawkins, Richard 45 Deep Blue (IBM’s chess program) 29, 31 democracies: ‘clash of civilisations’ thesis and 93–8; data processing and 65; equality and 74; individual, trust in and 217, 220; liberal democracy see liberal democracy; liberty and 44–6, 53, 55, 64, 65, 66, 67; media manipulation and 12–13; secular ethics and 204, 210 Denmark 4, 94, 105, 144, 153, 200, 210 dharma 270, 271, 286, 299, 309 Di Tzeitung 97 dictatorships 3, 5, 33, 74, 210, 305; digital xii, 43, 61–8, 71, 79–80, 121 discrimination: AI and 59–60, 67–8, 75–6; brain and structural bias 226–8; religion and 135, 191, 200, 208; racism/culturism, immigration and 147–55 disease 16, 22, 28, 49, 88, 107, 218, 289 disorientation, sense of 5, 6 DNA 49, 66, 67, 79, 98, 150, 182 doctors 22–3, 24, 28, 48–9, 106–7, 128–9, 280 dogmas, faith in 229–30 dollar, American 106 Donbas 238 Donetsk People’s Republic 232 drones 29, 30, 35, 64, 76 East Africa 239 ecological crisis, xi, xiv, 7, 109, 195, 219, 244, 265; climate change x, xi, 15, 75–6, 78, 108, 109, 116–20, 121, 122–3, 124, 127, 128, 130, 133, 138, 168, 195, 219, 223, 228, 244, 265; equality and 75–6; global solution to 115–26, 138, 155; ignorance and 219–20; justice and 223, 228, 244, 265; liberalism and 16; nationalism and 15, 115–26; religion and 127, 128, 130, 133, 138; technological breakthroughs and 118–19, 121, 122–4 economics xii, 3, 4, 7, 9, 11, 16, 68, 99, 222, 224, 225, 240, 262, 309; AI and 6, 7, 8, 9, 19–43; capitalist see capitalism; communism and see communism; data processing and 65–6; economic models 37, 105–6; equality and 9, 71, 73–7 see also equality; liberalism and 3–5, 16, 44–5; nationalism and 115, 117, 118, 120, 121, 124; religion and 130–3; war and 171–5, 177–8, 179–80; work and 19–43 education 11, 16, 66, 74, 75, 111, 112, 113, 184, 194, 259–68; AI and 32, 34, 35, 38 39, 40–1, 259–68; basic level of 40–1; future of 259–68; liberal 217, 219, 261; secular 207, 209 Egypt 63, 74, 128–9, 172, 181, 188–9, 235, 284, 291, 296 Einstein, Albert 45, 181, 193, 194, 195 El Salvador 4, 150 ‘End of History’ 11 Engels, Friedrich: The Communist Manifesto 262, 273 England 105, 139, 235–6 equality xi, 13, 41, 71–2, 73–81, 92, 95, 144, 204, 223; AI and 75–81; history of 73– 4; secularism and 206–7, 208–9 ethics: AI and 56–61, 63, 121; complex nature of modern world and 223–30; nationalism and 121–2; religion and 186–93, 199–202; secular 199–202, 203–14 Europe xi, xii, 5, 10, 11, 16, 40, 47, 79, 93–100, 103–4, 105, 106, 107, 108–9, 113, 114, 115, 124–5, 128, 135, 136, 138, 139, 140, 143–4, 145, 147, 150, 153, 154–5, 159, 160, 164, 169, 171–2, 175, 176, 186, 187, 193, 201, 207, 228, 236, 252, 294, 307 see also under individual nation name European Union xii, 47, 93, 94, 95, 99, 108, 115, 124, 169; Constitution 95, 124; crisis in 138; immigration and 138, 139, 143–4, 154–5; Russia and 177; size and wealth of 176; terrorism and 159 Evangelical Christians 133 evolution 47, 98–9, 110–11, 127, 187, 194, 205, 206, 217, 218, 223, 274, 276, 277 Ex Machina (film) 246 Facebook xiii, 27, 77, 178, 230, 301, 302, 306; community-building and xiii, 85–91, 93; equality and 77, 80; liberty and 55, 64, 65, 67, 80, 86; ownership of personal data 80, 86; post-truth and 233, 235, 238; US presidential election (2016) and 80, 86 failed states 101, 112, 210 fair game rules 187 fake news xi, 231–42 famine 16, 33, 208, 212, 238, 251, 271 farming, modern industrial 29, 116, 118, 127, 128, 129, 224, 260, 262 see also agriculture fascism xii, 3, 9, 10, 11, 33, 142, 148, 154, 237, 251, 292–5, 297, 305 feminism 87, 143, 208, 217, 246, 280 Ferdinand, Archduke Franz 9, 11, 171 Fernbach, Philip 218 financial crisis, global (2008) 4, 171 financial system, computers and complexity of 6 Finland 38, 74 First World War (1914–18) 9, 10, 11, 30, 33, 99–100, 112, 123, 124, 160, 170, 171, 172, 265 Flag Code of India 285–6 flags, national 103, 285–6 fMRI scanner 21, 240 football, power of fictions and 241 France 10, 13, 51, 63, 66, 76, 94, 96, 99, 102, 103, 104, 115, 122, 139, 144, 145, 164, 165, 172, 182, 184, 194, 204, 285, 295–6 Francis, Pope 133 Freddy (chimpanzee) 188 free-market capitalism xii, 3, 4, 11, 16, 44, 55, 217, 245 free will 20, 44, 45–6, 47–8, 250–1, 299–301 French Revolution (1789) 63, 184, 207 Freud, Sigmund 135, 185, 193, 194–5, 286 Friedman, Milton 130 Front National 13 Galilei, Galileo 193, 207 gay marriage 44, 198, 205–6 Gaza 173 genetically modified (GM) crops 219 Georgia 176, 177 Germany 13, 66, 68, 95, 96, 98–9, 108, 118, 139, 147, 148, 155, 169, 171–2, 173, 179, 182, 194, 195, 239, 251, 277; Nazi 10, 66, 96, 134, 136, 212, 213, 226, 237, 251, 279, 294, 295 Gandhi, Mahatma 132 globalisation 8, 9, 113, 139; AI/automation and 38–9; history of 99; inequality and 73, 74, 76; nationalism and 109; reversing process of xiii, 5; spread of 4, 99 global stories, disappearance of 5, 14 global warming see climate change God xi, xiii, 46, 106, 197–202; 245, 252, 254, 269, 281, 285, 287, 303, 304; Bible and see Bible; ethics and 199–202, 205, 206, 208, 209; existence of 197–9; Jewish and Christian ideas of 184–5, 189, 190; justice and 225; mass cooperation and 245; monotheism and 190–3; post-truth and 234–6, 239; sacrifice and 287, 289; state identity and 138 gods xii, 277, 281, 291; agriculture and 128, 129; humans becoming ix, 79, 86; justice and 188, 189; sacrifice and 287–9; state identity and 136, 137 Goebbels, Joseph 237 Goenka, S.

March of the Lemmings: Brexit in Print and Performance 2016–2019 by Stewart Lee

Airbnb, AltaVista, anti-communist, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, Bullingdon Club, Cambridge Analytica, cognitive dissonance, coherent worldview, Donald Trump, Etonian, fake news, Ford Model T, imposter syndrome, Jeremy Corbyn, New Journalism, off-the-grid, Overton Window, Ronald Reagan, Russell Brand, Snapchat, Social Justice Warrior, Stephen Hawking, Steve Bannon, white flight

I had an idea about taking Caspar David Friedrich’s 1818 Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog painting and sort of recreating it, but flipping it, so the subject was posing for a selfie against a backdrop of natural wonder, rather than facing it to contemplate it. This seemed to sum up my attitude to the modern age. It was a start. The Brexit referendum was brewing, but like most in the metropolitan liberal elite bubble, I assumed we would stay in the EU and had not predicted the deep divisions it was to create in British society, although I knew loads of shy racists who were excited about it, and it was already compromising my own social and family relationships.

…

I can’t remember when I had the idea that the Wanderer image could form a central plank of the next live show, but photos were shot in the spring of 2016 for publicity purposes, in which I tried to dress like the character in the painting, and was indeed thin enough at the time to do so. Once you are aware of the painting, you see its echoes everywhere – in advertising, album sleeves and film and theatre design. I believe young people call this idea a ‘meme’. It is a pre-Brexit referendum painting. The man is looking out into the world. 6 This section has subsequently been shorn of context by alt-right types and put on the Internet to prove that even I realise people on the Left merely clap the things they agree with. I don’t recognise this as being especially true of my audience, and the bit is meant as (a) a parody of this assumption, and (b) playful mockery of my own audience for their perceived folly, in the way one might make fun of a friend and expect that friend to understand that it was meant in a spirit of fun.

Human Frontiers: The Future of Big Ideas in an Age of Small Thinking by Michael Bhaskar

"Margaret Hamilton" Apollo, 3D printing, additive manufacturing, AI winter, Albert Einstein, algorithmic trading, AlphaGo, Anthropocene, artificial general intelligence, augmented reality, autonomous vehicles, backpropagation, barriers to entry, basic income, behavioural economics, Benoit Mandelbrot, Berlin Wall, Big bang: deregulation of the City of London, Big Tech, Bletchley Park, blockchain, Boeing 747, brain emulation, Brexit referendum, call centre, carbon tax, charter city, citizen journalism, Claude Shannon: information theory, Clayton Christensen, clean tech, clean water, cognitive load, Columbian Exchange, coronavirus, cosmic microwave background, COVID-19, creative destruction, CRISPR, crony capitalism, cyber-physical system, dark matter, David Graeber, deep learning, DeepMind, deindustrialization, dematerialisation, Demis Hassabis, demographic dividend, Deng Xiaoping, deplatforming, discovery of penicillin, disruptive innovation, Donald Trump, double entry bookkeeping, Easter island, Edward Jenner, Edward Lorenz: Chaos theory, Elon Musk, en.wikipedia.org, endogenous growth, energy security, energy transition, epigenetics, Eratosthenes, Ernest Rutherford, Eroom's law, fail fast, false flag, Fellow of the Royal Society, flying shuttle, Ford Model T, Francis Fukuyama: the end of history, general purpose technology, germ theory of disease, glass ceiling, global pandemic, Goodhart's law, Google Glasses, Google X / Alphabet X, GPT-3, Haber-Bosch Process, hedonic treadmill, Herman Kahn, Higgs boson, hive mind, hype cycle, Hyperloop, Ignaz Semmelweis: hand washing, Innovator's Dilemma, intangible asset, interchangeable parts, Internet of things, invention of agriculture, invention of the printing press, invention of the steam engine, invention of the telegraph, invisible hand, Isaac Newton, ITER tokamak, James Watt: steam engine, James Webb Space Telescope, Jeff Bezos, jimmy wales, job automation, Johannes Kepler, John von Neumann, Joseph Schumpeter, Kenneth Arrow, Kevin Kelly, Kickstarter, knowledge economy, knowledge worker, Large Hadron Collider, liberation theology, lockdown, lone genius, loss aversion, Louis Pasteur, Mark Zuckerberg, Martin Wolf, megacity, megastructure, Menlo Park, Minecraft, minimum viable product, mittelstand, Modern Monetary Theory, Mont Pelerin Society, Murray Gell-Mann, Mustafa Suleyman, natural language processing, Neal Stephenson, nuclear winter, nudge unit, oil shale / tar sands, open economy, OpenAI, opioid epidemic / opioid crisis, PageRank, patent troll, Peter Thiel, plutocrats, post scarcity, post-truth, precautionary principle, public intellectual, publish or perish, purchasing power parity, quantum entanglement, Ray Kurzweil, remote working, rent-seeking, Republic of Letters, Richard Feynman, Robert Gordon, Robert Solow, secular stagnation, shareholder value, Silicon Valley, Silicon Valley ideology, Simon Kuznets, skunkworks, Slavoj Žižek, sovereign wealth fund, spinning jenny, statistical model, stem cell, Steve Jobs, Stuart Kauffman, synthetic biology, techlash, TED Talk, The Rise and Fall of American Growth, the scientific method, The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, Thomas Bayes, Thomas Kuhn: the structure of scientific revolutions, Thomas Malthus, TikTok, total factor productivity, transcontinental railway, Two Sigma, Tyler Cowen, Tyler Cowen: Great Stagnation, universal basic income, uranium enrichment, We wanted flying cars, instead we got 140 characters, When a measure becomes a target, X Prize, Y Combinator

A world where inventions and medicines are never trialled, where the default is ‘no’ and risk aversion an art form, where comfortable incumbents can sail on unimpeded, where a ‘tyranny of metrics’, a thicket of rules and an over-laboured management structure dampens the scope for the new. These forces have built up over decades, seemingly impossible to dislodge or resist. ‘Thinking outside the box’ has become the most ridiculed of management clichés for a reason. The Blind Planet In the heat of Britain's 2016 Brexit referendum, one of the country's most senior politicians, Michael Gove, made a surprising claim: ‘people in [Britain] have had enough of experts’. Surely the modern world relies on experts; when you get a cancer diagnosis, fly an aircraft or evaluate complex legislation, experts are helpful? Not any more!

…

., and Uzzi, Brian (2007), ‘The Increasing Dominance of Teams in Production of Knowledge’, Science, Vol. 316 No. 5827, pp. 1036–9 Xinhua (2019), ‘China to build scientific research station on Moon's south pole’, Xinhua, accessed 18 January 2021, available at http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2019-04/24/c_138004666.htm Yueh, Linda (2018), The Great Economists: How Their Ideas Can Help Us Today, London: Penguin Viking Index ‘0,10’ exhibition 103 ‘0-I’ ideas 31 Aadhaar 265 abstraction 103 AC motor 287, 288 academia 209 Académie des sciences 47 Adam (robot) 235–6 Adams, John 211 Adler, Alfred 188 Adobe 265 Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) 180, 247, 253, 296, 317 AEG 34 aeroplanes 62–6, 68–70, 71, 219 Aeschylus 3 Africa 267, 279–80, 295 age/ageing 122, 158–60, 193 AGI see artificial general intelligence Agrarian Revolution 252 agricultural production 92–3 AI see artificial intelligence Akcigit, Ufuk 193 Alexander the Great 159 Alexander, Albert 52 Alexandrian Library 4, 295, 304 algorithms 175, 185, 196, 224, 235, 245 aliens 240–1, 306, 308–9, 337 Allison, Jim 58 Alphabet 193, 225, 265, 294, 295 AlphaFold software 225–6, 227, 228–9, 233 AlphaGo software 226–7, 228, 233 AlQuraishi, Mohammed 225, 226, 229 Amazon 84–5, 214, 272 Amazon Prime Air 71 American Revolution 139 amino acids 223, 226 Ampère, André-Marie 74–5 Anaximander 35 ancestors 10–12 ancient Greeks 1–6, 7–8, 291, 303–4 Anderson, Kurt 106 Angkor Wat 43 anthrax 47–8, 51 Anthropocene 14–15 anti-reason 211–12 anti-science 211–12 antibacterials 234 antibiotics 38, 52–3, 124, 125, 217, 315 resistance to 235 Apollo missions 70, 315, 316, 317, 318 Apple 33, 85, 159, 185, 186, 193, 272, 296, 312 Aquinas, Thomas 36 AR see augmented reality archaeology 153–4 Archimedes 1–6, 7–8, 19, 27, 32, 37, 39, 291, 304 architecture 103, 115, 188 ARIA 297 Aristarchus 5 Aristotle 24, 108, 282, 304 Arkwright, Richard 25, 26, 34, 253 Armstrong, Louis 103 ARPA see Advanced Research Projects Agency art 99–104, 107–8, 176–7, 236, 321, 339 Artemis (Moon mission) 71, 218 artificial general intelligence (AGI) 226, 237–8, 249, 250, 310, 313, 330, 341 artificial intelligence (AI) 225–9, 233–41, 246–7, 248, 249–52, 262, 266, 300, 310, 312–13, 323, 329, 330, 331, 338 arts 152, 293 see also specific arts Artsimovich, Lev 147 arXiv 116 Asia 264, 267–8, 273, 275 Asimov, Isaac, Foundation 45 Astor, John Jacob 288 astronomy 30, 231, 232 AT&T 85, 181, 183, 185, 197 Ates, Sina T. 193 Athens 24, 295 Atlantis 154 augmented reality (AR) 241–2, 338 authoritarianism 112–13, 284 autonomous vehicles 71, 72, 219 ‘Axial Age’ 108 Azoulay, Pierre 317–18 Bach, J.S. 236 bacillus 46 Bacon, Francis 25, 259 bacteria 38, 46, 53 Bahcall, Safi 31 Ballets Russes 99–100 Baltimore and Ohio railway 67 Banks, Iain M. 310 Bardeen, John 182 BASF 289 Batchelor, Charles 286 Bates, Paul 226 Bayes, Thomas 289 Beagle (ship) 36 Beethoven, Ludwig van 26 Beijing Genomics Institute 257, 294–5 Bell Labs 180–4, 186–8, 190, 206, 214, 217, 289, 296, 322 Benz, Karl 68, 219, 330 Bergson, Henri 109 Bessemer process 80 Bezos, Jeff 71, 326 Bhattacharya, Jay 201, 202, 321 Biden, Joe 59 Big Bang 117, 174, 181 Big Big Ideas 79–80 big ideas 5, 8, 11, 13–19 adoption 28 and an uncertain future 302–36 and art 99–103 artificial 223–38 and the Big Ideas Famine 13 and bisociation 36 blockers to 17–18 and breakthrough problems 46–73, 77, 86, 98, 222, 250, 301 and the ‘burden of knowledge’ effect 154–65, 175, 178, 235, 338 and business formation 95 ceiling 18 conception 37 definition 27–8, 40–1 Enlightenment 132–40, 136–40 era of 109–10 erroneous 176 evidence for 222, 223–54 execution 37 ‘fishing out’ mechanism 152 future of 45, 98, 302–36, 337–43 harmful nature 41–2 how they work 23–45 and the Idea Paradox 178–9, 187, 191, 217, 226, 250, 254, 283–4, 301, 312, 342 and the Kardashev Scale 337–43 long and winding course of 4, 5, 35–8, 136 and the low-hanging fruit paradox 149–54, 167, 178 and luck 38–9 moral 136, 138 nature of 169–72 necessity of 41–3 need for 42–3 normalisation of 171–5, 178 originality of 28 paradox of 143–79 and patents 97 process of 37–8 purchase 37–8 and resources 128 and rights 132–40 and ‘ripeness’ 39 and short-termism 192 slow death of 106–7 slowdown of 98 society's reaction to 216 and specialisation 156, 157–8 today 21–140 tomorrow 141–343 big pharma 31, 60, 185, 217–18, 226 Big Science 118–19 Bill of Rights 137 Bingham, Hiram 153 biology 243–8, 300 synthetic 245–6, 251, 310, 329 BioNTech 218, 298 biotech 195–6, 240, 246, 255–8, 262, 266, 307 bisociation 36 Björk 104 Black, Joseph 26 ‘black swan’ events 307, 310 Bletchley Park 180, 296 Bloom, Nick 91, 92, 93 Boeing 69, 72, 162, 165, 192, 238 Bohr, Niels 104, 118, 159 Boltsmann, Ludwig 188 Boston Consulting Group 204 Botha, P.W. 114 Bowie, David 107 Boyer, Herbert 243 Boyle, Robert 232 Brahe, Tycho 36, 229, 292 brain 166, 246–8, 299–300 collective 299, 300–1 whole brain emulations (‘ems’) 248–9, 341 brain drains 197 brain-to-machine interfaces 247–8 Branson, Richard 71 Brattain, Walter 182 Brazil 266–7, 268, 279 breakthrough organisations 294–9 breakthrough problems 46–73, 77, 86, 98, 222, 234, 250, 301 breakthroughs 2–5, 27–8, 32–7, 41, 129, 152, 156 and expedition novelty 333 hostility to 187 medical 58–60 missing 175 near-misses 160 nuclear power 145 price of 87–98 and short-termism 192 slowdown of 87, 94 society's reaction to 216 and universities 204 see also ‘Eureka’ moments breast cancer 94 Brexit referendum 2016: 208 Brin, Sergey 319, 326 Britain 24, 146, 259, 283, 297 see also United Kingdom British Telecom 196 Brunel, Isambard Kingdom 67 Brunelleschi 232 Bruno, Giordano 216 Buddhism 108, 175, 264–5, 340 Buhler, Charlotte 188–9 Buhler, Karl 188–9 ‘burden of knowledge’ effect 154–65, 175, 178, 235, 338 bureaucracy 198–87, 280–1 Bush, George W. 211 Bush, Vannevar 168, 314–15, 317 business start-ups 95–6 Cage, John 104 Callard, Agnes 111 Caltech 184 Cambridge University 75, 76, 124, 235–6, 257, 294–6 canals 67 cancer 57–61, 76, 93–4, 131, 234, 245, 318 research 59–61 capital and economic growth 88 gray 192, 196 human 275, 277 capitalism 36, 111–13, 186, 189, 191–8 CAR-Ts see chimeric antigen receptor T-cells carbon dioxide emissions 220–1 Cardwell's Law 283 Carey, Nessa 244 Carnap, Rudolf 189 Carnarvon, Lord 153 cars 289 electric 71 flying 71 Carter, Howard 153 Carter, Jimmy 58 Carthage 3, 43 Cartright, Mary 163 CASP see Critical Assessment of Protein Structure Prediction Cassin, René 135 Catholic Church 206, 230 Cavendish Laboratory 76, 294 Cell (journal) 234 censorship 210–11 Census Bureau (US) 78 Centers for Disease Control 212 Cerf, Vint 253 CERN 118, 233, 239, 252, 296 Chain, Ernst 52, 60, 124 Champollion, Jean-François 155 Chang, Peng Chun 135 change 10–13, 18–19, 24 rapid 30, 32 resistance to 222 slowdown 85 chaos theory 163 Chaplin, Charlie 104 Chardin, Pierre Teilhard de 300 Charpentier, Emmanuelle 244, 256 chemistry 49, 56, 104, 117, 118, 124, 149–50, 159, 241, 244 chemotherapy 57 Chicago 10 chicken cholera 46 chimeric antigen receptor T-cells (CAR-Ts) 58, 61 China 15, 25, 71–2, 111, 112, 138, 208, 213, 216, 255–64, 265, 266, 267, 268, 275, 277, 279, 280, 283, 284–5, 312, 313, 314, 319, 328 Han 259, 260 Ming 284, 308, 309 Qing 260 Song 24, 259–60, 306 Tang 259–60 Zhou 259 Christianity 108, 303–4, 340 Church, George 245 cities 270–2, 308–9, 340 civilisation collapse 42–4 decay 187 cleantech 195 climate change 219–21, 284, 313–14, 338 clinical trials 218 cliodynamics 339 coal 23, 24, 26, 80, 220 Cocteau, Jean 101 cognitive complexity, high 332–3 cognitive diversity 281–3 Cognitive Revolution 252 Cohen, Stanley N. 243, 244 collective intelligence 339 collectivism 282 Collison, Patrick 117, 272 colour 75 Coltrane, John 104 Columbian Exchange 177 Columbus 38 comfort zones, stepping outside of 334 communism 111, 133, 134, 173, 217, 284 companies creation 95–6 numbers 96–7 competition 87, 283 complacency 221–2 complexity 161–7, 178, 204, 208, 298, 302, 329 high cognitive 332–3 compliance 205–6 computational power 128–9, 168, 234, 250 computer games 107 computers 166–7, 240, 253 computing 254 see also quantum computing Confucianism 133, 259 Confucius 24, 108, 109, 282 Congressional Budget Office 82 connectivity 272 Conon of Samos 4 consciousness 248, 340 consequences 328–9 consolidation, age of 86 Constantine 303 convergence 174, 311–12 Copernicus 29, 30, 41, 152, 171, 229, 232, 292 copyright 195 corporations 204–5 cosmic background microwave radiation 117, 181 cotton weaving, flying shuttle 24–5 Coulomb, Charles-Augustin de 74–5 counterculture 106 Covid-19 (coronavirus) pandemic 13, 14, 15, 55, 86, 113–14, 193, 202, 208, 212, 218, 251–2, 263, 283–4, 297–8, 309, 318, 327 vaccine 125, 245 Cowen, Tyler 13, 82, 94–5, 221 cowpox 47 creativity 188, 283 and artificial intelligence 236 crisis in 108 decrease 106–8 and universities 203 Crete 43 Crick, Francis 119, 296 CRISPR 243, 244, 251, 255–8, 299 Critical Assessment of Protein Structure Prediction (CASP) 224–6, 228 Cronin, Lee 242 crop yields 92–3 cultural diversity 281–3 cultural homogenisation 177 cultural rebellion 106–7 Cultural Revolution 114, 305 culture, stuck 106 Cunard 67 Curie, Marie 104, 144, 203, 289–90, 332 Daniels, John T. 62–3 Daoism 259 dark matter/energy/force 338 DARPA see Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency Darwin, Charles 34, 35–6, 37–8, 41, 77, 109, 118, 171, 289 Darwin, Erasmus 35 data 233 datasets, large 28 Davy, Sir Humphrey 149, 150 Debussy, Claude 100–1 decision-making, bad 43–4 Declaration of Independence 1776: 137 Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen 1789: 137 DeepMind 225–9, 296 Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) 315 democracy 111–12 Deng Xiaoping 261 deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) 119, 223–4, 243, 251, 255, 339 DNA sequencing 56 Derrida, Jacques 109 Deutsch, David 126, 203 Diaghilev, Sergei 99–101 Diamond, Jared 42 Digital Age 180 digital technology 241–2, 243 diminishing returns 87, 91, 94, 97, 118, 123, 126, 130–1, 150, 161, 169, 173, 222, 250, 276, 285, 301 Dirac, Paul 159–60 disruption 34, 96, 109, 119, 157 diversity, cultural 281–3 DNA see deoxyribonucleic acid Dorling, Danny 171 Doudna, Jennifer 244, 251, 256 Douglas, Mary 290 Douthat, Ross 14, 106 drag 65 Drake equation 306 Drezner, Daniel 214 drones, delivery 71, 72 Drucker, Peter 189 drugs 55–7, 124, 235 Eroom's Law 55, 57, 61, 92–3, 119, 161, 234, 245, 338 and machine learning 234 research and development 55–7, 61, 92–4, 119, 161, 172–3, 217–18, 234, 245, 315, 338 see also pharmaceutical industry Duchamp, Marcel 103, 171 DuPont 184 Dutch East India Company 34 Dyson, Freeman 120 dystopias 305–8 East India Company 34 Easter Island 42–3 Eastern Europe 138 ecocides 42–3 economic growth 240, 272, 273, 316 endogenous 94 and ideas 88, 89–92, 95 process of 87–8 slowdown 82, 83, 84, 85, 178 economics 87–9, 98, 339, 340 contradictions of 87 Economist, The (magazine) 188 Edelman annual trust barometer 209 Edison, Thomas 183–4, 286–9, 290, 293 education 127, 277, 324–8 Einstein, Albert 11, 29, 74, 77, 104, 109, 117, 119, 124, 159–60, 203, 332 Eisenstein, Elizabeth 231 Eldredge, Niles 30 electric cars 71 electricity 11, 74–7, 81, 286–7, 289 electromagnetic fields 76 electromagnetic waves 75, 76 elements (chemical) 149–50 Elizabeth II 144–5 employment 204–5 Encyclopædia Britannica 97, 128, 155 ‘End of History’ 112 energy 337–8, 341–2 availability 85 use per capita 85 see also nuclear power engineering 243 England 25, 144–5, 309 Englert, François 118 Enlightenment 130, 136–40, 252 see also Industrial Enlightenment; neo-Enlightenment Eno, Brian 295 entrepreneurship, decline 96 epigenetics 164 epigraphy 236–7 epistemic polarisation 210 Epstein, David 334 Eratosthenes 5 Eroom's Law 55, 57, 61, 92–3, 119, 161, 234, 245, 338 ethical issues 256–7 Euclid 3, 304 ‘Eureka’ moments 2–5, 35, 36–7, 129, 163 Europe 95, 247, 258–60, 268, 268, 271, 283, 304, 308 European Space Agency 71 European Union (EU) 206, 216, 262, 266 Evans, Arthur 153 evolutionary theory 30, 35–6 expedition novelty 333 experimental spaces 296–8 Expressionism 104 Facebook 34, 159, 170, 197 Fahrenheit 232 failure, fear of 335 Faraday, Michael 75 FCC see Future Circular Collider FDA see Food and Drug Administration Federal Reserve (US) 82 Feigenbaum, Mitchell 163 fermentation 49 Fermi, Enrico 143, 159, 306 Fermi Paradox 306 Fernández-Armesto, Felipe 109 fertility rates 269 Feynman, Richard 77, 166, 332 film 104, 106–7, 108, 115 financialism 191–8, 206–7, 214, 217, 219 Firebird, The (ballet) 99–100 ‘first knowledge economy’ 25–6 First World War 54, 99, 104, 187, 188–9 Fisk, James 182 Fleming, Alexander 38, 52, 60, 332 flight 36, 62–6, 68–70, 71, 335 Flint & Company 64 flooding 220, 284 Florey, Howard 52, 60, 124, 332 Flyer, the 62–4, 66, 72 Foldit software 225 Food and Drug Administration (FDA) 55, 60, 93, 212 food supply 81 Ford 34, 253 Ford, Henry 68, 104, 219 Fordism 81 Foucault, Michel 110 Fraenkel, Eduard 124 France 49–51, 54, 64, 67, 95, 279, 309, 332 franchises 31 Franklin, Benjamin 119, 211 Frederick the Great 292 French Revolution 137, 275 Freud, Sigmund 34, 36, 77, 104, 171, 188, 190, 216 frontier 278–9, 283–4, 302, 310–11 Fukuyama, Francis 111–12 fundamentalism 213 Future Circular Collider (FCC) 239 futurology 44 Gagarin, Yuri 70 Galen 303 Galileo 206, 231, 232, 291, 322 Galois, Évariste 159 GDPR see General Data Protection Regulation Gell-Mann, Murray 77 gene editing 243–4, 251, 255–8 General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) 206 General Electric (GE) 33, 184, 265, 288, 333 General Motors 289 Generation Z 86 genes 223–4 genetic engineering 243–4, 251, 253, 255–8 genetic science 163–4, 202 genius 26 genome, human 119, 202, 244, 255–7, 296, 313 genome sequencing 243–4 germ theory of disease 50–1, 53 Germany 54, 95, 96, 279, 283, 292, 332 Gesamtkunstwerk 99 Gibson, William 241 Glendon, Mary Ann 135 global warming 147 globalisation 177 Go 226–7 Gödel, Kurt 41, 168 Goldman Sachs 197 Goodhart's Law 199 Google 34, 85, 185, 197, 240, 272, 318 20 per cent time 319–20 Google Glass 241 Google Maps 86 Google Scholar 116 Google X 294 Gordon, Robert 13, 83, 94–5 Gouges, Olympe de 137 Gould, Stephen Jay 30 Gove, Michael 208 government 205, 207, 214, 216, 252, 267–8, 297 funding 185–6, 249, 252, 314–19, 321 GPT language prediction 234, 236 Graeber, David 13–14, 111 grants 120, 185–6, 195, 202, 316, 317, 319, 321–3 gravitational waves 117–18, 119 Great Acceleration 309–10 Great Convergence 255–301, 339 Great Disruption 96 Great Enrichment (Great Divergence) 23, 26, 258 Great Exhibition 1851: 293, 309 Great Stagnation Debate 13–14, 16, 17, 45, 72, 82–3, 87, 94–6, 129, 150, 240, 279, 338 Greenland 42 Gropius, Walter 103 Gross Domestic Product (GDP) 82, 90, 128, 278, 318 GDP per capita 23, 78, 82 growth cultures 25 growth theory, endogenous 88–9, 94 Gutenberg, Johannes 36 Guzey, Alexey 200, 322 Haber, Fritz 332 Haber-Bosch process 289 Hadid, Zaha 152 Hahn, Otto 144 Hamilton, Margaret 316 Harari, Yuval Noah 114–15, 236 Harris, Robert 307 Harvard Fellows 200 Harvard, John 156 Harvey, William 34, 291–2 Hassabis, Demis 229, 233 Hayek, Friedrich 189 Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich 36 Heisenberg, Werner 41, 159, 168, 332 heliocentric theory 5, 29, 118, 232, 304 helium 145 Hendrix, Jimi 105 Henry Adams curve 85 Hero of Alexandria 39 Herper, Matthew 55 Hertz, Heinrich 76 Herzl, Theodor 188 Hesse, Herman 307 Hieron II, king of Syracuse 1–2 Higgs, Peter 118 Higgs boson 117–18, 119, 239 Hinduism 133 Hiroshima 144 Hitler, Adolf 138, 188 Hodgkin, Dorothy 124, 332 Hollingsworth, J.

Dangerous Ideas: A Brief History of Censorship in the West, From the Ancients to Fake News by Eric Berkowitz

Albert Einstein, algorithmic management, anti-communist, Ayatollah Khomeini, Big Tech, Black Lives Matter, Bonfire of the Vanities, borderless world, Brexit referendum, British Empire, Charlie Hebdo massacre, Chelsea Manning, colonial rule, coronavirus, COVID-19, deplatforming, disinformation, Donald Trump, Edward Snowden, Evgeny Morozov, fake news, Filter Bubble, high-speed rail, Index librorum prohibitorum, Jeff Bezos, Julian Assange, lockdown, Mark Zuckerberg, microaggression, Mikhail Gorbachev, Minecraft, New Urbanism, post-truth, pre–internet, QAnon, Ralph Nader, Saturday Night Live, Silicon Valley, source of truth, Steve Bannon, surveillance capitalism, undersea cable, W. E. B. Du Bois, WikiLeaks

POLITICAL SPEECH UNDER PRESSURE “A totalitarian state is in effect a theocracy,” wrote George Orwell, “and its ruling caste, in order to keep its position, has to be thought of as infallible.” Such a state demands “the continuous alteration of the past” and “in the long run . . . a disbelief in the very existence of objective truth.”14 In light of the mass of disinformation that plagued the 2016 US presidential election and the UK’s Brexit referendum that year, “post-truth” became the Oxford Dictionaries’ “word of the year.” “We’ve Entered a Post-Truth World—There’s No Going Back Now,” read the headline of Matthew Norman’s November 8, 2016, column in The Independent. That may recently have become so in the democratic West, but Orwell’s dark assessment has long been the case in postwar authoritarian states.

…

Facebook complained that the ruling undermines the rights of individual countries to set their own speech standards, but its objections were ignored. For Internet companies, and to the detriment of users in more tolerant jurisdictions, the price of doing business internationally is that censorship decrees in one country could apply elsewhere or worldwide. In the wake of the disinformation–saturated 2016 Brexit referendum and US election, European governments moved to force online Internet companies to purge disinformation from their platforms. A 2018 German law requires networks with more than two million members to take down fake news within twenty-four hours of notification or face fines of up to €50 million, and a 2018 French law allows authorities to order the deletion of false online information that could affect elections.

The Wires of War: Technology and the Global Struggle for Power by Jacob Helberg

"World Economic Forum" Davos, 2021 United States Capitol attack, A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace, active measures, Affordable Care Act / Obamacare, air gap, Airbnb, algorithmic management, augmented reality, autonomous vehicles, Berlin Wall, Bernie Sanders, Big Tech, bike sharing, Black Lives Matter, blockchain, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, cable laying ship, call centre, Cambridge Analytica, Cass Sunstein, cloud computing, coronavirus, COVID-19, creative destruction, crisis actor, data is the new oil, data science, decentralized internet, deep learning, deepfake, deglobalization, deindustrialization, Deng Xiaoping, deplatforming, digital nomad, disinformation, don't be evil, Donald Trump, dual-use technology, Edward Snowden, Elon Musk, en.wikipedia.org, end-to-end encryption, fail fast, fake news, Filter Bubble, Francis Fukuyama: the end of history, geopolitical risk, glass ceiling, global pandemic, global supply chain, Google bus, Google Chrome, GPT-3, green new deal, information security, Internet of things, Jeff Bezos, Jeffrey Epstein, John Markoff, John Perry Barlow, knowledge economy, Larry Ellison, lockdown, Loma Prieta earthquake, low earth orbit, low skilled workers, Lyft, manufacturing employment, Marc Andreessen, Mark Zuckerberg, Mary Meeker, Mikhail Gorbachev, military-industrial complex, Mohammed Bouazizi, move fast and break things, Nate Silver, natural language processing, Network effects, new economy, one-China policy, open economy, OpenAI, Parler "social media", Peter Thiel, QAnon, QR code, race to the bottom, Ralph Nader, RAND corporation, reshoring, ride hailing / ride sharing, Ronald Reagan, Russian election interference, Salesforce, Sam Altman, satellite internet, self-driving car, Sheryl Sandberg, side project, Silicon Valley, Silicon Valley ideology, Silicon Valley startup, Skype, smart grid, SoftBank, Solyndra, South China Sea, SpaceX Starlink, Steve Jobs, Steven Levy, Stuxnet, supply-chain attack, Susan Wojcicki, tech worker, techlash, technoutopianism, TikTok, Tim Cook: Apple, trade route, TSMC, Twitter Arab Spring, uber lyft, undersea cable, Unsafe at Any Speed, Valery Gerasimov, vertical integration, Wargames Reagan, Westphalian system, white picket fence, WikiLeaks, Y Combinator, zero-sum game

And she’s got no intelligence, no interior ministry, no defense ministry, no KGB.” Social media, Peskov boasted, “creates a perfect opportunity for mass disturbances.”30 Initially, the Kremlin mostly focused on creating these mass disturbances in Ukraine.31 Russian trolls likewise meddled in the UK’s Brexit referendum,32 sending thousands of tweets with hashtags like #ReasonsToLeaveEU—a dry run for the 2016 presidential campaign in the United States.33 Day by day, the trolls shifted their focus to what was vaguely called the “translator project.”34 At the behest of Putin and Prigozhin, the IRA began to target the United States.

…

. §§ 2,371, 1349, 1028A. 28 Chen, “The Agency.” 29 Rid, Active Measures, 408–409. 30 Jim Rutenberg, “RT, Sputnik and Russia’s New Theory of War,” New York Times, September 13, 2017, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/13/magazine/rt-sputnik-and-russias-new-theory-of-war.html. 31 Rid, Active Measures, 400. 32 “Did Russia Influence Brexit?,” Center for Strategic and International Studies, July 21, 2020, https://www.csis.org/blogs/brexit-bits-bobs-and-blogs/did-russia-influence-brexit. 33 Matthew Field and Mike Wright, “Russian trolls sent thousands of pro-Leave messages on day of Brexit referendum, Twitter data reveals,” The Telegraph, October 17, 2018, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2018/10/17/russian-iranian-twitter-trolls-sent-10-million-tweets-fake-news/. 34 Indictment, U.S. Department of Justice, 18 U.S.C. §§ 2,371, 1349, 1028A. 35 Rid, Active Measures, 402. 36 DiResta, Shaffer, and Ruppel, “The Tactics & Tropes of the Internet Research Agency.” 37 Sanger, The Perfect Weapon, 201. 38 Indictment, U.S.

Open: The Story of Human Progress by Johan Norberg

Abraham Maslow, additive manufacturing, affirmative action, Albert Einstein, anti-globalists, basic income, Berlin Wall, Bernie Sanders, Bletchley Park, Brexit referendum, British Empire, business cycle, business process, California gold rush, carbon tax, citizen journalism, classic study, Clayton Christensen, clean water, cognitive dissonance, collective bargaining, Corn Laws, coronavirus, COVID-19, creative destruction, crony capitalism, decarbonisation, deindustrialization, Deng Xiaoping, digital map, Donald Trump, Edward Jenner, fake news, Fall of the Berlin Wall, falling living standards, Filter Bubble, financial innovation, flying shuttle, Flynn Effect, Francis Fukuyama: the end of history, future of work, Galaxy Zoo, George Gilder, Gini coefficient, global pandemic, global supply chain, global village, green new deal, humanitarian revolution, illegal immigration, income per capita, Indoor air pollution, indoor plumbing, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), invisible hand, Isaac Newton, Islamic Golden Age, James Watt: steam engine, Jane Jacobs, Jeff Bezos, job automation, John von Neumann, joint-stock company, Joseph Schumpeter, Kickstarter, knowledge economy, labour mobility, Lao Tzu, liberal capitalism, manufacturing employment, mass immigration, negative emissions, Network effects, open borders, open economy, Pax Mongolica, place-making, profit motive, RAND corporation, regulatory arbitrage, rent control, Republic of Letters, road to serfdom, Ronald Reagan, Schrödinger's Cat, sharing economy, side project, Silicon Valley, Solyndra, spice trade, stem cell, Steve Bannon, Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, Steven Pinker, tacit knowledge, The Death and Life of Great American Cities, The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, Thomas L Friedman, too big to fail, trade liberalization, trade route, transatlantic slave trade, Tyler Cowen, Uber for X, ultimatum game, universal basic income, World Values Survey, Xiaogang Anhui farmers, zero-sum game

Nothing could be further from the truth. It is more important than ever to understand the world, including the backlash, which is global in its nature. It was inspired by transnational events like the financial crisis and the migration crisis, and even nativists constantly travel across borders to inspire one another. The Brexit referendum gave an injection of energy to the Trump movement, and Trump’s election energized populists all over Europe – agitators and parties who claim that there is one true, united people whose general will is blocked by a corrupt elite. So did money and media assistance from Putin’s Russia, which is eager to show that Western liberalism is obsolete.

…

Nothing gave as much boost to the Trump campaign than Hillary Clinton’s attack on ‘deplorables’ among his voters, and the Brexit leader Nigel Farage talks happily about how Remainers think that ‘we’re thick, we’re stupid, we’re ignorant, we’re racist’. These divisions did not come out of nowhere, of course. There were already important divides that crossed traditional political allegiances, like young/old, urban/rural and national/cosmopolitan. The Trump campaign and the Brexit referendum weaponized those identities but it was by no means a certainty that they would become so salient. This should be a cautionary tale. The more we talk about one way of grouping people, the more likely it is that people will align themselves accordingly. This is relevant when we think about a kind of identity politics that began trickling down from the radical Left at American universities into politics, journalism and internet forums in the 1990s.

The Road to Somewhere: The Populist Revolt and the Future of Politics by David Goodhart

Affordable Care Act / Obamacare, agricultural Revolution, assortative mating, Big bang: deregulation of the City of London, borderless world, Boris Johnson, Branko Milanovic, Bretton Woods, Brexit referendum, British Empire, call centre, capital controls, carbon footprint, central bank independence, centre right, coherent worldview, corporate governance, credit crunch, Crossrail, deglobalization, deindustrialization, Donald Trump, Downton Abbey, Edward Glaeser, en.wikipedia.org, Etonian, European colonialism, eurozone crisis, falling living standards, first-past-the-post, gender pay gap, gig economy, glass ceiling, global supply chain, global village, Great Leap Forward, illegal immigration, income inequality, informal economy, Jeremy Corbyn, job satisfaction, knowledge economy, labour market flexibility, low skilled workers, market friction, mass immigration, meritocracy, mittelstand, Neil Kinnock, New Urbanism, non-tariff barriers, North Sea oil, obamacare, old-boy network, open borders, open immigration, Peter Singer: altruism, post-industrial society, post-materialism, postnationalism / post nation state, race to the bottom, Richard Florida, Ronald Reagan, selection bias, shareholder value, Skype, Sloane Ranger, stem cell, the long tail, Thomas L Friedman, transaction costs, trickle-down economics, ultimatum game, upwardly mobile, wages for housework, white flight, women in the workforce, working poor, working-age population, World Values Survey

For Somewheres, meanwhile, post-industrialism has largely abolished manual labour, reduced the status of lower income males and weakened the national social contract—neither the affluent nor employers feel the same obligation towards ‘their’ working class that they once did. In a democracy the Somewheres cannot, however, be ignored. And in recent years in Britain and Europe, and in the US through Donald Trump, they have begun to speak through new and established parties and outside party structures altogether. In Britain they helped to win the Brexit referendum and then the vote itself, and by constantly telling pollsters how worried they are about immigration they have kept that issue at the centre of British politics. The Anywhere ideology is invariably a cheerleader for restless change. Consider this from Tony Blair, again, at the 2005 Labour conference: ‘I hear people say we have to stop and debate globalisation.

…

.: product lines of, 86 Appiah, Kwame Anthony: 117 assortative mating: 188 Aston University: 164 austerity: 98, 200 Australia: 4, 160 Austria: 56, 69–70 authoritarianism: 8, 12, 30, 33, 44, 57; concept of, 57; hard, 45 Baggini, Julian: observations of British class system, 59 Bangladesh: 130 Bank of England: personnel of, 86 Bartels, Larry: Democracy for Realists, 61 Bartlett, Jamie: Radicals, 64 Basel Accords: 85 BASF: 176 Bayer: 176 Belgium: 73, 75, 101; Brussels, 53, 89, 93, 95, 98 Berlusconi, Silvio: 65 birther movement: 68 Bischof, Bob: head of German-British Forum, 174 Blair, Tony: 10, 76, 159, 189; administration of, 218; foreign policy of, 96; speeches of, 3, 7, 49; support for Bulgarian and Romanian EU accession, 26; unravelling of legacy, 221 Bloomsbury Group: 34 Bogdanor, Vernon: concept of ‘exam-passing classes’, 3 Boyle, Danny: Summer Olympics opening ceremony (2012), 111, 222 Branson, Richard: 11 Brexit (EU Referendum)(2016): 1–2, 19, 27, 81, 89, 93, 99–100, 125, 233; negotiations, 103; polling prior to voting, 30, 64; Remainers, 2, 19–20, 52–3, 132; sociological implications of, 4–7, 13, 53–4, 118, 126, 167–8, 225; Stronger In campaign, 61; Vote Leave campaign, 42, 53, 72, 91, 132; voting pattern in, 7–9, 19–20, 23, 26, 36, 52, 55–6, 60, 71, 74, 215, 218 British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC): 112, 145; Newsnight, 60; personnel of, 15; Radio 4, 31, 227; Today, 60 British Empire: 107 British National Party: European election performance of (2009), 119; supporters of, 38 British Future: 19 British Private Equity and Venture Capital Association: personnel of, 135 British Social Attitudes (BSA) surveys: 153; authoritarian-libertarian scale, 44–5; findings of, 38–9, 44, 106–7, 120, 202, 206–7, 218; immigration survey (2013), 44; personnel of, 218–19 British Values Survey: establishment of (1973), 43; groups in, 43 Brooks, Greg: Sheffield report, 155 Brown, Belinda: 205, 207–8 Brown, Gordon: 106; abolition of Married Couples Allowance, 204; budget of (2006), 147–8; political rhetoric of, 16–17 Brummer, Alex: Britain for Sale, 173 Bulgaria: 26; accession to EU, 225 (2007); migrants from, 126; population levels of, 102 Burgess, Simon: 131 Burggraf, Shirley: Feminine Economy and Economic Man, The, 194 Cahn, Andrew: 98 Callaghan, Jim: Ruskin College speech (1976), 154 Callan, Eamonn: 191 Callan, Samantha: 202, 212 Cambridge University: 35, 179, 186; faculty of, 37; students of, 158–9 Cameron, David: 71, 103, 179, 183, 189; administration of, 226; cabinet of, 187 Canada: 160; mass immigration in, 119 capital: 9, 100; cultural, 190; human, 34; liberalisation of controls, 97; social, 110 capitalism: 7, 11; organised, 159 Care (Christian Action Research & Education): 203 Carswell, Douglas: 13 Case, Anne: 67 Casey, Louise: review of opportunity and integration, 129 Catholicism: 15, 213; original sin, 57 Cautres, Bruno: 72 Center for Humans and Nature: 30 Centre for Social Justice: 206; personnel of, 202 chauvinism: 33; decline in prevalence of, 39; violent, 106 China, People’s Republic of: 10, 95, 104, 160; accession to WTO (2001), 88; manufacturing sector of, 86; steel industry of, 87 Chirac, Jacques: electoral victory of (2002), 49 Christianity: 33, 69, 83, 156 citizenship: 68, 121–2; democratic, 7; global, 114; legislation, 103; national, 5; relationship with migration, 126; shared, 113; temporary, 126 Clarke, Charles: British Home Secretary, 84 Clarke, Ken: education reforms of, 158–9 Clegg, Nick: 11, 13, 189 Cliffe, Jeremy: 10–11; ‘Britain’s Cosmopolitan Future’ 216; observations of social conservatism, 217 Clinton, Bill: 29, 76; administration of, 218 Clinton, Hillary: electoral defeat of (2016), 67–8 Coalition Government (UK) (2010–16): 13, 54, 226; cabinet members of, 16; immigration policies of, 124–5 Cold War: end of, 83, 92, 95, 98 Collier, Paul: 110; view of potential reform of UNHCR, 84 colonialism: 87; European, 105 communism: 58 Communist Party of France: 72 Confederation of British Industry (CBI): 164 confirmation bias: concept of, 30 Conservative Party (Tories)(UK): 19, 207; dismantling of apprenticeship system by, 157; ideology of, 76, 196; members of, 31, 164, 187; Party Conference (2016), 226; Red Toryism, 63; supporters of, 24, 35, 77, 143, 216–17 conservatism: 4, 9; cultural, 58; social, 217; Somewhere, 7–8; working-class, 8 Corbyn, Jeremy: elected as leader of Labour Party, 20, 53, 59, 75, 78 Cowley, Philip: 35 Crosland, Tony: Secretary of Education, 36; two-tier higher education system proposed by, 158 Crossrail 2: 228; spending on, 143 Czech Republic: 69, 73 D66: supporters of, 76 Dade, Pat: 43–4, 219; role in establishment of British Values Survey, 43, 218–19 Daily Mail: 227; reader base of, 4 Danish Peoples’ Party: 55, 69–70, 73; ideology of, 73 Darwin, Charles: 28 death penalty: 44; support for, 39, 216–17 Deaton, Angus: 67 deference, end of: 63 Delors, Jacques: 96, 103–4; President of European Commission, 94 Democratic Party: ideology of, 62, 65; shortcomings of engagement strategies of, 66–7 Demos: 137 Dench, Geoff: 207; concept of ‘quality with pluralism’, 214; Transforming Men, 209 Denmark: 69, 71, 99; education levels in, 156 Diana, Princess of Wales: death of (1997), 107 double liberalism: 1, 11, 63 Duffy, Gillian: 124 Dyson: 173; Dyson effect, 173 Economist: 10, 210, 216 Eden, Anthony: administration of, 187 Eichengreen, Barry: 91 Elias, Norbert: 119 Employer Skills Survey: 163 Engineering Employers Federation: 166 Englishness: 111 Erdogan, Recep Tayyip: 218 Essex Man/Woman: 186 Estonia: population levels of, 102 Eton College: 179, 187 Euro (currency): 100–1; accession of countries to, 98–9 European Commission: 26, 97 European Convention on Human Rights: 83–4 European Court of Justice (ECJ): 103 European Economic Community (EEC): 92; British accession to (1973), 93; Treaty of Rome (1957), 101 European Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM): 97–8 European Parliament: elections (2009), 71–2; elections (2014), 72 European Union (EU): 10, 25, 53, 76, 89, 92–4, 99–100, 120, 124, 160, 215, 221–2, 229, 233; Amsterdam Treaty (1997), 94; Common Agricultural Policy, 92, 96; establishment of (1957), 91–2; freedom of movement principles, 100–1, 163–4; Humanitarian Protection Directive (2004), 83; integration, 50, 98–9, 173; Lisbon Treaty (2009), 94; Maastricht Treaty (1992), 94, 96, 103; members states of, 16, 31, 55, 71, 216; personnel of, 128; Schengen Agreement (1985), 94–5, 99, 117; Single European Act (1986), 94; Treaty of Nice (2000), 94 Euroscepticism: 69 Eurozone Crisis (2008–): 92, 99 Evening Standard: 143–5 Facebook: 86 family culture: 196–7; childcare, 202–3; cohabitation, 196, 211; divorce figures, 196–7; gender roles, 206–13; legislation impacting, 195–6; lone parents, 196; married couples tax allowance, 225; relationship with state intrusion, 200–2; tax burdens, 203–4; tax credit systems, 202, 204–5, 225 Farage, Nigel: 11; leader of UKIP, 72; political rhetoric of, 20 Fawcett Society: surveys conducted by, 195–6 federalism: 69 feminism: 185, 199, 205; gender pay gap, 198–9; orthodox, 194 Fidesz: 69, 71, 73 Fillon, François: 73 Financial Times: 91, 108, 115, 138, 145, 147 Finkelstein, Daniel: 34 Five Star Movement: 53, 55, 64, 70, 73 Florida, Richard: concept of ‘Creative Class’, 136 Foges, Clare: 183 food sector: 17, 102, 125, 126 Ford, Robert: 35, 150 foreign ownership: 172–74, 230 Fortuyn, Pim: assassination of (2002), 50, 69 France: 69, 75, 94–6, 101, 173; agricultural sector of, 96; compulsory insurance system of, 222; Paris, 104, 143; high-skill/low-skill job disappearance in, 151; Revolution (1789–99), 106 Frank, Thomas: concept of ‘liberalism of the rich’, 62 Franzen, Jonathan: 110 free trade agreements: opposition to, 62 Freedom Party: 69; electoral defeat of (2016), 70; ideology of, 73; supporters of, 70 French Colonial Empire (1534–1980): 107 Friedman, Sam: ‘Introducing the Class Ceiling: Social Mobility and Britain’s Elite Occupations’, 187 Friedman, Thomas: World is Flat, The, 85 Front National (FN): 53, 69, 72–3; European electoral performance of (2014), 72; founding of (1973), 72; supporters of, 72 Gallup: polls conducted by, 65 Ganesh, Janan: 115, 145 gay marriage: 5, 76; opposition to, 46–7; support for, 26, 220 General Electric Company (GEC) plc: 172, 175 German-British Forum: members of, 174 Germany: 70, 73, 86, 94, 96, 100–1, 173–4, 209; automobile industry of, 96; chemical industry of, 176; compulsory insurance system of, 222; education sector of, 166; high-skill/low-skill job disappearance in, 151; labour market of, 147; Leipzig, 58; Ludwigshafen, 176; Reunification (1990), 96, 147, 176; Ruhr, 176–7 Ghemawat, Prof Pankaj: 85–6 Gilens, Martin: study of American public policy and public preferences, 61–2 Glasman, Maurice: 227 Global Financial Crisis (2007–9): 56, 169–70, 177; Credit Crunch (2007–8), 98, 177 Global Villagers: 31–2, 44–5, 160, 226; characteristics of, 46; political representation of, 75; political views of, 109, 112 globalisation: 9–10, 50–2, 81–2, 85, 87–8, 90–1, 105–6, 148; economic, 9; global trade development, 86–7; growth of, 85–6; hyperglobalisation, 88–9; relationship with nation states, 85–6; sane, 90 Golden Dawn: 74; growth of, 105 Goldman Sachs: personnel of, 31 Goldthorpe, John: 184–5, 189–90 Goodhart, David: 12 Goodwin, Fred: 168 Goodwin, Matthew: 150 Gordon, Ian: 137–8, 140 Gould, Philip: 220 Gove, Michael: 64, 91 great liberalisation: 39–40, 47; effect of, 40 Greater London Authority (GLA): 143 Greece: 53, 56, 69, 74, 99, 105; Athens, 143; government of, 98 Green, Francis: 163 Green Party (UK): supporters of, 38 Group of Twenty (G20): 89 Guardian: 14, 210 Habsburg Empire (Austro-Hungarian Empire): collapse of (1918), 107 Haidt, Jonathan: 11, 30, 33, 133; Righteous Mind, The, 28–9 Hakim, Catharine: 205 Hall, Stuart: 14–15 Hames, Tim: 135–6 Hampstead/Hartlepool alliance: 75 Hanson Trust: subsidiaries of, 175 Hard Authoritarian: 43–7, 51, 119, 220; characteristics of, 24–5; political views of, 109 Harris, Gareth: 137; ‘Changing Places’, 137 Harvard University: faculty of, 57 Heath, Edward: foreign policy of, 96 Higgins, Les: role in establishment of British Values Survey, 43 High Speed 2 (HS2): 228 High Speed 3 (HS3): aims of, 151, 228 Hitler, Adolf: 94 Hoescht: 176 Hofstadter, Richard: ‘Everyone is Talking About Populism, But No One Can Define It’ (1967), 54 Holmes, Chris: 151 homophobia: observations in BSA surveys, 39; societal views of, 39–40, 216 Honig, Bonnie: concept of ‘objects of public love’, 111 Huguenots: 121 Huhne, Chris: 16, 32 human rights: 5, 10, 55, 113; courts, 113; legislation, 5, 83–4, 109, 112; rhetoric, 112–13 Hungary: 53, 64, 69, 71, 73–4, 99, 218; Budapest, 218 Ignatieff, Michael: leader of Liberal Party (Canada), 13 Imperial Chemical Industries (ICI): 172, 174–5; personnel of, 169; subsidiaries of, 175 Inbetweeners: 4, 25, 46, 109; political views of, 109 India: 104 Inglehart, Ronald: theories of value change, 27 Insider Nation: concept of, 61, 64; evidence of, 61–2 Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS): 201; findings of, 211–12 International Monetary Fund (IMF): 86–7, 102 interracial marriage: societal views of, 40 India: 10, 160 Ipsos MORI: polls conducted by, 42, 122 Iraq: 84; Operation Iraqi Freedom (2003–11), 82 Islam: 50; Ahmadiyya, 84; conservative, 131; Halal, 68; hostility to, 73; Qur’an, 50 Islamism: 130 Islamophobia: 130 Italy: 55, 64, 69–70, 73, 96; migrants from, 125 Jamaica: 14 Japan: 86; request for League of Nations racial equality protocol (1919), 109 Jews/Judaism: 121, 259; orthodox, 131; persecution of, 17 jingoism: 8 Jobbik: 53, 64, 74 Johnson, Boris: 145 Jones, Sir John Harvey: death of (2008), 169 Jordan, Hashemite Kingdom of: government of, 84 Jospin, Lionel: defeat in final round of French presidential elections (2002), 49 Judah, Ben: This is London: Life and Death in the World City, 145 Kaufmann, Eric: 8–9, 131, 219, 227; ‘Changing Places’, 137 Kellner, Peter: 78 King, Mervyn: Governor of Bank of England, 86 Kinnock, Neil: 98 knowledge economy: 147, 149, 154, 166, 221 Kohl, Helmut: 94 Kotleba: 74 Krastev, Ivan: 55, 65, 82–3 labour: 9, 89–90, 149; eastern European, 125–6; gender division of, 197; hourglass labour market, 150, 191; living wage, 26, 152; market, 95, 101–2, 124, 140, 147–8, 150–2, 156–7, 181, 225 Labour Party (Denmark): 77 Labour Party (Netherlands): 50; supporters of, 76 Labour Party (UK): 2, 23, 53, 57, 72, 123, 157, 159, 207; Blue Labour, 63; electoral performance of (2015), 75; European election performance (2014), 72; expansion of welfare state under, 199–200; members of, 14, 20, 36, 59, 61, 77–8, 84; Momentum, 53; New Labour, 33, 75, 107, 123, 155, 159, 167, 196, 207, 220, 226, 232; Party Conference (2005), 7; social media presence of, 79; supporters of, 17, 35, 75, 77, 143, 221; voting patterns in Brexit vote, 19 Lakner, Christoph: concept of elephant curve, 87 Lamy, Pascal: 97 Latvia: adoption of Euro, 98–9; migrants from, 25–6 Laurison, Daniel: ‘Introducing the Class Ceiling: Social Mobility and Britain’s Elite Occupations’, 187 Law and Justice Party: 69, 71, 73 Lawson, Nigel: 205 Le Pen, Jean-Marie: victory in final round of French presidential elections (2002), 49, 69 Le Pen, Marine: 53; electoral strategies of, 73 Leadbeater, Charles: 53 League of Nations: protocols of, 109 left-behinders: 20 Lega Nord: 69 Levin, Yuval: Fractured Republic, The, 232 liberal democracy: 2, 31, 55 Liberal Democrats: 23, 53–4; members of, 16; supporters of, 38, 78 Liberal Party (Canada): members of, 13 liberalism: 4–5, 12–13, 29–31, 55, 76, 119, 127–8, 199, 233; Anywhere, 27–8; baby boomer, 6; double, 1, 63; economic, 11; graduate, 216–17; meritocratic, 34; metropolitan, 216; orthodox, 13–14; Pioneer, 44; social, 4, 11 libertarianism: 8, 11, 22, 39, 44 Libya: 84; Civil War (2011), 225 Lilla, Mark: 35 Lind, Michael: 105, 135 Livingstone, Ken: 136 Lloyd, John: 56 London School of Economics (LSE): 54, 137–8, 140, 183 Low Pay Commission: findings of, 170 Lucas Industries plc: 172 male breadwinner: 149, 194, 195, 198, 206, 207 Manchester University: faculty of, 131 Mandelson, Peter: British Home Secretary, 61; family of, 61 Mandler, Peter: 135 Marr, Andrew: 53, 181 Marshall Plan (1948): 92 mass immigration: 14, 55, 104–5, 118–19, 121–4, 126–7, 140, 228–9; accompanied infrastructure development, 137–9; brain-drain issue, 102; debate of issue, 81–2; freedom of movement debates, 100–3; housing levels issue, 138–9; impact on wages, 152; integration, 129–32, 140–2; non-EU, 124–5; opposition to, 16–17, 120, 220 May, Theresa: 63, 179, 183, 198–9; administration of, 173, 176, 187, 191, 230; British Home Secretary, 124–5; ‘Citizens of Nowhere’ speech (2016), 31; political rhetoric of, 15, 31, 226 McCain, John: electoral defeat of (2008), 68 meritocracy: 152, 179–80, 190; critiques of, 180–1; perceptions of, 182–3 Merkel, Angela: reaction to refugee crisis (2015), 71 Mexico: borders of, 21 migration flows: global rates, 82, 87; non-refugee, 82 Milanovic, Branko: 126; concept of elephant curve, 87 Miliband, Ed: 78, 189 Mill, John Stuart: ‘harm principle’ of, 11–12 Millennium Cohort Study: 159 Miller, David: concept of ‘weak cosmopolitanism’, 109 Mills, Colin: 185 Mitterand, François: 94, 97 mobility: 8, 11, 20, 23, 36, 37, 38, 153, 167, 219; capital: 86, 88; geographical, 4, 6; social, 6, 33, 58, 152, 168, 179, 180, 182, 183–191, 213, 215, 220, 226, 231 Moderate Party: members of, 70 Monnet, Jean: 94–5, 97, 103–4 Morgan Stanley: 171 Mudde, Cas: observations of populism, 57 multiculturalism: 14, 50, 141–2; conceptualisation of, 106; laissez-faire, 132 narodniki: 54 national identity: 14, 38, 41, 111–12; conceptualisations of, 45; indifference to, 41, 46, 106, 114; polling on, 41 nationalism: 38, 46–7, 105; chauvinistic, 107, 120; civic, 23, 53; extreme, 104; moderate, 228; modern, 112; post-, 8, 105–6, 112; Scottish, 221 nativism: 57 Neave, Guy: 36 net migration: 126; White British, 136 Netherlands: 13–14, 50, 69, 73, 75, 99–100; Amsterdam, 49, 51; immigrant/minority population of, 50–1; Moroccan population of, 50–1 Netmums: surveys conducted by, 205–6 New Culture Forum: members of, 144 New Jerusalem: 105 New Society/Opinion Research Centre: polling conducted by, 33 New Zealand: 160 Nextdoor: 114 non-governmental organizations (NGOs): 21; refugee, 82 Norris, Pippa: 57 North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA): 91; opposition to, 62 North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO): 85, 92; personnel of, 84 Norway: 69 Nuttall, Paul: leader of UKIP, 72; Obama, Barack: 67; approval ratings of, 60; electoral victory of (2012), 68; healthcare policies of, 22–3; target of birther movement, 68 O’Donnell, Gus: background of, 15–16; British Cabinet Secretary, 15 O’Leary, Duncan: 232 Open University: Centre for Research on Socio-Cultural Change (CRESC), 172–3 Operation Iraqi Freedom (2003–11): political impact of, 56 Orbán, Victor: 69, 218 Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD): 201, 204; report on education levels (2016), 155–6; start-ups ranking, 173 Orwell, George: Nineteen Eighty-Four, 108–9 Osborne, George: 189; economic policies of, 4, 226 Oswald, Andrew: 171 Ottoman Empire: collapse of (1923), 107 outsider nation: concept of, 61, 64 Owen, David: 99 Oxford University: 15, 35, 179, 186; Centre on Skills, Knowledge and Organisational Performance, 151; faculty of, 31, 151; Nuffield College, 32 Pakistan: persecution of Ahmadiyya Muslims in, 84 Parris, Matthew: 115 Parsons, Talcott: concept of ‘achieved’ identities, 115 Party of Freedom (PVV): 69; ideology of, 73; supporters of, 50, 76 Paxman, Jeremy: 42 Pearson: ownership of Higher National Certificates (HNCs)/Higher National Diplomas (HNDs), 157 Pegida: ideology of, 73 Pessoa, Joao Paulo: 88 Phalange: 74 Phillips, Trevor: 133 Pioneers: characteristics of, 43–4 Plaid Cymru: supporters of, 38 Podemos: 53, 64 Poland: 56, 69, 73; migrants from, 25–6, 121 Policy Exchange: ‘Bittersweet Success’, 188 political elites: media representation of, 63–4 populism: 1, 5, 13–14, 49–52, 55–6, 60, 64, 67, 69–74, 81; American, 54, 65; British, 63; decent, 6, 55, 71, 73, 219–20, 222, 227, 233; definitions of, 54; European, 49, 53, 65, 68–9, 74; left-wing, 54, 56; opposition to, 74; right-wing, 33, 51, 54 Populists: 54 Portillo, Michael: 31 Portugal: migrants from, 121, 125 post-industrialism: 6 post-nationalism: 105 poverty: 83, 168; child, 183–4, 200, 204; extreme, 87; reduction of, 78, 200; wages, 231 Powell, Enoch: ‘Rivers of Blood’ speech (1968), 127 Professionalisation of politics: 59 Progress Party: 69 progressive individualism: 5 Progressive Party: founding of (1912), 54 proportional representation: support for, 228 Prospect: 14, 91, 136 Prospectors: characteristics of, 43 Protestantism: 8, 213 Putin, Vladimir: 218 Putnam, Robert: 22; theory of social capital, 110 racism: 32, 73–4, 134; observations in BSA surveys, 39; societal views of, 39; violent, 127 Rashid, Sammy: Sheffield report, 155 Reagan, Ronald: 58, 63; approval ratings of, 60 Recchi, Ettore: 104 Refugee Crisis (2015–): 83–4; charitable efforts targeting, 21–2; government funds provided to aid, 83; political reactions to, 71 Relationships Foundation: 202 Republic of Ireland: 99; high-skill/low-skill job disappearance in, 151; property bubble in, 98 Republican Party: ideology of, 62, 65; members of, 68 Resolution Foundation: 87–8; concept of ‘squeezed middle’, 168–9; reports of, 171 Ricardo, David: trade theory of, 101 Robinson, Eric: 36 Rodrik, Dani: 82, 89; concept of ‘hyperglobalisation’, 88; theory of ‘sane globalisation’, 90 Romania: 26; accession to EU, 225 (2007); migrants from, 102, 126 Romney, Mitt: electoral defeat of (2012), 68 Roosevelt, Theodore: leader of Progressive Party, 54 Rousseau, Jean-Jacques: 156 Rowthorn, Bob: 149 Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS): personnel of, 168 Royal College of Nursing: 140 Rudd, Amber: foreign worker list conflict (2016), 17 Ruhs, Martin: 126 Russell Group: 55; culture of, 37; student demographics of, 130–1, 191 Russian Federation: 2, 92; Moscow, 218; St Petersburg, 218 Rwanda: Genocide (1994), 82 Saffy factor: concept of, 199, 221–2 Scheffer, Paul: 85; ‘Multicultural Tragedy, The’ (2000), 49–50 Schumann, Robert: 94 Sciences Po: personnel of, 104 Scottish National Party (SNP): 1, 23, 54, 112; electoral performance of (2015), 75; ideology of, 53 Second World War (1939–45): 105, 194; Holocaust, 109 Security and identity issues: 41, 78, 81 Settlers: characteristics of, 43 Sikhism: 131 Singapore: 101, 128; education levels in, 156 Slovakia: 69, 73–4 Slovenia: adoption of Euro, 98–9 Smer: 69, 73 Smith, Zadie: 141–2 Social Democratic Party: supporters of, 75–6 social mobility: 6, 33, 58, 179–80, 183, 187, 189–91, 220; absolute mobility, 184, 188; relative mobility, 184; slow, 168; upward, 152 Social Mobility Commission: 161, 179–80 socialism: 49, 72, 183, 190 Somewheres: 3–5, 12–13, 17–18, 20, 41–3, 45, 115, 177, 180, 191, 214, 223, 228; characteristics of, 5–6, 2, 32; conflict with Anywheres, 23, 79, 81, 193, 215; conservatism, 7–8; employment of, 11; European, 103; immigration of, 106; moral institutions, 223–4; political representation/voting patterns of, 13–14, 24–6, 36, 53–5, 77–9, 124, 227; political views of, 71, 76, 109, 112, 119, 199, 218, 224–6, 232; potential coalition with Anywheres, 220, 222, 225–6, 233; view of migrant integration, 134 Sorrell, Martin: 31 Soskice, David: 159 South Korea: 86 Soviet Union (USSR): 92, 188; collapse of (1991), 82, 107 Sowell, Thomas: 30; A Conflict of Visions, 29 Spain: 53, 56, 64, 74; government of, 98; migrants from, 125; property bubble in, 98 Steinem, Gloria: 198 Stenner, Karen: 30, 44, 122, 133, 227; Authoritarian Dynamic, The, 30–1 Stephens, Philip: 108 Sun, The: 227 Sutherland, Peter: 31–2 Sutton Trust: end of mobility thesis, 183–5 Swaziland: 135 Sweden: 56, 70, 100; general elections (2014), 70; Stockholm, 143; taxation system of, 222 Sweden Democrats: 70; electoral performance of (2014), 70; ideology of, 73 Switzerland: 37 Syria: Civil War (2009–), 82, 84 Syriza: 53, 69 Taiwan: 86 Teeside University: 164 terrorism: jihadi, 71, 74, 129 Thatcher, Margaret: 58, 63, 95, 189, 205; administration of, 169; economic policies of, 176 Third Reich (1933–45): 104; persecution of Jews in, 17 Times Education Supplement: 37 Timmermans, Frans: EU Commissioner, 128 Thompson, Mark: Director-General of BBC, 15 trade theory: principles of, 101 Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP): 89; support for, 225 Trump, Donald: 50, 62, 74, 85; electoral victory of (2016), 1–3, 5–7, 13, 27, 30, 64–8, 81, 232; political rhetoric of, 14, 22–3, 51, 54, 66–7; supporters of, 56, 67 Tube Investments (TI): 172 Turkey: 218 Twitter: use for political activism, 79 Uber: 140 UK Independence Party (UKIP): 53, 55, 63–4, 69, 71–3, 228; electoral performance of (2015), 75; European election performance (2009), 71–2; members of, 13; origins of, 72; supporters of, 24, 35, 38, 72, 75, 143, 168, 216, 222 ultimatum game: 52 Understanding Society: surveys conducted by, 37–8, 202 unemployment: 101–2; gender divide of, 208–9; not in employment, education or training (Neets), 151–2, 190; youth, 139, 151–2, 166 Unilever: 175 United Kingdom (UK): 1–3, 8, 11–12, 21, 27–8, 31, 33, 41, 44, 59–60, 69, 73, 75, 81, 83, 91, 111–12, 147, 165, 173, 180, 193–5, 199, 204, 217, 227; Aberdeen, 136; accession to EEC (1973), 93; Adult Skills budget of, 161, 225; apprenticeship system of, 154, 157, 162–3, 166; Birmingham, 7, 123, 166; Boston, 121; Bradford, 133, 136; Bristol, 136; British Indian population of, 77; Burnley, 151; Cambridge, 136; City of London, 95, 106, 174; class system in, 58–9, 75, 123, 135–6, 149–52, 172, 182–3, 186, 195; Dagenham, 136; Department for Education, 206; Department for International Development (DfID), 224; Divorce Law Reform Act (1969), 196; economy of, 152, 170; Edinburgh, 54, 136; education sector of, 35, 147, 154–8; ethnic Chinese population of, 77; EU citizens in, 101; Finance Act (2014), 211; Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO), 224; Glasgow, 136; high-skill/low-skill job disappearance in, 150–1; higher education sector of, 35–7, 47, 159–62, 164–7, 179, 208, 230–1; Home Office, 17; House of Commons, 162; general election in (2015), 60; House of Lords, 31; Human Rights Act, 123, 225; income inequality levels in, 169–70, 172, 177, 184–5; labour market of, 16, 26, 124, 140–1, 148, 150–1, 152, 225; Leicester, 133; Leeds, 161; London, 3–4, 7, 10–11, 18–19, 24, 26, 34, 37, 59, 79, 101, 114–15, 119, 123, 131, 133–45, 151, 168, 216, 218, 226, 228, 232–3; Manchester, 123, 136, 151, 161, 228; manufacturing sector of, 17, 88; mass immigration in, 122–4, 126–7, 228–9; Muslim immigration in, 41–2, 44; Muslim population of, 127, 130; National Health Service (NHS), 72, 91, 111, 120, 140, 144, 200–1, 229; National Insurance system of, 204; Newcastle, 131, 136, 161; Northern Ireland, 38; Office for Fair Access, 180; Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills (Ofsted), 155; Office of National Statistics (ONS), 138, 144–5; Oldham, 133; Olympic Games (2012), 111, 143, 222; Oxford, 136; Parliamentary expenses scandal (2009), 56, 168; Plymouth, 131; public sector employment in, 171, 208–9, 229–30; regional identities in, 3–4, 186; Rochdale, 124; Scotland, 110, 138; Scottish independence referendum (2014), 53, 110; self-employment levels in, 171; Sheffield, 161; Slough, 131, 133; social mobility rate in, 58, 184–5, 187; start-ups in, 173–4; Stoke, 121; Sunderland, 52, 172; Supreme Court, 66; taxation system of, 222; Treasury, 16; UK Border Agency, 108; vocational education in, 163; voting patterns for Brexit vote, 7–9, 19–20, 23, 26, 36, 52; wage levels in, 168; Wales, 138; welfare state in, 199–203, 223–4, 231–2; Westminster, 54, 58, 60; youth unemployment in, 151–2 United Nations (UN): 102, 198; Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), 10; Declaration of Human Rights (1948), 109; Geneva Convention (1951), 82–4; High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR), 82, 84; Security Council, 99 United States of America (USA): 1–2, 6–7, 22–3, 36–7, 51, 57, 60, 74, 86, 89, 94, 128, 168, 193, 208, 227; 9/11 Attacks, 130; Agency for International Development (USAID), 224; Asian population of, 68; borders of, 21; Chinese Exclusion Act (1882), 54; class identity in, 65–6; Congress, 67; Constitution of, 57; education system of, 166; higher education sector of, 167; Hispanic population of, 67–8, 85; House of Representatives, 67; immigration debate in, 67–8; Ivy League, 36, 61; New York, 135; political divisions in, 65; Senate, 67 University College London (UCL): Imagining the Future City: London 2061, 137, 139 University of California: 165 University of Kent: 36 University of Sussex: 36 University of Warwick: 36; faculty of, 171 Vietnam War (1955–75): 29 Visegrad Group: 69, 73, 99 Vlaams Belang: ideology of, 73 wages for housework: 194 Walzer, Michael: 117–18 War on Drugs: 62 WEIRD (Western, Educated, Industrialised, Rich and Democratic): 27 Welzel, Christian: Freedom Rising, 27 Westminster University: 165 white flight: 129, 134, 136 white identity politics: 9, 67 white supremacy: 8, 68, 73–4 Whittle, Peter: 144 Wilders, Geert: 50, 76 Willetts, David: 164, 185 Wilson, Harold: electoral victory of (1964), 150 Wolf, Prof Alison: 162, 164–5; XX Factor, The, 189, 198 working class: 2–4, 6, 51–2, 59, 61, 65; conservatism, 8 political representation/views of, 8, 52, 58, 63, 70, 72; progressives, 78–9; voting patterns of, 15, 52, 75–6; white, 19, 68 World Bank: 84 World Trade Organisation (WTO): 10, 85, 89–90, 97; accession of China to (2001), 88 World Values Survey: 27 xenophobia: 2, 14, 50–1, 57, 71, 119, 121, 141, 144, 225 York, Peter: 138 York University: 36 YouGov: personnel of, 78; polls conducted by, 16–17, 42, 66, 79, 114, 132, 141 Young, Hugo: 93 Young, Michael: 119, 190; Rise of the Meritocracy, The, 180–1 Yugoslav Wars (1991–2001): 97 Yugoslavia: 97 Zeman, Milos: President of Czech Republic, 73

How to Be Right: In a World Gone Wrong by James O'Brien

Black Lives Matter, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, clockwatching, collective bargaining, death of newspapers, Donald Trump, fake news, game design, housing crisis, Jeremy Corbyn, mass immigration, Neil Armstrong, plutocrats, post-industrial society, QAnon, ride hailing / ride sharing, sexual politics, Social Justice Warrior, Steve Bannon, young professional

I’m not going to speculate about what Brian in Peterborough meant when he spoke of me being ‘on the same side’ as Khan, in the context of a conversation about a racist, misogynistic American politician who fallaciously blames immigrants, Muslims and people with foreign-sounding names for all his country’s woes. You can, though. Brendan Cox is the widower of the murdered British MP, Jo Cox. A week before the Brexit referendum and hours after Nigel Farage unveiled his ‘Breaking Point’ poster, grimly reminiscent of Joseph Goebbels’ Nazi propaganda, Jo was shot by a white supremacist terrorist. So perhaps Brian was suggesting that being ‘on the same side’ as Brendan Cox meant being opposed to murderous white supremacists?

Willful: How We Choose What We Do by Richard Robb

activist fund / activist shareholder / activist investor, Alvin Roth, Asian financial crisis, asset-backed security, Bear Stearns, behavioural economics, Bernie Madoff, Brexit referendum, capital asset pricing model, cognitive bias, collapse of Lehman Brothers, Daniel Kahneman / Amos Tversky, David Ricardo: comparative advantage, delayed gratification, diversification, diversified portfolio, effective altruism, endowment effect, Eratosthenes, experimental subject, family office, George Akerlof, index fund, information asymmetry, job satisfaction, John Maynard Keynes: Economic Possibilities for our Grandchildren, lake wobegon effect, loss aversion, market bubble, market clearing, money market fund, Paradox of Choice, Pareto efficiency, Paul Samuelson, Peter Singer: altruism, Philippa Foot, principal–agent problem, profit maximization, profit motive, Richard Thaler, search costs, Silicon Valley, sovereign wealth fund, survivorship bias, the scientific method, The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, Thomas Malthus, Thorstein Veblen, transaction costs, trolley problem, ultimatum game

The successes we remember are close calls that work out in the end. (I hesitate to call these the “best,” since that implies comparison and ranking, which are not part of the for-itself realm.) I grappled with just such a challenge when the United Kingdom voted to drop out of the European Union in June 2016. I had an ominous feeling in the lead-up to the Brexit referendum, although I can’t say I expected the Leave camp to win. Anyone who claims to have seen it coming is kidding themselves. The vote in favor of withdrawing from the European Union was, objectively, shocking. Our hedge fund had a lot riding on the vote, more than we would have liked. A Brexit shock could plunge markets into chaos, right when we were counting on investors to follow through on commitments to supply capital.

Nine Crises: Fifty Years of Covering the British Economy From Devaluation to Brexit by William Keegan

Alan Greenspan, banking crisis, Bear Stearns, Berlin Wall, Big bang: deregulation of the City of London, Boris Johnson, Bretton Woods, Brexit referendum, British Empire, capital controls, congestion charging, deindustrialization, Donald Trump, Etonian, eurozone crisis, Fall of the Berlin Wall, financial engineering, financial innovation, financial thriller, floating exchange rates, foreign exchange controls, full employment, gig economy, inflation targeting, Jeremy Corbyn, Just-in-time delivery, light touch regulation, liquidity trap, low interest rates, Martin Wolf, military-industrial complex, moral hazard, negative equity, Neil Kinnock, Nixon triggered the end of the Bretton Woods system, non-tariff barriers, North Sea oil, Northern Rock, oil shock, Parkinson's law, Paul Samuelson, pre–internet, price mechanism, quantitative easing, Ronald Reagan, school vouchers, short selling, South Sea Bubble, Suez crisis 1956, The Chicago School, transaction costs, tulip mania, Winter of Discontent, Yom Kippur War

Recent history has been dominated by the banking crisis of 2007–09, with whose consequences we are still living – not least with the era of austerity that followed. The financial crisis took a complacent generation of economists and policymakers by surprise. Conquering inflation was supposed to be the ultimate achievement. And then came the Brexit referendum… CRISIS 1 1967: DEVALUATION: BEFORE AND AFTER The devaluation of 1967 followed a sequence of events in which the Conservatives under Reginald Maudling began a ‘dash for growth’ which ended in what became known as the Maudling boom, whose consequences Labour had to deal with. The background to this was partly the general observation that the leading European economies were growing faster than ours, which was one of the factors behind the push to join the common market.

…

However, for all the political rhetoric, the underlying arithmetic of the Treasury’s, the OBR’s and various think tanks’ analyses showed that it was going to continue. Indeed, the OBR brought out figures showing that there had already been significant damage to the economy since the referendum, and there would be worse to come on any of the various scenarios for so-called hard or soft Brexits. CRISIS 9 2016: REFERENDUM AND THREAT OF BREXIT It was 8.15 p.m. on Wednesday 13 July 2016, some three weeks after the electors of the United Kingdom had voted by 51.9 per cent to 48.1 per cent to leave the European Union. I had been to a drinks reception at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, where all the talk was of the shock, horror and possible implications of the result of the referendum.

Reaching for Utopia: Making Sense of an Age of Upheaval by Jason Cowley

"World Economic Forum" Davos, anti-communist, Berlin Wall, Bernie Sanders, Big bang: deregulation of the City of London, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, Bullingdon Club, Cambridge Analytica, centre right, Charles Lindbergh, coherent worldview, Corn Laws, corporate governance, crony capitalism, David Brooks, deindustrialization, deskilling, Donald Trump, Etonian, eurozone crisis, fake news, Fall of the Berlin Wall, illegal immigration, Jeremy Corbyn, liberal world order, Neil Kinnock, Occupy movement, offshore financial centre, old-boy network, open borders, open immigration, plutocrats, post-war consensus, public intellectual, Right to Buy, Robert Mercer, Ronald Reagan, Russell Brand, technological determinism, University of East Anglia

Old certainties are crumbling, social trust has declined, and shocks keep happening, from the election of Donald Trump as president of the United States, to the vote for Brexit, to the no less astonishing triumph in France of Emmanuel Macron, a former Rothschild banker who founded his own movement and party and swept to power in 2017. The New Statesman – where I have worked as editor since autumn 2008 – began in 1913 as a weekly review of politics and literature. So, it has existed for more than a century – through two world wars – and yet by any measure the present era is remarkable: Trump, Brexit, the Scottish independence referendum, the election of Jeremy Corbyn as Labour leader and the rise of the radical left, the crises in Europe, the rise and fall of Islamic State, a mini world war in Syria, an unprecedented shift in power from the West to the East – these are turbulent and volatile new times. Our world is defined by entrenched wealth inequality, the mass movement of people – including free movement within the European Union – and astounding technological innovation and disruption.

…

‘We Europeans can never accept Polish workers being beaten up, harassed or even murdered in the streets of Essex,’ the president of the European Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, said in an annual state of the union address on 14 September. The subtext of Juncker’s intervention was this: the death of Arkadiusz Jozwik was a manifestation of the xenophobic forces unleashed by the Brexit referendum, and Harlow and its people were implicated. Sometimes I dream about Harlow. I was born in what was then called the new town, at home, in a rented maisonette above a parade of shops, with just a midwife to keep watch on my mother as my father waited anxiously with my four-year-old sister in another room.

Subscribed: Why the Subscription Model Will Be Your Company's Future - and What to Do About It by Tien Tzuo, Gabe Weisert

3D printing, Airbnb, airport security, Amazon Web Services, augmented reality, autonomous vehicles, Big Tech, bike sharing, blockchain, Brexit referendum, Build a better mousetrap, business cycle, business intelligence, business process, call centre, cloud computing, cognitive dissonance, connected car, data science, death of newspapers, digital nomad, digital rights, digital twin, double entry bookkeeping, Elon Musk, factory automation, fake news, fiat currency, Ford Model T, fulfillment center, growth hacking, hockey-stick growth, Internet of things, inventory management, iterative process, Jeff Bezos, John Zimmer (Lyft cofounder), Kevin Kelly, Lean Startup, Lyft, manufacturing employment, Marc Benioff, Mary Meeker, megaproject, minimum viable product, natural language processing, Network effects, Nicholas Carr, nuclear winter, pets.com, planned obsolescence, pneumatic tube, profit maximization, race to the bottom, ride hailing / ride sharing, Salesforce, Sand Hill Road, shareholder value, Silicon Valley, skunkworks, smart meter, social graph, software as a service, spice trade, Steve Ballmer, Steve Jobs, subscription business, systems thinking, tech worker, TED Talk, Tim Cook: Apple, transport as a service, Uber and Lyft, uber lyft, WeWork, Y2K, Zipcar

Some of these initiatives succeed, some fail, but the goal of all of them is to drive legitimate reader engagement, as opposed to reverse engineering an editorial product for the benefit of advertisers. BRITISH WITS: FINANCIAL TIMES AND THE ECONOMIST Pricing agility—being able to pivot on a dime when a big story breaks—is also key to this transformation. Financial Times knew they were going to get a surge of traffic over the weekend of the Brexit referendum, so what did they do? Dropped their paywall for all their Brexit news and made sure that the flood of new readers saw plenty of tailored subscription offers. As a result, they saw a 600 percent surge in digital subscriptions sales compared with the average weekend. Today FT has more than 900,000 subscribers, with over 75 percent of their revenue coming from digital subscriptions.

Spite: The Upside of Your Dark Side by Simon McCarthy-Jones

affirmative action, Atul Gawande, Bernie Sanders, Brexit referendum, Daniel Kahneman / Amos Tversky, dark triade / dark tetrad, Donald Trump, Elon Musk, en.wikipedia.org, experimental economics, Extinction Rebellion, greed is good, Greta Thunberg, income inequality, Jeremy Corbyn, Jon Ronson, loss aversion, Menlo Park, meta-analysis, Milgram experiment, New Journalism, Nick Bostrom, p-value, profit maximization, rent-seeking, rewilding, selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI), shareholder value, Steven Pinker, TED Talk, The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, theory of mind, Tragedy of the Commons, ultimatum game, WikiLeaks

It is the only acceptable form of domination left in our society. The better-reasoned argument wins through what the philosopher Jürgen Habermas calls “unforced force” (zwanglose Zwang).34 Yet unforced force is still force. People resent domination by reason. Michael Gove, the former UK Justice Secretary, captured this sentiment during the 2016 Brexit Referendum Campaign when he said, “People in this country have had enough of experts.”35 One could argue that if others try to dominate you by reason, then reason can also act as its own counterdominance device. If someone tries to reason you into something, you can try to reason your way out of it. Yet this claim presupposes that everyone has equal access to reasoning.

Spike: The Virus vs The People - The Inside Story by Jeremy Farrar, Anjana Ahuja

"World Economic Forum" Davos, bioinformatics, Black Monday: stock market crash in 1987, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, contact tracing, coronavirus, COVID-19, crowdsourcing, dark matter, data science, DeepMind, Demis Hassabis, disinformation, Dominic Cummings, Donald Trump, double helix, dual-use technology, Future Shock, game design, global pandemic, Kickstarter, lab leak, lockdown, machine translation, nudge unit, open economy, pattern recognition, precautionary principle, side project, social distancing, the scientific method, Tim Cook: Apple, zoonotic diseases

Cummings says he wishes he had interrogated the behavioural science assumptions more carefully: ‘That is one of the things that I blame myself for. A lot of people started babbling theories about behaviour and communications [about why the UK could not lock down]. I spent a lot of time looking at this in the context of the Brexit referendum and I knew that a lot of smart people have completely bonkers ideas about it ... Both Ben Warner and I said we did not believe this idea that the public won’t accept lockdowns, or won’t accept a test and trace system. You could see the TV pictures of Lombardy. We were getting messages from our own friends and family saying, “What is going on down there, when are you going to lock down?”’

The Breakup Monologues: The Unexpected Joy of Heartbreak by Rosie Wilby

Airbnb, Brexit referendum, Burning Man, coronavirus, COVID-19, David Attenborough, Donald Trump, fear of failure, George Santayana, Jeremy Corbyn, Kintsugi, lateral thinking, lockdown, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI), social contagion, social distancing, zero-sum game

We even conquer the unpredictable wilful sea once we hire that car and make our way to another calmer section of beach. Sitting on our towels on the warm sand one late afternoon, she says, ‘Baby, can we start looking for a puppy when we get home?’ ‘Awww, oh my god, yes! How cute.’ ‘Oh yay! I can’t wait to be a dog mummy with you.’ Notes 1 In the few years leading up to the ‘Brexit’ referendum in the UK, there had been a decline in divorce rates. However, in its aftermath, this figure rose again. Couples were divided by this incredibly binary question. Our response to it seemed to say so much about our personal values, our sense of inclusivity. Hitherto unseen aspects of people were revealed, aspects that carry more resonance than superficial tastes in films or music.

Fully Automated Luxury Communism by Aaron Bastani

"Peter Beck" AND "Rocket Lab", Alan Greenspan, Anthropocene, autonomous vehicles, banking crisis, basic income, Berlin Wall, Bernie Sanders, Boston Dynamics, Bretton Woods, Brexit referendum, capital controls, capitalist realism, cashless society, central bank independence, collapse of Lehman Brothers, computer age, computer vision, CRISPR, David Ricardo: comparative advantage, decarbonisation, deep learning, dematerialisation, DIY culture, Donald Trump, double helix, driverless car, electricity market, Elon Musk, energy transition, Erik Brynjolfsson, fake news, financial independence, Francis Fukuyama: the end of history, future of work, Future Shock, G4S, general purpose technology, Geoffrey Hinton, Gregor Mendel, housing crisis, income inequality, industrial robot, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Internet of things, Isaac Newton, James Watt: steam engine, Jeff Bezos, Jeremy Corbyn, Jevons paradox, job automation, John Markoff, John Maynard Keynes: technological unemployment, Joseph Schumpeter, Kevin Kelly, Kuiper Belt, land reform, Leo Hollis, liberal capitalism, low earth orbit, low interest rates, low skilled workers, M-Pesa, market fundamentalism, means of production, mobile money, more computing power than Apollo, new economy, off grid, pattern recognition, Peter H. Diamandis: Planetary Resources, post scarcity, post-work, price mechanism, price stability, private spaceflight, Productivity paradox, profit motive, race to the bottom, rewilding, RFID, rising living standards, Robert Solow, scientific management, Second Machine Age, self-driving car, sensor fusion, shareholder value, Silicon Valley, Simon Kuznets, Slavoj Žižek, SoftBank, stem cell, Stewart Brand, synthetic biology, technological determinism, technoutopianism, the built environment, the scientific method, The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, Thomas Malthus, transatlantic slave trade, Travis Kalanick, universal basic income, V2 rocket, Watson beat the top human players on Jeopardy!, We are as Gods, Whole Earth Catalog, working-age population

A few months later, Jeremy Corbyn, who began his outsider bid at odds of 200–1, became Leader of the Labour Party – his supporters certain he could be powered by the same wave that had taken the likes of Syriza and Podemos so far in such a short space of time. It was 2016 which proved to be the decisive year, however, as a crisis that started eight years earlier found its most potent political expressions. In June, Britain voted to leave the European Union with more people voting in the ‘Brexit’ referendum than any previous vote held in the country. That appeared to be a pivotal moment, with right-wing populism seeming to capture an increasingly clear hostility to governing elites. As Nigel Farage, a figurehead for the Brexit movement, triumphantly declared on the night, ‘This is a victory for ordinary people, for good people, for decent people … the people who’ve had enough of the merchant bankers.’

How Democracy Ends by David Runciman

barriers to entry, basic income, Bernie Sanders, Big Tech, bitcoin, blockchain, Brexit referendum, Cambridge Analytica, Capital in the Twenty-First Century by Thomas Piketty, centre right, crowdsourcing, cuban missile crisis, disinformation, Dominic Cummings, Donald Trump, Dr. Strangelove, Edward Snowden, fake news, first-past-the-post, Francis Fukuyama: the end of history, full employment, Internet of things, Jeremy Corbyn, Jon Ronson, Joseph Schumpeter, Kickstarter, Large Hadron Collider, loss aversion, Mahatma Gandhi, Mark Zuckerberg, money: store of value / unit of account / medium of exchange, mutually assured destruction, Network effects, Nick Bostrom, Norman Mailer, opioid epidemic / opioid crisis, Panopticon Jeremy Bentham, Paris climate accords, Peter Thiel, post-truth, power law, precautionary principle, quantitative easing, Russell Brand, self-driving car, Sheryl Sandberg, Silicon Valley, Steve Bannon, Steven Pinker, the long tail, The Wisdom of Crowds, Travis Kalanick, universal basic income, Yogi Berra

Yet the result was to hand more control to the British executive, whose job it became to deliver on what the British people wanted. The executive is now locked in a tussle with the British parliament to try to ensure that it retains those powers even after Brexit has happened. No one could argue that the Brexit referendum was a successful instance of an executive coup, given that the prime minister who called it lost his job as a result. What it does show is how easily the popular demand for more democracy can end up having the opposite effect. The old-fashioned coup d’état is far from dead everywhere, however.

Zucked: Waking Up to the Facebook Catastrophe by Roger McNamee

"Susan Fowler" uber, "World Economic Forum" Davos, 4chan, Albert Einstein, algorithmic trading, AltaVista, Amazon Web Services, Andy Rubin, barriers to entry, Bernie Sanders, Big Tech, Bill Atkinson, Black Lives Matter, Boycotts of Israel, Brexit referendum, Cambridge Analytica, carbon credits, Cass Sunstein, cloud computing, computer age, cross-subsidies, dark pattern, data is the new oil, data science, disinformation, Donald Trump, Douglas Engelbart, Douglas Engelbart, driverless car, Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, Elon Musk, fake news, false flag, Filter Bubble, game design, growth hacking, Ian Bogost, income inequality, information security, Internet of things, It's morning again in America, Jaron Lanier, Jeff Bezos, John Markoff, laissez-faire capitalism, Lean Startup, light touch regulation, Lyft, machine readable, Marc Andreessen, Marc Benioff, Mark Zuckerberg, market bubble, Max Levchin, Menlo Park, messenger bag, Metcalfe’s law, minimum viable product, Mother of all demos, move fast and break things, Network effects, One Laptop per Child (OLPC), PalmPilot, paypal mafia, Peter Thiel, pets.com, post-work, profit maximization, profit motive, race to the bottom, recommendation engine, Robert Mercer, Ronald Reagan, Russian election interference, Sand Hill Road, self-driving car, Sheryl Sandberg, Silicon Valley, Silicon Valley startup, Skype, Snapchat, social graph, software is eating the world, Stephen Hawking, Steve Bannon, Steve Jobs, Steven Levy, Stewart Brand, subscription business, TED Talk, The Chicago School, The future is already here, Tim Cook: Apple, two-sided market, Uber and Lyft, Uber for X, uber lyft, Upton Sinclair, vertical integration, WikiLeaks, Yom Kippur War

To them, connecting 2.2 billion people is so obviously a good thing, and continued growth so important, that they cannot imagine that the problems that have resulted could be in any way linked to their designs or business decisions. It would never occur to them to listen to critics—how many billion people have the critics connected?—much less to reconsider the way they do business. As a result, when confronted with evidence that disinformation and fake news spread over Facebook influenced the Brexit referendum in the United Kingdom and a presidential election in the United States, Facebook took steps that spoke volumes about the company’s world view. They demoted publishers in favor of family, friends, and Groups on the theory that information from those sources would be more trustworthy. The problem is that family, friends, and Groups are the foundational elements of filter and preference bubbles.

The Power of Geography: Ten Maps That Reveal the Future of Our World by Tim Marshall

Apollo 11, Ayatollah Khomeini, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, British Empire, carbon footprint, centre right, clean water, coronavirus, COVID-19, David Sedaris, disinformation, Donald Trump, drone strike, Elon Musk, European colonialism, failed state, glass ceiling, global pandemic, Great Leap Forward, Jeff Bezos, Johannes Kepler, low earth orbit, Malacca Straits, means of production, megaproject, Mikhail Gorbachev, mutually assured destruction, Neil Armstrong, new economy, New Urbanism, Ronald Reagan, Silicon Valley, South China Sea, sovereign wealth fund, space junk, Strategic Defense Initiative, Suez canal 1869, Suez crisis 1956, trade route, uranium enrichment, urban planning, women in the workforce

The Republic was formed in 1922 after a campaign of violence achieved independence – an early example of the long-drawn-out roar of the dying British empire. These modern independence scenarios are directly connected to Brexit. The Scottish independence referendum of 2014 saw a 55 per cent vote to remain in the UK, but that was when the UK was in the EU. In the Brexit referendum, support for the EU was considerably higher in Scotland and Northern Ireland than in England. One way to stay in that union is to leave another. This is not an argument for or against Scottish independence, nor do the economic arguments for and against it concern us here; but a case can be made that if Scotland does leave, the damage to the UK’s international standing would be worse than that caused by it leaving the EU.

Four Battlegrounds by Paul Scharre

2021 United States Capitol attack, 3D printing, active measures, activist lawyer, AI winter, AlphaGo, amateurs talk tactics, professionals talk logistics, artificial general intelligence, ASML, augmented reality, Automated Insights, autonomous vehicles, barriers to entry, Berlin Wall, Big Tech, bitcoin, Black Lives Matter, Boeing 737 MAX, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, business continuity plan, business process, carbon footprint, chief data officer, Citizen Lab, clean water, cloud computing, commoditize, computer vision, coronavirus, COVID-19, crisis actor, crowdsourcing, DALL-E, data is not the new oil, data is the new oil, data science, deep learning, deepfake, DeepMind, Demis Hassabis, Deng Xiaoping, digital map, digital rights, disinformation, Donald Trump, drone strike, dual-use technology, Elon Musk, en.wikipedia.org, endowment effect, fake news, Francis Fukuyama: the end of history, future of journalism, future of work, game design, general purpose technology, Geoffrey Hinton, geopolitical risk, George Floyd, global supply chain, GPT-3, Great Leap Forward, hive mind, hustle culture, ImageNet competition, immigration reform, income per capita, interchangeable parts, Internet Archive, Internet of things, iterative process, Jeff Bezos, job automation, Kevin Kelly, Kevin Roose, large language model, lockdown, Mark Zuckerberg, military-industrial complex, move fast and break things, Nate Silver, natural language processing, new economy, Nick Bostrom, one-China policy, Open Library, OpenAI, PalmPilot, Parler "social media", pattern recognition, phenotype, post-truth, purchasing power parity, QAnon, QR code, race to the bottom, RAND corporation, recommendation engine, reshoring, ride hailing / ride sharing, robotic process automation, Rodney Brooks, Rubik’s Cube, self-driving car, Shoshana Zuboff, side project, Silicon Valley, slashdot, smart cities, smart meter, Snapchat, social software, sorting algorithm, South China Sea, sparse data, speech recognition, Steve Bannon, Steven Levy, Stuxnet, supply-chain attack, surveillance capitalism, systems thinking, tech worker, techlash, telemarketer, The Brussels Effect, The Signal and the Noise by Nate Silver, TikTok, trade route, TSMC

These efforts were aimed at not only influencing the election, but more broadly sowing division among Americans and undermining faith in democracy. Nor was Russia’s campaign against the U.S. election an anomaly. Russian government and government-backed operatives undertook a slew of influence operations across Europe to undermine democratic processes, including against the 2016 British Brexit referendum and the 2017 French presidential election. In the aftermath of the 2016 U.S. presidential election, concerns about Russian disinformation reached a fever pitch in Washington. U.S. senators warned that Russia’s “information warfare campaign” was designed to “sow fear, discord, and paralysis that undermines democratic institutions and weakens critical Western alliances” and was “a threat to the foundations of American democracy.”

…

., 263–75 limitations of, 229–37 roles in warfare, 273 rule-based, 230, 236 safety and security challenges of, 249–59 arXiv, 163 ASICs (application-specific integrated circuits), 180 ASML (company), 181 Associated Press, 139 Atari, 235 Atlantic, The, 173 atoms, in the universe, number of, 335 AUKUS partnership, 76 Austin, Lloyd, 292 Australia, 76, 108, 158, 182, 187 Australian Strategic Policy Institute, 82, 98, 158 Autodesk, 162 automated surveillance, 103 automatic target recognition, 56–58 automation bias, 263 autonomous cars, 23, 65 autonomous weapons, 61, 64–66, 256 autonomous weapons, lethal, 286 AWACS (airborne warning and control system), 196 AWCFT (Algorithmic Warfare Cross-Functional Team), See Project Maven Azerbaijan, 108 BAAI (Beijing Academy of Artificial Intelligence), 172, 455 backdoor poisoning attacks, 245 badnets, 246 BAE (company), 211 Baidu, 37, 92, 160, 172, 173, 212 Baise Executive Leadership Academy, 109 “Banger” (call sign), 1 Bannon, Steve, 295 Battle of Omdurman, 13 BBC, 138 BeiDou, 80 Beijing, 84, 92, 159 Beijing Academy of Artificial Intelligence (BAAI), 172, 455 Beijing AI Principles, 172, 173 Beijing Institute of Big Data Research, 157 Belt and Road Initiative, 105, 108–10 BERTLARGE, 294 Betaworks, 127–28 Bezos, Jeff, 215 biases, 234, 236 Biddle, Stephen, 219 Biden, Hunter, 131 Biden, Joe, and administration, 33–34, 147, 166–67, 184, 252, 292 big data analysis, 91 Bing, 160 Bin Salman, Mohammed, 141 biometrics, 80, 84; See also facial recognition “Bitter Lesson, The” (Sutton), 299 black box attacks, 240–41 blacklists, 99–100 BlackLivesMatter, 143, 148 “blade runner” laws, 121–22, 170 blind passes, 249 Bloomberg, 118 Bloomberg Government, 257 Boeing, 193, 216 Bolivia, 107 bots, 118, 121–22, 142, 144–49, 221 Bradford, Anu, 112 Bradshaw, Samantha, 141–42 brain drain, 31, 304 “brain scale” models, 300 Brands, Hal, 223 Brazil, 106, 107, 110 Breakfast Club, 53 Brexit referendum, 122 Bridges Supercomputer, 44 brinkmanship, 281 Brokaw, Tom, 143 Brooks, Rodney, 233 “brothers and sisters,” Han Chinese, 81 Brown, Jason, 54–55, 57, 201–3 Brown, Michael, 49, 196–97 Brown, Noam, 44, 48, 50 Bugs Bunny (fictional character), 231 Bureau of Industry and Security, 166 Burundi, 110 Buscemi, Steve, 130 Bush, George W., and administration, 68–70 ByteDance, 143 C3 AI, 196, 224 C4ISR (Command, Control, Communication, Cloud, Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance), 107 CalFire, 201–2 California Air National Guard, 201, 203 Caltech, 32, 120 Cambridge Innovation Center, 135 cameras, surveillance, 6, 86–87, 91 Campbell, Kurt, 292 Canada, 40, 76, 158, 187 Capitol insurrection of 2021, 150 car bombs, 54–55 Carnegie Mellon University, 31–32, 45–46, 66, 193, 196, 207 Carnegie Robotics, 193 cars, self-driving, 23 Carter, Ash, 57 casualties, military, 255 CBC/Radio-Canada, 138 CCP, See Chinese Communist Party Ceaușescu, Nicolae, 345 CEIEC (China National Electronics Import and Export Corporation), 106 censorship, 175–76 centaur model, 263 Center for a New American Security, 36, 71, 222 Center for Data Innovation, 15 Center for Security and Emerging Technology, 33, 139, 162, 185, 298, 323 Center on Terrorism, Extremism, and Counterterrorism, 124 Central Military Commission, 292 Central Military Commission Science and Technology Commission, 36 central processing units (CPUs), 25 CFIUS (Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States), 179 C-5 cargo plane, 196 chance, 282 character of warfare, 280 checkers, 47 Chen Hanghui, 279 Chen Weiss, Jessica, 110 Chesney, Robert, 130 chess, 47, 267, 269, 271, 275 Chile, 107 China AI research of, 30 bots, 142 Central Military Commission Science and Technology Commission, 36 commercial tech ecosystem, 223 data privacy regulations of, 21–22 ethics standards, 171–75 High-End Foreign Expert Recruitment Program, 33 human rights abuses, 63 in industrial revolution, 12–13 internet use, 22 nuclear capabilities, 50 ranking in government strategy, 40 semiconductor imports, 29 synthetic media policies of, 140 technology ecosystem, 91–96 Thousand Talents Plan, 32 China Arms Control and Disarmament Association, 290 China Initiative, 164, 167 China National Electronics Import and Export Corporation (CEIEC), 106 China National Intellectual Property Administration (CNIPA), 353 China Security and Protection Industry Association, 91 China Telecom, 169 Chinese Academy of Sciences, 88, 158 Chinese Academy of Sciences Institute of Automation, 172 Chinese Communist Party (CCP) economic history, 85–86 human rights abuses, 79–80, 83 surveillance, 97–104, 174–77 Chinese graduate students in U.S., 31 Chinese military aggression, 76; See also People’s Liberation Army (PLA) AI dogfighting system, 257 and Google, 62–63 investments in weapons, 70 scientists in U.S., 5 and Tiananmen massacre, 68 U.S. links to, 157–58, 161, 166, 303 Chinese Ministry of Education, 162 Chinese People’s Institute of Foreign Affairs, 173 Chinese Talent Program Tracker, 33 chips, See semiconductor industry; semiconductors CHIPS and Science Act, 40, 180 Cisco, 109, 246 Citron, Danielle, 121, 130 Civil Aviation Industry Credit Management Measures, 100 Clarifai, 60–61, 63, 66, 224 Clark, Jack, 31, 117, 119–25 Clinton, Bill, and administration, 69–70, 97 CLIP (multimodal model), 295–96 cloud computing, 91, 215–16 CloudWalk, 105, 156, 389 CNIPA (China National Intellectual Property Administration), 353 COBOL (programming language), 204 cognitive revolution, 4 cognitization of military forces, 265 Colombia, 107 Command, Control, Communication, Cloud, Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (C4ISR), 107 command and control, 268 Commerce Department, 155–57, 166, 171, 184 Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), 179 computational efficiency, 297–300 computational game theory, 47–50 compute, 25–29 control over, 27 global infrastructure, 178 hardware, 297–99 resources, size of, 294–96 trends in, 325 usage of, 26, 51 computer chips, See semiconductor industry; semiconductors Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL), 156 computer vision, 55–57, 64, 224 Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition conference, 57 concentration camps, 81 confidence-building measures, 290–93 confinement, 82 content recommendations, 145 Cook, Matt, 203 cooperation, research, 303–4 Cornell University, 124 cost, of AI, 296–97 Côte d’Ivoire, 107 Cotton, Tom, 164 counter-AI techniques, 248 COVID pandemic, 74–75 CPUs (central processing units), 25 Crootof, Rebecca, 123 CrowdAI, 202, 224 CSAIL (Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory), 156 Cukor, Drew, 57, 58–59 Customs and Border Patrol, 110–11 cyberattacks, 246 Cyber Grand Challenge, 195–96 Cybersecurity Law, 95, 174 “cyberspace,” 102 Cyberspace Administration of China, 99 cyber vulnerabilities, 238 adversarial examples, 239–44 data poisoning, 244–47 discovery, 195–96 model inversion attacks, 247 Czech Republic, 108 Dahua, 89, 156, 169, 353, 354–55, 388–89 Dalai Lama, 80 Dalian University of Technology, 212 DALL·E, 295 Darcey, Brett, 220, 249–50 DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency), 1, 195, 210–13, 220 DARPA Squad X, 231, 233, 236 data, 18–24 explosion, 18–19 mapping, 204 open-source, 288 poisoning, 238, 244–47 privacy laws, 21–22, 111–12, 170–71, 174–77 storage, 91 usage, 51 Data Security Law, 95, 174 datasets publicly available, 139 reliance on, 323 training, see training datasets DAWNBench, 57 D-Day Invasion of Normandy, 46 dead hand, 289–90 Dead Hand, 447; See also Perimeter deception in warfare, 45 Deep Blue, 275 deepfake detection, 127, 132–33, 137–38 Deepfake Detection Challenge, 132–33 deepfake videos, 121, 130–32 deep learning, 2, 19, 31, 210, 236 Deep Learning Analytics, 209–13, 233 DeepMind, 23, 26, 32, 180, 221, 271–72, 295–96, 298–99, 441, 454 Deeptrace, 121, 130–33 defense acquisition policy, 217 Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), 1, 195, 210–13, 220 Defense Innovation Board, 65–66 Defense Innovation Unit (DIU), 35, 49, 57, 195–99, 214, 252 Defense One, 58 Defense Sciences Office, 231 defense start-ups, 222 Dell, 162 Deloitte, 246 Deng Xiaoping, 75, 85 Denmark, 108 Department of Defense, 35, 51–52, 56, 60–67, 70, 160, 166, 194 AI principles, 65–66 AI strategy, 249 budget, 297 contracts, 214–18 cyberattacks on, 246 innovation organizations, 198f reform, 225 Department of Energy, 246 Department of Energy’s Office of Science, 40 Department of Homeland Security, 246 Department of Justice, 164, 246 destruction, extinction-level, 282 deterrence, 51 DiCaprio, Leonardo, 130 Dick, Philip K., 81 dictator’s dilemma, 69 Didi, 92 digital devices, 18 DigitalGlobe, 204 Digital Silk Road, 110 DiResta, Renée, 139 disaster relief, 201, 204 disinformation, 117–26 AI text generation, 117–21 deepfake videos, 121 GPT-2 release, 123–24 Russian, 122 voice bots, 121–22 distributional shift, 233, 426 DIU, See Defense Innovation Unit (DIU) DNA database, 89–90 dogfighting, 1, 249–50, 272; See also Alpha Dogfight “Donald Trump neuron,” 295 Doom bots, 221 doomsday device, 282 Dota 2 (game), 26, 117, 267–72, 298 Dragonfly, 62 Drenkow, Nathan, 247 drone pilots, 223 drones, 229–30, 257, 286–87 drone video footage, 36, 53–56, 61, 65, 202–3; See also image processing; video processing drugs, 251 Dulles Airport, 110–11 Dunford, Joe, 62 Duplex, 121 Easley, Matt, 193 Eastern Foundry, 209 Economist, The, 18 Ecuador, 106 efficiency, algorithmic, 51 Egypt, 109 XVIII Airborne Corps at Fort Bragg, 194 elections, 122, 128, 129, 131, 134, 150 Elmer Fudd (fictional character), 231 Entity List, 155–57, 161, 163, 166–67, 171, 182, 184, 388–89 Environmental Protection Agency, 40 Erasmus University Medical Center, 158, 393–94 Esper, Mark, 67, 197, 205 espionage, 33, 163–64 Estonia, 108 “Ethical Norms for New Generation Artificial Intelligence,” 172 ethical use of technology, 140 ethics censorship, 175–76 Chinese standards, 171–75 data privacy, 176–77 international standards, 169–71 Ethiopia, 108 E-3 Sentry, 196 Europe AI research of, 30 in industrial revolution, 12–13 internet use, 22 and semiconductor market, 27 European Union, 76, 187 Europe Defender, 194 EUV (extreme ultraviolet lithography), 181 explainable AI, 237 export controls, 166–67, 181–86, 300 extinction-level destruction, 282 extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUV), 181 Eyes in the Sky (Michel), 54 F-35 stealth fighter jet, 254–55 Faber, Isaac, 193–94, 203 Face++, 88 Facebook account removal, 142 algorithms, 144–46 content moderation, 149 Deepfake Detection Challenge, 132 manipulated media policies of, 140 number of users, 22 and Trusted News Initiative, 139 face swapping, 121, 130–31 facial recognition attacks on, 241, 245 challenges in, 426 in China, 5–6, 80, 88–91, 103, 167 Chinese export of technology, 105–7 laws and policies for, 113, 159, 170 poor performance outside training data, 64–65 of Uighurs, 88–89, 158 in U.S., 22–23, 111, 159 fake news, 117–19, 122, 124–25 Falco (call sign), 1–2, 221, 226 Fan Hui, 298 FBI, 95–96, 164 Fedasiuk, Ryan, 162 Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), 204 FedRAMP, 213 FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency), 204 Fidelity International, 157 field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), 180 “50 cent army,” 125 Fighting to Innovate (Kania), 222 filtering, of harmful content, 144 Financial Times, 157–58 Finland, 40, 187 fire perimeter mapping, 201–4 5G wireless networking, 37, 108, 182–83 Floyd, George, 143, 148 flu, H5N1 avian bird, 123 ForAllSecure, 196 Forbes magazine, 202 Ford, Harrison, 121 480th ISR Wing, 54 FPGAs (field-programmable gate arrays), 180 France, 40, 76, 108, 158, 187 Frazier, Darnella, 143 Frederick, Kara, 105 French Presidential election, 2017, 122 future, uncertainty of, 276 G7 group, 76, 187 Gab, 149 Gabon, 134 Gadot, Gal, 121 Game Changer, 206 games and gaming, 43–51, 266–73; See also specific games game trees, 47–49 GANs (generative adversarial networks), 127, 133 GAO, See Government Accountability Office (GAO) Garcia, Dominic, 203 Gates, Bill, 159 Gato, 295 GDP (gross domestic product), 69f, 85, 85f GDPR, See General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) General Dynamics, 209, 212–13 generative adversarial networks (GANs), 127, 133 generative models, 125 genomics, 37 geopolitics, 129, 317 Germany, 12, 76, 107, 108, 158, 187 Gibson, John, 61 Gibson, William, 101, 102 Gizmodo, 120 Global AI Index, 15, 40 Global AI Vibrancy Tool, 319 go (game), 23, 47–48, 73, 180, 271, 275, 298 Golden Shield Project, 87 Goodfellow, Ian, 239 Google, 31, 32, 36, 57, 224, 294 and ASICs, 180 and Dragonfly, 339 Duplex, 121 Meena, 125 and Seven Sons of National Defense, 162 social app dominance, 143 and Trusted News Initiative, 139 work with Chinese researchers, 157, 392, 396 Google AI China Center, 62, 159, 167 Google Brain, 32, 294–96, 299 Google-Maven controversy, 22, 60–67 Google Photos, 64 Googleplex, 195 Google Translate, 234 Gorgon Stare, 53–55, 58 “Governance Principles for a New Generation of Artificial Intelligence,” 173 “Governance Principles for a New Generation of Artificial Intelligence: Develop Responsible Artificial Intelligence,” 172 Government Accountability Office (GAO), 195, 215, 217, 248 government contracting, 215–16, 222, 224–25 government-industry relationship, 95–96 government subsidies, 179–80 GPT-2 (language model), 20, 117–20, 122–25, 139, 294 GPT-3 (language model), 139, 294 GPUs (graphics processing units), 25, 28–29, 185, 296 Grace, Katja, 298 Great Britain, 191–92 Great Firewall, 62, 70, 102, 166 Great Gatsby, The (film), 130 Great Leap Forward, 85 Great Wall, 101 Greitens, Sheena, 105 Griffin, Michael, 200, 257 Guardian, The, 120, 148 Gulf War, 1991, 14, 219 HA/DR (humanitarian assistance/disaster relief), 201, 204 Hamad Bin Khalifa University, 142 Han Chinese, 81, 88 Harbin Institute of Technology, 161 hardware, computing, See compute Harvard University, 32 hashtags, 141 Hate Crimes in Cyberspace (Citron), 121 Heinrich, Martin, 37 Heritage Foundation, 105 Heron Systems in AlphaDogfight Trials, 1–2, 266, 272 background, 220–22 as defense start-up, 224 and real-world aircraft, 249–50 heuristics, 274 Hewlett Packard Enterprise, 157, 392 Hicks, Kathleen, 252 High-End Foreign Expert Recruitment Program, 33 Hikvision, 89, 91, 107, 156, 157, 353, 355, 389, 390 Hikvision Europe, 389 Himalayan border conflict, 75 Hindu, The, 139 Hinton, Geoffrey, 210 HiSilicon, 91 Hoffman, Samantha, 82, 98–99, 101, 102, 174 HoloLens, 160, 217 Honeywell, 162 Hong Kong, 75, 148, 175 Hoover Institution, 162 Horner, Chuck, 14 Howard, Philip, 141–42 Howell, Chuck, 250–51 Huawei, 29, 76, 88–89, 91, 92, 106–9, 169, 171, 182–85, 353, 354, 357, 409 Huawei France, 354 Huffman, Carter, 135–37 human cognition, 275 Human Genetics, 158 human intelligence, 284–85 humanitarian assistance/disaster relief (HA/DR), 201, 204 human-machine teaming, 263–64, 273, 276–86 human psychology, 274 human rights abuses, 63, 155, 158, 176–77 Human Rights Watch, 79, 81–82, 95, 170, 174 Hungary, 110 Hurd, Will, 39 Hurricane Dorian, 204 Husain, Amir, 66, 280 Hwang, Tim, 139, 323 hyperwar, 280 IARPA (Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity), 91, 246 IBM, 32, 109, 162, 215 IDG Capital, 157 IEC (International Electrotechnical Commission), 169 IEDs (improvised explosive devices), 45–46 IEEE (Institute for Electrical and Electronics Engineers), 171 iFLYTEK, 37, 91, 93–95, 104, 156, 157, 169 IJOP (Integrated Joint Operations Platform), 81–82 image classification systems, 64–65 image misclassification, 296 Imagen, 295 ImageNet, 19, 54, 210 image processing, 53–55, 58, 61 immigration policies, 33–34, 331 improvised explosive devices (IEDs), 45–46 iNaturalist, 211–12, 233 India, 75, 76, 108, 110, 187 bots, 142 in industrial revolution, 12–13 internet use, 22 industrial revolutions, 4–5, 11–13, 264–65 infant mortality, 85, 87f inference, 25, 180, 298 information processing, scale of, 269 information revolution, 14 insecure digital systems, 248 Institute for Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), 171 institutions, 35–40 Integrated Joint Operations Platform (IJOP), 81–82 Intel, 27, 29, 156, 162, 179, 181–82, 246, 390–91 intellectual property, 33, 71, 92, 163–64, 179 Intellifusion, 88, 156 intelligence, human, 284–85 intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR), 53–54 Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity (IARPA), 91, 246 intelligence analysis, 55 intelligentization of military, 37, 53, 222, 265 intelligentization of surveillance systems, 88 Intelligent Systems Center, 238, 247–48 Intelligent Trial System, 95 Intelligent UAV Swarm System Challenge, 36 international cooperation, 76 International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC), 169 International Organization for Standardization (ISO), 169 international stability, 286–93 international standard-setting, 169–71 International Telecommunication Union (ITU), 169 internet in China, 87, 92, 97, 99 data capacity of, 18 usage, 22 IP Commission, 164 iPhone encryption, 174 Iran, 142 Iraq, 45–46, 58, 253, 255–56 ISIS, 58, 63 ISO (International Organization for Standardization), 169 ISR (intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance), 53–54 Israel, 187, 278 IS’Vision, 156 Italy, 76, 108, 187 ITU (International Telecommunication Union), 169–70 JAIC (Joint AI Center), 35, 66, 200–208, 214, 289 jamming and anti-jamming strategies, 50 Japan, 27, 76, 108, 158, 181–82, 187 JASON scientific advisory group, 251 Javorsek, Dan “Animal,” 3, 230 jaywalking, 99 JEDI (Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure), 61, 214–18, 224 Jennings, Peter, 143 Johansson, Scarlett, 121, 130 Johns Hopkins University, 223 Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, 238, 247 Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (JEDI), 61, 214–18, 224 “Joint Pledge on Artificial Intelligence Industry Self-Discipline,” 172 Jones, Marc Owen, 142 Jordan, 109 Joske, Alex, 158 Kania, Elsa, 36, 96, 222–24 Kasparov, Garry, 275 Katie Jones (fake persona), 131 Kaufhold, John, 209, 213 Kazakhstan, 108, 155–56 Keegan, John, 443 Ke Jie, 73 Kelly, Kevin, 4 Kelly, Robin, 39 Kennedy, Paul, 12, 13 Kenya, 107 Kernan, Joseph, 200 Kessel Run, 214 KFC, 92 KGB, 122 Khan, Saif, 185–86, 298 Khashoggi, Jamal, 141–42 kill chain, 263 Kim Jong-un, 131 King’s College London, 273 Kingsoft, 160 Kocher, Gabriel “Gab707,” 230 Komincz, Grzegorz “MaNa,” 270 Kovrig, Michael, 177 Krizhevsky, Alex, 210 Kuwait, 46 Lamppost-as-a-Platform, 107 language models, 20, 118–20, 124–25, 232, 234, 294; See also GPT-2; GPT-3; OpenAI Laos, 108 Laskai, Lorand, 96 Laszuk, Danika, 128, 140 Latvia, 108 Lawrence, Jennifer, 130 laws and regulations, 111–13 “blade runner,” 121–22, 170 data privacy, 21–22, 111–12, 170–71, 174–77 facial recognition, 113 and Microsoft, 111 for surveillance, 108–9 learning, unintended, 234 learning hacks, 234–35 Lebanon, 109 Lee, Kai-Fu, 22 Lee, Peter, 165, 167 legal reviews, 259 Le Monde, 108 Les, Jason, 46, 48 lethal autonomous weapons, 286 “liar’s dividend,” 130 Li Bin, 291 Libratus, 43–51, 266–67, 271 Libya, 109 Li Chijiang, 290–91 life expectancy, 85, 86f Li, Fei-Fei, 62 Lin Ji, 93–95, 104 Liu Fan, 393–94 LinkedIn, 131 lip-syncing, 130–31 lithography, extreme ultraviolet (EUV), 181 Liu He, 76 Liu Qingfeng, 156 Llorens, Ashley, 248, 249 Lockheed Martin, 1, 57, 211 London, 109 Long Kun, 291 long-term planning, 270 Lord, Ellen, 217 Lucky, Palmer, 66 Luo, Kevin, 161 Machine Intelligence Research Institute (MIRI), 298 machine learning and compute, 25–26, 32, 296–97 failure modes, 64, 232–33, 236–39, 243–44, 246–49 at Heron Systems, 220–21 opacity of algorithms, 145 and synthetic media, 127, 139 training data for, 202–5, 230 and voice synthesis, 137 at West Point, 194–95 MacroPolo, 30 Made in China 2025, 37, 183 Malaysia, 106 Management Action Group, 56 maneuver warfare, 442 Manhattan Project, 297 Mao Zedong, 85, 97 Marines, 231 marriage, coerced, 81 Martin, Rachael, 206 Martin Aspen (fake persona), 131 Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), 31, 156, 157, 165, 233 Mattis, Jim, 53, 61, 197, 209, 215, 280 MAVLab (Micro Air Vehicle Lab), 250–52 Max Planck Society, 158, 393 McAulay, Daniel, 267 McCord, Brendan, 52, 56–57, 200 McKinsey, 25 McKinsey Global Institute, 72–73 McNair, Lesley, 192 McQuade, Michael, 66 media, AI-generated, 118–20 media conferences, 109 Meena, 125 Megatron-Turing NLG, 20, 294 Megvii, 88–89, 156, 160, 212, 353, 354, 357, 388 Memorandum of Understanding Regarding the Rules of Behavior for Safety of Air and Maritime Encounters, 292 Meng Wanzhou, 177 Merrill Lynch, 162 Meta, 22, 143, 296 metrics, 320 Mexico, 107 Michel, Arthur Holland, 54 Micron, 182 Microsoft, 294 China presence, 159 and computer vision, 57 and cyberattacks, 246–47 deepfake detection, 132, 138–39 and Department of Defense, 36, 62, 66, 215–17, 224–25 digital watermarks, 138 and facial recognition, 23, 111 financial backing of AI, 296–97 funding, 296 and Google-Maven controversy, 62, 66 and government regulation, 111 and ImageNet, 54 Megatron-Turing NLG, 20, 294 and OpenAI, 26 revenue, 297 and Seven Sons of National Defense, 162 and Trusted News Initiative, 139 work with Chinese researchers, 157, 393, 396 Microsoft Research, 31, 167 Microsoft Research Asia, 157–63, 165–67 Microsoft’s Asia-Pacific R&D Group, 161 Middlebury Institute, 124 military AI adoption, 35–37, 219–26 applications, 191–94 military capabilities, 47 military-civil fusion, 5, 95, 161–63 military competition, 304 military forces cognitization, 265 military organization, 278–79 military power, potential, 13 military tactics, future, 277 Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, 87 Ministry of Public Security, 87, 89–90, 158 Ministry of Public Security (MPS), 95 Ministry of Science and Technology, 172, 173 Minneapolis police, 143 minority identification technology, 88–89 “Minority Report, The” (Dick), 81 MIRI (Machine Intelligence Research Institute), 298 Missile Defense Agency, 218 MIT, See Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) MITRE, 250 MIT-SenseTime Alliance on Artificial Intelligence, 156 MIT Technology Review, 93, 159 mobile devices, 18 Mock, Justin “Glock,” 2 model inversion attacks, 247 Modulate, 135–36, 138 monitoring and security checkpoints, 80 Moore’s law, 26, 28, 325 Morocco, 109 Mozur, Paul, 101, 102 MPS Key Lab of Intelligent Voice Technology, 95 MQ-9 Reaper, 53 Mulchandani, Nand, 207, 214, 217 multimodal models, 295–96 multiparty game theory, 50 mutism, 128 Mutsvangwa, Christopher, 105 NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration), 40, 72, 220 national AI research cloud, 32 National Artificial Intelligence Initiative Act of 2020, 32 National Artificial Intelligence Research Resource, 32 National Defense Education Act, 33 National Defense Strategy, 52 National Development and Reform Commission, 88 National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA), 56 National Institute of Standards and Technology, 40 National Institutes of Health, 40 National Instruments, 162 National Intelligence Law, 95, 174 National New Generation Artificial Intelligence Governance Expert Committee, 172 National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), 40, 204 national power, 13, 318 National Robotics Engineering Center (NREC), 193 National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity, 123 National Science Foundation, 40 National Security Agency, 216 National Security Commission on AI, 33, 39, 73, 186, 250, 252, 258 National Security Law, 95, 174 national security vulnerabilities, 239 National University of Defense Technology (NUDT), 157, 161 NATO, 287 natural language processing, 206 Nature (journal), 123 nature of war, 280–84 Naval Air Station Patuxent River, 220 Naval Research Laboratory, 162 Naval War College, 219 negative G turns, 249 Netherlands, 158, 181, 187 NetPosa, 156, 391 Neural Information Processing Systems, 232 neural networks, 19f, 25 applications, 54 badnets, 246 and Deep Learning Analytics, 210 explainability, 236–37 failure modes, 232–34, 250 and Heron Systems, 220 training, 19 NeurIPS, 30 Neuromancer (Gibson), 101 “New Generation Artificial Intelligence Development Plan,” 71, 169 New H3C Technologies, 157 “new oil,” 11–17 news articles, bot-generated, 118 new technologies, 255–56 new technologies, best use of, 191–92 New York Times, 31, 118, 125, 138, 290 NGA (National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency), 56 Nieman Journalism Lab, 145 1984 (Orwell), 97–98, 103 NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology), 91 Nixon, Richard, and administration, 68 NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration), 40, 204 Nokia Bell Labs, 157 Normandy, France, 46 North Korea, 50, 117–18 Northrop Grumman, 57, 211, 216 NREC (National Robotics Engineering Center), 193 nuclear war, 288 nuclear weapons, 11, 50 NUDT (National University of Defense Technology), 157, 161 NVIDIA, 20, 28–29, 32, 120, 156, 246, 294, 390–91 Obama, Barack, and administration, 70, 71, 73, 137 object recognition and classification, 55–58 Office of Inspector General (OIG), 216 Office of Naval Research, 157 Office of Responsible AI, 159 Office of Technology Assessment, 162 OIG (Office of Inspector General), 216 oil, 20–21; See also “new oil” 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, 207 OpenAI, 26, 117–20, 122–25, 272, 294, 295–97, 299; See also GPT-2 (language model); GPT-3 (language model) OpenAI Five, 268, 270–71 Operation RYaN, 445; See also RYaN; VRYAN Oracle, 215–18, 224 Orwell, George, 97–98, 103 Osprey tiltrotor aircraft, 255 O’Sullivan, Liz, 60–61, 63, 65 OTA (other transaction authority), 217 outcomes of AI, 299–301 of war, 282–83 Owen, Laura Hazard, 145 Oxford Internet Institute, 141 Pakistan, 107, 142 Palantir, 109 PaLM, 294–95 Pan, Tim, 160, 161, 163 Papernot, Nicolas, 239 Pappas, Mike, 135–38, 140 Paredes, Federico, 250 Parler, 149 Partnership on AI, 132 patches, adversarial, 241–42, 242f Patrini, Giorgio, 130, 132–34, 137, 140 Patriot air and missile defense system, 253 Payne, Kenneth, 273–74 Pelosi, Nancy, 76, 128 Pence, Mike, 295 pension funds, 157 People’s Liberation Army (PLA); See also military-civil fusion affiliated companies, 166–67 and drone pilots, 222–23 researchers funded by, 158, 164 Percent Corporation, 107 Percipient.AI, 224 Perimeter, 289; See also Dead Hand Persian Gulf War, 46, 318 Personal Information Protection Law, 174, 176 pharmaceuticals, 251 phenotyping, DNA, 90 Philippines, 109 phones, 89 phone scanners, 89 photoresist, 182 phylogenic tree, 211 physical adversarial attacks, 242f, 243f, 429 Pichai, Sundar, 62 Pittsburgh, Pa., 44, 193 Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center, 44 PLA, See People’s Liberation Army Pluribus, 50, 51 poisonous animal recognition, 211 poker, 43–44, 46–48, 50, 266–67, 269–73, 335 Poland, 108 Police Audio Intelligent Service Platform, 95 Police Cloud, 89–90 policy analysis, automated, 206 Politiwatch, 124 pornography, 121, 130 Portman, Rob, 37 Poseidon, 289; See also Status-6 post-disaster assessment, 204 power metrics, 13 Prabhakar, Arati, 210 prediction systems, 287–88 predictive maintenance, 196–97, 201 Price, Colin “Farva,” 3 Primer (company), 224 Princeton University, 156, 157 Project Maven, 35–36, 52–53, 56–59, 194, 202, 205, 224; See also Google-Maven controversy Project Origin, 138 Project Voltron, 195–99 Putin, Vladimir, 9, 131, 304–5 Q*bert, 235 Quad summit, 76 Qualcomm Ventures, 157 Quantum Integrity, 132 quantum technology, 37 “rabbit hole” effect, 145 race to the bottom on safety, 286, 289, 304 radar, synthetic aperture, 210 Rahimi, Ali, 232 Raj, Devaki, 202, 207, 213, 224 Rambo (fictional character), 130 RAND Corporation, 252 ranking in government strategy, 40 Rao, Delip, 120, 123 Rather, Dan, 143 Raytheon, 211 reaction times, 272–73 real-time computer strategy games, 267–69 real-world battlefield environments, 264 situations, 230–36 Rebellion Defense, 224 Reddit, 140 reeducation, 81 Reface app, 130 reinforcement learning, 221, 232, 243, 250 repression, 81, 175–77 research and development funding, 35–39, 36f, 38f, 39f, 333–34 Research Center for AI Ethics and Safety, 172 Research Center for Brain-Inspired Intelligence, 172 research communities, 327 responsible AI guidelines, 252 Responsible Artificial Intelligence Strategy, 252 résumé-sorting model, 234 Reuters, 95, 139 Rise and Fall of the Great Powers, The (Kennedy), 12 risk, 271, 290–93 robotic nuclear delivery systems, 289 robotic process automation tools, 206 robotic vehicles, 266 robots, 92–94, 265–66, 286 Rockwell Automation, 162 Rockwell Collins, 193 Romania, 108 Root, Phil, 231 Roper, Will, 55–56, 214, 224, 225, 257 Rubik’s cube, 26 rule-based AI systems, 230, 236 Rumsfeld, Donald, 61 Russia, 12, 40, 52, 108, 110 bots, 142 cyberattacks of, 246 disinformation, 122 invasion of Ukraine, 129, 196, 219, 288 nuclear capabilities, 50 submarines, 255 Rutgers University Big Data Laboratory, 156 RYaN (computer program), 287, 445; See also Operation RYaN; VRYAN safe city technology, 107–8 safety of AI, 286, 289, 304 Samsung, 27–29, 179, 181 Sandholm, Tuomas, 43–51 Sasse, Ben, 184 satellite imagery, 56 Saudi Arabia, 40, 107, 109, 141–42 Scale AI, 224 scaling of innovation, 224 Schatz, Brian, 37 schedule pressures, 254–55 Schmidt, Eric, 39, 40, 71–73, 150, 164–65 Schumer, Chuck, 39 Science (journal), 123 Seagate, 156, 390 security applications, 110–11, 315 security dilemma, 50–51, 289 Sedol, Lee, 23, 266, 274–75, 298 self-driving cars, 23, 65 semiconductor industry; See also semiconductors in China, 178–79 chokepoints, 180–81 export controls, 181–86 global chokepoints in, 178–87 globalization of, 27–29 international strategy, 186–87 in Japan, 179 supply chains, 26, 76, 300 in U.S., 179–80 Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation (SMIC), 178, 181, 184 semiconductor(s) fabrication of, 32 foundries, 27–28 improvements in, 325 manufacturing equipment, 179 market, 27 as strategic asset, 300 Seminar on Cyberspace Management, 108–9 SenseNets, 91, 156, 357 SenseTime, 37, 88–89, 91, 156, 160, 169, 353–54, 357, 388 SensingTech, 88 Sensity, 130–33 Sentinel, 132 Sequoia, 157 Serbia, 107, 110 Serelay, 138 servicemember deaths, 255 Seven Sons of National Defense, 161–62 “shallow fakes,” 129 Shanahan, Jack on automated nuclear launch, 289 on international information sharing, 258, 291–92 and JAIC, 66, 201, 203, 205–6, 214 and Project Maven, 57–58 on risks, 254, 256 Sharp Eyes, 88, 91 Shenzhen, China, 37 Shield AI, 66, 196, 222, 224 shortcuts, 254–56 Silk Road, 110 SIM cards, 80, 89 Singapore, 106, 107, 158 singularity in warfare, 279–80 Skyeye, 99 Skynet, 87–88, 90, 91 Slashdot, 120 Slate, 120 smartphones, 26, 80 SMIC (Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation), 178, 181, 184 Smith, Brad, 159, 163, 166, 167 social app dominance, 149–50 social credit system, 99–100 social governance, 97–104 social media, 126, 141–51 socio-technical problems, 65 soft power, 317 SOFWERX (Special Operations Forces Works), 214 SolarWinds, 246 South Africa, 107 South China Sea militarization, 71, 74 South Korea, 27, 40, 182, 185, 187 Soviet Union, 287, 289, 447 Spain, 40, 107 SparkCognition, 66, 224 Spavor, Michael, 177 Special Operations Command, 218 Special Operations Forces Works (SOFWERX), 214 speech recognition, 91 “Spider-Man neuron,” 295 Springer Nature, 158 Sputnik, 33, 71–72 Stability AI, 125, 295 stability, international, 286–93 Stable Diffusion, 125, 139, 295 Stallone, Sylvester, 130 Stanford Internet Observatory, 139 Stanford University, 31, 32, 57, 162 Starbucks, 92 StarCraft, 180, 298 StarCraft II, 267, 271, 441 Status-6, 289; See also Poseidon Steadman, Kenneth A., 192 STEM talent, 30–34 sterilization and abortion, 81 Strategic Capabilities Office, 56 strategic reasoning, 49 Strategy Robot, 44–45, 49, 51 Strike Hard Campaign, 79–80 Stuxnet, 283 subsidies, government, 179–80 Sullivan, Jake, 186 Sun Tzu, 45 superhuman attentiveness, 269–70 superhuman precision, 270 superhuman reaction time, 277 superhuman speed, 269, 271 supervised learning, 232 supply chain(s), 300 attacks, 246 global, 76, 179, 183 “Surprising Creativity of Digital Evolution, The,” 235 surveillance, 79–90 cameras, 6, 86–87, 91 laws and policies for, 108–9 throughout China, 84–90 in Xinjiang, 79–83 Sutskever, Ilya, 210 Sutton, Rich, 299, 455 swarms and swarming, 277–79 autonomous systems, 50, 220 demonstrations, 257 Sweden, 108, 158, 187 Switch-C, 294 Synopsys, 162 synthetic aperture radar, 210 synthetic media, 127–34, 138–39 criminal use, 128–29 deepfake detectors, 132–33 deepfake videos, 130–32 geopolitical risks, 129–30 watermarks, digital, 138–39 Syria, 58 system integration, 91 tactics and strategies, 270 Taiwan, 27, 71, 76, 100, 175, 178, 185–86 Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), 27–28, 179, 181, 184 Taiwan Strait, 71, 75–76 talent, 30–34, 304 Tang Kun, 393 tanks, 192 Tanzania, 109 targeting cycle, 263 target recognition, 210 Target Recognition and Adaptation in Contested Environments (TRACE), 210–12 Tay, chatbot, 247 TDP (thermal design power), 454 TechCrunch, 120 technical standards Chinese, 171–75 international, 169–71 techno-authoritarianism, 79–110, 169 China’s tech ecosystem, 91–96 global export of, 105–10, 106f social governance, 97–104 throughout China, 83–90 in Xinjiang, 79–83 technology ecosystem, Chinese, 91–96 platforms, 35 and power, 11 transfer, 33, 163–64 Tektronix, 162 Tencent, 37, 143, 160, 169, 172 Tensor Processing Unit (TPU), 180 Terregator, 193 Tesla, 65, 180 TEVV (test and evaluation, verification and validation), 251–52 Texas Instruments, 162 text generation, 117–21, 123 text-to-image models, 125, 295 Thailand, 107, 109 thermal design power (TDP), 454 Third Offset Strategy, 53, 61 “Thirteenth Five-Year Science and Technology Military-Civil Fusion Special Projects Plan,” 73 Thousand Talents Plan, 32, 164 “Three-Year Action Plan to Promote the Development of New-Generation AI Industry,” 73 Tiananmen Square massacre, 68, 97–98, 103, 148, 160, 341, 359 tic-tac-toe, 47, 336 TikTok, 146–49 Tortoise Market Research, Inc., 15, 40 TPU (Tensor Processing Unit), 180 TRACE (Target Recognition and Adaptation in Contested Environments), 210–12 Trade and Technology Council (TTC), 187 training costs, 296–97 training datasets, 19–23 attacks on, 238–40, 244–45 of drone footage, 203 “radioactive,” 139 real world environments, vs., 58, 64, 233, 264 size of, 294–96 transistor miniaturization, 28 transparency among nations, 258–59, 288 Treasury Department, 246 Trump, Donald, and administration; See also “Donald Trump neuron” budget cuts, 39–40 and COVID pandemic, 74 and Entity List, 166 GPT-2 fictitious texts of, 117–19 graduate student visa revocation, 164 and Huawei, 182–84 and JEDI contract, 215–16 national strategy for AI, 73 relations with China, 71 and TikTok, 147 Twitter account, 150 trust, 249–53 Trusted News Initiative, 138–39 “truth,” 130 Tsinghua University, 31, 93, 173, 291 TSMC, See Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) TTC (Trade and Technology Council), 187 Turkey, 107, 108, 110 Turkish language, 234 Twitter, 139–40, 142, 144, 149, 247 Uganda, 108, 109 Uighurs; See also Xinjiang, China facial recognition, 88–89, 158, 353–55 genocide, 79, 304 mass detention, 74, 79–81, 102, 175 speech recognition, 94 surveillance, 82, 155–56 Ukraine, 108, 129, 196, 219, 288 United Arab Emirates, 107, 109 United Kingdom, 12, 76, 108, 122, 158, 187, 191–92 United States AI policy, 187 AI research of, 30 Chinese graduate students in, 31 competitive AI strategy, 185 United States Presidential election, 2016, 122 United States Presidential election, 2020, 128, 131, 134, 150 University of Illinois, 157 University of Richmond, 123 Uniview, 89, 355 unsupervised learning, 232 Ürümqi, 80, 84 Ürümqi Cloud Computing Center, 156 U.S.

Picnic Comma Lightning: In Search of a New Reality by Laurence Scott

4chan, Airbnb, airport security, Apollo 11, augmented reality, Berlin Wall, Bernie Sanders, Black Lives Matter, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, Cambridge Analytica, clean water, colonial rule, crisis actor, cryptocurrency, deepfake, dematerialisation, Donald Trump, Elon Musk, fake news, Herbert Marcuse, housing crisis, Internet of things, Joan Didion, job automation, Jon Ronson, late capitalism, machine translation, Mark Zuckerberg, Narrative Science, Neil Armstrong, post-truth, Productivity paradox, QR code, ride hailing / ride sharing, Saturday Night Live, sentiment analysis, Silicon Valley, skeuomorphism, Skype, Slavoj Žižek, Snapchat, SoftBank, technological determinism, TED Talk, Y2K, you are the product

Our aim is therefore to establish a sustainable, shared hallucination – a social reality – that doesn’t elevate one set of fantasies at the expense of others. Just as each historical period constructs its shared realities in different ways, so too do the stresses on these realities alter with the times. Recent political events have certainly disrupted our belief in the viability of rational public discourse. The shock of the Brexit referendum occurred almost as soon as I began writing this book, after which it was immediately impossible to maintain a coherent estimate of the near future. The question and outcome of Brexit instantly flooded public life with the idea of fantasy. In the British media, this is a bipartisan phenomenon.

The New Rules of War: Victory in the Age of Durable Disorder by Sean McFate

Able Archer 83, active measures, anti-communist, barriers to entry, Berlin Wall, blood diamond, Boeing 747, Brexit referendum, cognitive dissonance, commoditize, computer vision, corporate governance, corporate raider, cuban missile crisis, disinformation, Donald Trump, double helix, drone strike, escalation ladder, European colonialism, failed state, fake news, false flag, hive mind, index fund, invisible hand, John Markoff, joint-stock company, military-industrial complex, moral hazard, mutually assured destruction, Nash equilibrium, nuclear taboo, offshore financial centre, pattern recognition, Peace of Westphalia, plutocrats, private military company, profit motive, RAND corporation, ransomware, Ronald Reagan, Silicon Valley, South China Sea, Steve Bannon, Stuxnet, Suez crisis 1956, technoutopianism, vertical integration, Washington Consensus, Westphalian system, yellow journalism, Yom Kippur War, zero day, zero-sum game

Then there are bots, programs that mimic trolls by the thousands and drown out legitimate content. The West has few defenses against this subversive blitzkrieg. The Troll Factory’s mission is to manipulate Western public opinion to serve Russian interests. For example, it dropped 45,000 garbage tweets on the United Kingdom during the final forty-eight hours of the Brexit referendum, and some believe it altered the close vote.4 Russia wants to explode the European Union, and Brexit could be the spark that ignites the fuse. Russia also likes to disrupt democracy. The CIA, the FBI, and the National Security Agency all agree with “high confidence” that Moscow tried to swing the 2016 US presidential election to Donald Trump.5 The Department of Justice investigation led by special counsel Robert Mueller has found evidence for this, charging thirteen Russians and three Russian companies, including the Internet Research Agency, of having “a strategic goal to sow discord in the U.S. political system, including the 2016 U.S. presidential election.”6 Congressional hearings, multiple investigations, media inquiries, public outrage, and White House scandal has frenzied the country ever since, as Putin chuckles.

Empty Planet: The Shock of Global Population Decline by Darrell Bricker, John Ibbitson

"World Economic Forum" Davos, affirmative action, agricultural Revolution, Berlin Wall, Black Lives Matter, Brexit referendum, BRICs, British Empire, Columbian Exchange, commoditize, demographic dividend, demographic transition, Deng Xiaoping, Donald Trump, en.wikipedia.org, full employment, gender pay gap, gentrification, ghettoisation, glass ceiling, global reserve currency, Great Leap Forward, Gunnar Myrdal, Hans Rosling, Hernando de Soto, illegal immigration, income inequality, James Watt: steam engine, Jeff Bezos, John Snow's cholera map, Kibera, knowledge worker, labor-force participation, Mark Zuckerberg, megacity, New Urbanism, nuclear winter, off grid, offshore financial centre, out of africa, Potemkin village, purchasing power parity, reserve currency, Ronald Reagan, Silicon Valley, South China Sea, statistical model, Steve Jobs, Steven Pinker, The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, Thomas Malthus, transcontinental railway, upwardly mobile, urban planning, working-age population, young professional, zero-sum game

France insists its immigrants embrace the idea of being French, even as many of the old stock deny such a thing is possible, leaving immigrant communities isolated in their banlieues, separate and not equal. The population of the United Kingdom is projected to continue growing, to about 82 million at the end of the century, from 66 million today, but only if the British continue to welcome robust levels of immigration. As the Brexit referendum revealed, many Brits want to turn the English Channel into a moat. To combat depopulation, nations must embrace both immigration and multiculturalism. The first is hard. The second, for some, may prove impossible. Among great powers, the coming population decline uniquely advantages the United States.

Restarting the Future: How to Fix the Intangible Economy by Jonathan Haskel, Stian Westlake

"Friedman doctrine" OR "shareholder theory", activist fund / activist shareholder / activist investor, Andrei Shleifer, Big Tech, Black Lives Matter, book value, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, business cycle, business process, call centre, Capital in the Twenty-First Century by Thomas Piketty, central bank independence, Charles Lindbergh, charter city, cloud computing, cognitive bias, cognitive load, congestion charging, coronavirus, corporate governance, COVID-19, creative destruction, cryptocurrency, David Graeber, decarbonisation, Diane Coyle, Dominic Cummings, Donald Shoup, Donald Trump, Douglas Engelbart, Douglas Engelbart, driverless car, Edward Glaeser, equity risk premium, Erik Brynjolfsson, Estimating the Reproducibility of Psychological Science, facts on the ground, financial innovation, Francis Fukuyama: the end of history, future of work, general purpose technology, gentrification, Goodhart's law, green new deal, housing crisis, income inequality, index fund, indoor plumbing, industrial cluster, inflation targeting, intangible asset, interchangeable parts, invisible hand, job-hopping, John Maynard Keynes: Economic Possibilities for our Grandchildren, Joseph Schumpeter, Kenneth Arrow, knowledge economy, knowledge worker, lockdown, low interest rates, low skilled workers, Marc Andreessen, market design, Martin Wolf, megacity, mittelstand, new economy, Occupy movement, oil shock, patent troll, Peter Thiel, Phillips curve, postindustrial economy, pre–internet, price discrimination, quantitative easing, QWERTY keyboard, remote working, rent-seeking, replication crisis, risk/return, Robert Gordon, Robert Metcalfe, Robert Shiller, Ronald Coase, Sam Peltzman, Second Machine Age, secular stagnation, shareholder value, Silicon Valley, six sigma, skeuomorphism, social distancing, superstar cities, the built environment, The Rise and Fall of American Growth, The Spirit Level, The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, Thorstein Veblen, total factor productivity, transaction costs, Tyler Cowen, Tyler Cowen: Great Stagnation, Uber for X, urban planning, We wanted flying cars, instead we got 140 characters, work culture , X Prize, Y2K

It also has its more bombastic version, in the form of what Lorenzo Castellani and Rowland Manthorpe call technopopulism.17 Castellani coined the term to describe an unusual aspect of Italy’s Five Star Movement: in Rome and other places, he saw populist politicians such as Virginia Raggi surrounding themselves not with like-minded Jacobins but rather with “functionaries, magistrates, academics, and other professionals, the likes of whom you would never see at a Five Star meet-up.” British readers will recognise something similar in the way that the Brexit referendum and British prime minister Boris Johnson’s 2019 election victory have led to a rather technocratic-sounding drive to reform the civil service, to greatly increase public R&D investment, and to reform research funding bodies. These initiatives are backed by Dominic Cummings, who served as chief adviser to Boris Johnson and was associated both with the populist Vote Leave campaign and with a technocratic, technophilic desire to reform British institutions.

Butler to the World: How Britain Became the Servant of Tycoons, Tax Dodgers, Kleptocrats and Criminals by Oliver Bullough

Alan Greenspan, Bellingcat, Big bang: deregulation of the City of London, Big Tech, bitcoin, Black Lives Matter, blockchain, Boris Johnson, Bretton Woods, Brexit referendum, British Empire, capital controls, coronavirus, COVID-19, crowdsourcing, cryptocurrency, cuban missile crisis, Downton Abbey, Etonian, financial deregulation, financial innovation, full employment, Global Witness, John Bercow, Julian Assange, light touch regulation, lockdown, Nixon triggered the end of the Bretton Woods system, offshore financial centre, race to the bottom, rent-seeking, Ronald Reagan, Shoshana Zuboff, Silicon Valley, Suez canal 1869, Suez crisis 1956, surveillance capitalism, the High Line, WikiLeaks

But that was a rare exception to the general governmental willingness to accept money from anywhere, which has so distinguished Britain since it got started in the butlering business. In 2020 Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee published a report on Russian influence in the UK. The report failed to gain as much attention as it deserved thanks in part to Prime Minister Boris Johnson dismissing it as an attempt to delegitimise the Brexit referendum. This was a shame because it was a thoughtful analysis of the kind of blind spot that has led Britain to accept money directly from Russian oligarchs, as well as from Russia-allied businessmen like Firtash, without looking into where it comes from. ‘The inherent tension between the government’s prosperity agenda and the need to protect national security that has led to the current situation has been played out across Whitehall departments,’ the report said.

The Art of Statistics: Learning From Data by David Spiegelhalter

Abraham Wald, algorithmic bias, Anthropocene, Antoine Gombaud: Chevalier de Méré, Bayesian statistics, Brexit referendum, Carmen Reinhart, Charles Babbage, complexity theory, computer vision, confounding variable, correlation coefficient, correlation does not imply causation, dark matter, data science, deep learning, DeepMind, Edmond Halley, Estimating the Reproducibility of Psychological Science, government statistician, Gregor Mendel, Hans Rosling, Higgs boson, Kenneth Rogoff, meta-analysis, Nate Silver, Netflix Prize, Northpointe / Correctional Offender Management Profiling for Alternative Sanctions, p-value, placebo effect, probability theory / Blaise Pascal / Pierre de Fermat, publication bias, randomized controlled trial, recommendation engine, replication crisis, self-driving car, seminal paper, sparse data, speech recognition, statistical model, sugar pill, systematic bias, TED Talk, The Design of Experiments, The Signal and the Noise by Nate Silver, The Wisdom of Crowds, Thomas Bayes, Thomas Malthus, Two Sigma

For example, how can we best communicate uncertainty about facts and the future without jeopardizing trust and credibility, and how can our techniques be tailored to audiences with different attitudes and knowledge? These are important and researchable questions. In addition, the dismal level of statistical debate in the UK Brexit referendum campaign suggests the need for research into different ways of communicating how policy decisions might impact society. Helping to Call Out Poor Practice Many individuals and groups have a role in identifying poor statistical practice, including referees of papers that have been submitted for publication, those conducting systematic reviews of published evidence, journalists and fact-checking organizations, and individual members of the public.

Alchemy: The Dark Art and Curious Science of Creating Magic in Brands, Business, and Life by Rory Sutherland

"World Economic Forum" Davos, 3D printing, Alfred Russel Wallace, barriers to entry, basic income, behavioural economics, Black Swan, Brexit referendum, butterfly effect, California gold rush, call centre, Captain Sullenberger Hudson, Cass Sunstein, cognitive dissonance, confounding variable, Daniel Kahneman / Amos Tversky, Dava Sobel, delayed gratification, Donald Trump, double helix, Downton Abbey, driverless car, Easter island, Edward Jenner, Elon Musk, Firefox, Ford Model T, General Magic , George Akerlof, gig economy, Google Chrome, Google X / Alphabet X, Grace Hopper, Hyperloop, Ignaz Semmelweis: hand washing, IKEA effect, information asymmetry, it is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it, James Dyson, John Harrison: Longitude, loss aversion, low cost airline, Mason jar, Murray Gell-Mann, nudge theory, Peter Thiel, placebo effect, race to the bottom, Richard Feynman, Richard Thaler, Rory Sutherland, shareholder value, Silicon Valley, social intelligence, Steve Jobs, supply-chain management, systems thinking, TED Talk, the map is not the territory, The Market for Lemons, The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, ultimatum game, universal basic income, Upton Sinclair, US Airways Flight 1549, Veblen good, work culture

Cause, context, meaning, emotion, effect. 1.18: The Overuse of Reason One explanation for why apparently logical arguments may be ineffectual at changing people’s minds, and why they should be treated with suspicion, is that it is simply too easy to generate them in the real world. As with ‘GPS logic’ it is possible to construct a plausible reason for any course of action, by cherry-picking the data you choose to include in your model and ignoring inconvenient facts. As I said earlier, the people who lost the Brexit referendum in the UK, and the Democrats who lost to Donald Trump in the US, both feel that their respective campaigns had the better arguments, but you would have to be a very committed Remainer or Democrat not to notice that the field in which they were prepared to argue in both cases was spectacularly narrow.

The Classical School by Callum Williams

"Friedman doctrine" OR "shareholder theory", bank run, banking crisis, basic income, Brexit referendum, British Empire, Capital in the Twenty-First Century by Thomas Piketty, Carmen Reinhart, Charles Babbage, complexity theory, Corn Laws, David Ricardo: comparative advantage, death from overwork, deindustrialization, Donald Trump, double entry bookkeeping, falling living standards, Fellow of the Royal Society, full employment, Gini coefficient, Gordon Gekko, greed is good, helicopter parent, income inequality, invisible hand, Jevons paradox, John Maynard Keynes: technological unemployment, Joseph Schumpeter, Kenneth Arrow, Kenneth Rogoff, land reform, low skilled workers, Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Wolf, means of production, Meghnad Desai, minimum wage unemployment, Modern Monetary Theory, new economy, New Journalism, non-tariff barriers, Paul Samuelson, Post-Keynesian economics, purchasing power parity, Ronald Coase, secular stagnation, Silicon Valley, spinning jenny, The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, Thomas Malthus, universal basic income

Arrow’s theorem explains, in the words of Larry Summers, a former US treasury secretary, “why committees have so much trouble coming to consistent conclusions and why, with an increasingly polarised electorate, democracy can become increasingly dysfunctional”. These may sound like extreme statements. But it turns out that Condorcet’s paradox has some real-world applications. Following Britain’s Brexit referendum of 2016 there was a lively discussion about whether Britain was living in the middle of a Condorcet paradox. The Brexit debate boiled down to three options: Remain, Soft Brexit, or Hard Brexit. Here is where it gets complicated. None of these three options could beat the other two combined. A coalition of hard and soft Brexit beat Remain in the 2016 referendum.

The Art of Statistics: How to Learn From Data by David Spiegelhalter

Abraham Wald, algorithmic bias, Antoine Gombaud: Chevalier de Méré, Bayesian statistics, Brexit referendum, Carmen Reinhart, Charles Babbage, complexity theory, computer vision, confounding variable, correlation coefficient, correlation does not imply causation, dark matter, data science, deep learning, DeepMind, Edmond Halley, Estimating the Reproducibility of Psychological Science, government statistician, Gregor Mendel, Hans Rosling, Higgs boson, Kenneth Rogoff, meta-analysis, Nate Silver, Netflix Prize, Northpointe / Correctional Offender Management Profiling for Alternative Sanctions, p-value, placebo effect, probability theory / Blaise Pascal / Pierre de Fermat, publication bias, randomized controlled trial, recommendation engine, replication crisis, self-driving car, seminal paper, sparse data, speech recognition, statistical model, sugar pill, systematic bias, TED Talk, The Design of Experiments, The Signal and the Noise by Nate Silver, The Wisdom of Crowds, Thomas Bayes, Thomas Malthus, Two Sigma

For example, how can we best communicate uncertainty about facts and the future without jeopardizing trust and credibility, and how can our techniques be tailored to audiences with different attitudes and knowledge? These are important and researchable questions. In addition, the dismal level of statistical debate in the UK Brexit referendum campaign suggests the need for research into different ways of communicating how policy decisions might impact society. Helping to Call Out Poor Practice Many individuals and groups have a role in identifying poor statistical practice, including referees of papers that have been submitted for publication, those conducting systematic reviews of published evidence, journalists and fact-checking organizations, and individual members of the public.

Winners Take All: The Elite Charade of Changing the World by Anand Giridharadas

"Friedman doctrine" OR "shareholder theory", "World Economic Forum" Davos, activist lawyer, affirmative action, Airbnb, benefit corporation, Bernie Sanders, bitcoin, Black Lives Matter, Boeing 747, Brexit referendum, Burning Man, Capital in the Twenty-First Century by Thomas Piketty, carried interest, cognitive dissonance, collective bargaining, corporate raider, corporate social responsibility, critical race theory, crowdsourcing, David Brooks, David Heinemeier Hansson, deindustrialization, disintermediation, do well by doing good, Donald Trump, Edward Snowden, Elon Musk, fake it until you make it, fake news, food desert, friendly fire, gentrification, global pandemic, high net worth, hiring and firing, housing crisis, Hyperloop, impact investing, income inequality, independent contractor, invisible hand, Jeff Bezos, Kevin Roose, Kibera, Kickstarter, land reform, Larry Ellison, Lyft, Marc Andreessen, Mark Zuckerberg, microaggression, new economy, Occupy movement, offshore financial centre, opioid epidemic / opioid crisis, Panopticon Jeremy Bentham, Parag Khanna, Paul Graham, Peter Thiel, plutocrats, profit maximization, public intellectual, risk tolerance, rolodex, Ronald Reagan, shareholder value, sharing economy, Sheryl Sandberg, side hustle, side project, Silicon Valley, Silicon Valley billionaire, Silicon Valley startup, Skype, social distancing, Social Responsibility of Business Is to Increase Its Profits, Steven Pinker, systems thinking, tech baron, TechCrunch disrupt, technoutopianism, TED Talk, The Chicago School, The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid, the High Line, The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, Thomas L Friedman, too big to fail, Travis Kalanick, trickle-down economics, Two Sigma, Uber and Lyft, uber lyft, Upton Sinclair, Vilfredo Pareto, Virgin Galactic, work culture , working poor, zero-sum game

I carry the passports of two countries, and most of my friends here are non-U.S.-born.” So one might have expected Rodrik to recoil, as so many of the globalists did, when Theresa May, the British prime minister, smeared “citizens of the world” shortly after coming to power in the choppy wake of the Brexit referendum. “Today,” she said, too many people in positions of power behave as though they have more in common with international elites than with the people down the road, the people they employ, the people they pass on the street. But if you believe you are a citizen of the world, you are a citizen of nowhere.

Red Flags: Why Xi's China Is in Jeopardy by George Magnus

"World Economic Forum" Davos, 3D printing, 9 dash line, Admiral Zheng, AlphaGo, Asian financial crisis, autonomous vehicles, balance sheet recession, banking crisis, Bear Stearns, Bretton Woods, Brexit referendum, BRICs, British Empire, business process, capital controls, carbon footprint, Carmen Reinhart, cloud computing, colonial exploitation, corporate governance, crony capitalism, currency manipulation / currency intervention, currency peg, demographic dividend, demographic transition, Deng Xiaoping, Doha Development Round, Donald Trump, financial deregulation, financial innovation, financial repression, fixed income, floating exchange rates, full employment, general purpose technology, Gini coefficient, global reserve currency, Great Leap Forward, high net worth, high-speed rail, hiring and firing, Hyman Minsky, income inequality, industrial robot, information security, Internet of things, invention of movable type, Joseph Schumpeter, Kenneth Rogoff, Kickstarter, labour market flexibility, labour mobility, land reform, Malacca Straits, means of production, megacity, megaproject, middle-income trap, Minsky moment, money market fund, moral hazard, non-tariff barriers, Northern Rock, offshore financial centre, old age dependency ratio, open economy, peer-to-peer lending, pension reform, price mechanism, purchasing power parity, regulatory arbitrage, rent-seeking, reserve currency, rising living standards, risk tolerance, Shenzhen special economic zone , smart cities, South China Sea, sovereign wealth fund, special drawing rights, special economic zone, speech recognition, The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, total factor productivity, trade route, urban planning, vertical integration, Washington Consensus, women in the workforce, working-age population, zero-sum game

First, the simplest way of addressing labour or skill shortages is to import them – that is, immigration. Generally speaking, though, there is only a handful of countries with immigration rates that come close to having a material effect on sustaining the WAP. It includes the US, Canada and Australia, France and the pre-Brexit-referendum UK. The political climate for immigration, though, has turned markedly more hostile, and coupled with a historical opposition to immigration in many countries, including China, other coping mechanisms have better potential. Second, we can try and compensate for the weakness in the WAP by encouraging people who are generally under-represented at work to go to work, or stay on.

Nervous States: Democracy and the Decline of Reason by William Davies

active measures, Affordable Care Act / Obamacare, Amazon Web Services, Anthropocene, bank run, banking crisis, basic income, Black Lives Matter, Brexit referendum, business cycle, Cambridge Analytica, Capital in the Twenty-First Century by Thomas Piketty, citizen journalism, Climategate, Climatic Research Unit, Colonization of Mars, continuation of politics by other means, creative destruction, credit crunch, data science, decarbonisation, deep learning, DeepMind, deindustrialization, digital divide, discovery of penicillin, Dominic Cummings, Donald Trump, drone strike, Elon Musk, failed state, fake news, Filter Bubble, first-past-the-post, Frank Gehry, gig economy, government statistician, housing crisis, income inequality, Isaac Newton, Jeff Bezos, Jeremy Corbyn, Johannes Kepler, Joseph Schumpeter, knowledge economy, loss aversion, low skilled workers, Mahatma Gandhi, Mark Zuckerberg, mass immigration, meta-analysis, Mont Pelerin Society, mutually assured destruction, Northern Rock, obamacare, Occupy movement, opioid epidemic / opioid crisis, Paris climate accords, pattern recognition, Peace of Westphalia, Peter Thiel, Philip Mirowski, planetary scale, post-industrial society, post-truth, quantitative easing, RAND corporation, Ray Kurzweil, Richard Florida, road to serfdom, Robert Mercer, Ronald Reagan, sentiment analysis, Silicon Valley, Silicon Valley billionaire, Silicon Valley startup, smart cities, Social Justice Warrior, statistical model, Steve Bannon, Steve Jobs, tacit knowledge, the scientific method, Turing machine, Uber for X, universal basic income, University of East Anglia, Valery Gerasimov, W. E. B. Du Bois, We are the 99%, WikiLeaks, women in the workforce, zero-sum game

In the 2016 presidential election, Donald Trump won 2,584 counties to Hillary Clinton’s 472, but those counties that voted for Clinton account for 64% of American GDP.10 Britain has a similar story to tell, with the most extreme geographic polarization of rich and poor regions of any nation in western Europe, contributing directly to the outcome of the 2016 Brexit referendum. Output per head in West London is eight times higher than it is in the Welsh Valleys, which was one of the most pro-Brexit regions.11 During the coalition government of 2010–15, median household wealth in London rose by 14%, while it fell by 8% in Yorkshire and on the Humber, areas that also featured strongly pro-Brexit votes.

Corbyn by Richard Seymour

anti-communist, banking crisis, battle of ideas, Bernie Sanders, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, British Empire, call centre, capital controls, capitalist realism, centre right, collective bargaining, credit crunch, Donald Trump, eurozone crisis, fake news, first-past-the-post, full employment, gender pay gap, gentrification, housing crisis, income inequality, Jeremy Corbyn, knowledge economy, land value tax, liberal world order, mass immigration, means of production, moral panic, Naomi Klein, negative equity, Neil Kinnock, new economy, non-tariff barriers, Northern Rock, Occupy movement, offshore financial centre, pension reform, Philip Mirowski, post-war consensus, precariat, quantitative easing, race to the bottom, rent control, Snapchat, stakhanovite, systematic bias, Washington Consensus, wealth creators, Winter of Discontent, Wolfgang Streeck, working-age population, éminence grise

He added the gloss, shared by UKIP, of blaming free movement for ‘a race to the bottom’ in living standards.3 The Left indeed looked weaker and more isolated as a result of the Brexit vote; Labour seemed aimless and adrift, and having recovered some of its lost core vote in the year before the decision, it began losing more seats than it won. The loss of the by-election in Copeland and the just-about-victory in Stoke, precipitated by two right-wing Labour MPs resigning, appeared to have seriously weakened the leadership. As with the independence referendum in Scotland, the Brexit referendum looked to have remoulded politics in England and Wales along nationalist lines. And immigration was the number-one issue. The Tories took a huge lead in national opinion polls, and it was predicted that with UKIP votes filtering back into the Conservative fold, many Labour majorities in traditional heartlands of the North, the West Midlands, and Wales would succumb to a blue tide.

The Tyranny of Merit: What’s Become of the Common Good? by Michael J. Sandel

affirmative action, Affordable Care Act / Obamacare, anti-communist, Berlin Wall, Bernie Sanders, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, Capital in the Twenty-First Century by Thomas Piketty, centre right, coronavirus, COVID-19, Credit Default Swap, Deng Xiaoping, Donald Trump, ending welfare as we know it, facts on the ground, Fall of the Berlin Wall, financial deregulation, financial engineering, financial innovation, global supply chain, helicopter parent, High speed trading, immigration reform, income inequality, Khan Academy, laissez-faire capitalism, meritocracy, meta-analysis, Nate Silver, new economy, obamacare, Occupy movement, open immigration, Paris climate accords, plutocrats, prosperity theology / prosperity gospel / gospel of success, Rishi Sunak, Ronald Reagan, smart grid, social distancing, Steve Jobs, Steven Levy, the market place, The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, W. E. B. Du Bois, Washington Consensus, Yochai Benkler

One of the deepest political divides in American politics today is between those with and those without a college degree. In the 2016 election, Trump won two-thirds of white voters without a college degree, while Hillary Clinton won decisively among voters with advanced degrees. A similar divide appeared in Britain’s Brexit referendum. Voters with no college education voted overwhelming for Brexit, while the vast majority of those with a postgraduate degree voted to remain. 9 Reflecting on her presidential campaign a year and a half later, Hillary Clinton displayed the meritocratic hubris that contributed to her defeat. “I won the places that represent two-thirds of America’s gross domestic product,” she told a conference in Mumbai, India, in 2018.

The Coming of Neo-Feudalism: A Warning to the Global Middle Class by Joel Kotkin

"RICO laws" OR "Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations", "World Economic Forum" Davos, Admiral Zheng, Alvin Toffler, Andy Kessler, autonomous vehicles, basic income, Bernie Sanders, Big Tech, bread and circuses, Brexit referendum, call centre, Capital in the Twenty-First Century by Thomas Piketty, carbon credits, carbon footprint, Cass Sunstein, clean water, company town, content marketing, Cornelius Vanderbilt, creative destruction, data science, deindustrialization, demographic transition, deplatforming, don't be evil, Donald Trump, driverless car, edge city, Elon Musk, European colonialism, Evgeny Morozov, financial independence, Francis Fukuyama: the end of history, Future Shock, gentrification, gig economy, Gini coefficient, Google bus, Great Leap Forward, green new deal, guest worker program, Hans Rosling, Herbert Marcuse, housing crisis, income inequality, informal economy, Jane Jacobs, Jaron Lanier, Jeff Bezos, Jeremy Corbyn, job automation, job polarisation, job satisfaction, Joseph Schumpeter, land reform, liberal capitalism, life extension, low skilled workers, Lyft, Marc Benioff, Mark Zuckerberg, market fundamentalism, Martin Wolf, mass immigration, megacity, Michael Shellenberger, Nate Silver, new economy, New Urbanism, Northpointe / Correctional Offender Management Profiling for Alternative Sanctions, Occupy movement, Parag Khanna, Peter Thiel, plutocrats, post-industrial society, post-work, postindustrial economy, postnationalism / post nation state, precariat, profit motive, public intellectual, RAND corporation, Ray Kurzweil, rent control, Richard Florida, road to serfdom, Robert Gordon, Salesforce, Sam Altman, San Francisco homelessness, Satyajit Das, sharing economy, Sidewalk Labs, Silicon Valley, smart cities, Social Justice Warrior, Steve Jobs, Stewart Brand, superstar cities, technological determinism, Ted Nordhaus, The Death and Life of Great American Cities, The future is already here, The Future of Employment, The Rise and Fall of American Growth, Thomas L Friedman, too big to fail, trade route, Travis Kalanick, Uber and Lyft, uber lyft, universal basic income, unpaid internship, upwardly mobile, Virgin Galactic, We are the 99%, Wolfgang Streeck, women in the workforce, work culture , working-age population, Y Combinator

If the media and most high-level government and business leaders in Europe have an “anywhere” perspective, people in less cosmopolitan precincts outside the capital cities tend to remain more strongly tied to national identities, local communities, religion and tradition. These divisions were particularly evident in the vote on Brexit and the Conservative sweep in 2019.32 The “somewhere” sentiment has repeatedly been expressed in votes concerning the European Union. In addition to the Brexit referendum of 2016, French, Danish, and Dutch voters have opted against deeper or broader EU ties, preferring a stronger national “somewhere.” Less than 10 percent of EU residents identify themselves as Europeans first, and 51 percent favor a more powerful nation-state, while only 35 percent want power in Brussels to be increased.33 As long as the political and economic elites ignore these preferences, populist rebellions against establishment parties will likely continue and could become more disruptive.

The Miracle Pill by Peter Walker

active transport: walking or cycling, agricultural Revolution, autonomous vehicles, Boris Johnson, Brexit referendum, call centre, car-free, Coronary heart disease and physical activity of work, coronavirus, COVID-19, driverless car, experimental subject, James Watt: steam engine, Kickstarter, lockdown, longitudinal study, meta-analysis, randomized controlled trial, Sidewalk Labs, social distancing, Stop de Kindermoord, the built environment, Traffic in Towns by Colin Buchanan, twin studies, Wall-E, washing machines reduced drudgery

The authors did note that this particular set of figures could be higher than the US average because around half the data was collected in the chillingly named Stroke Belt, a collection of southeastern states including Alabama, Kentucky, Tennessee and North and South Carolina which suffer particularly high rates of both strokes and early death, something closely connected to poverty levels as well as inactive, sedentary living.10 For all that the idea of active applause made me think about sitting down, it’s fair to say it still didn’t make much of an immediate dent in my behaviour. Soon after learning about it, I moved into the specialism of political journalism. This was in the aftermath of the UK’s Brexit referendum, a period involving two general elections, two changes of prime minister and near-constant drama and chaos. It certainly felt to me like I was spending a long time sitting in my office chair, typing up the latest developments. But how long? So, again, I decided to become my own research subject.

100 Years of Identity Crisis: Culture War Over Socialisation by Frank Furedi

1960s counterculture, 23andMe, Abraham Maslow, behavioural economics, Brexit referendum, Cass Sunstein, classic study, coronavirus, COVID-19, Donald Trump, epigenetics, Greta Thunberg, Gunnar Myrdal, Herbert Marcuse, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, knowledge worker, libertarian paternalism, lockdown, New Urbanism, nocebo, nudge theory, nudge unit, scientific management, the scientific method, Thorstein Veblen, work culture

The authors of the first book to refer to identity politics (in 1973) claimed that ‘identity politics swallowed itself’.715 Writing in 1995, Ross Posnock, a Professor of Literature, wrote that ‘after twenty-five years of identity politics’ a ‘renascent cosmopolitanism is currently gaining ground on the left; indeed, belief that the prestige of identity politics is fading in the academy is fast becoming the received wisdom’.716 ‘After identity, politics: the return of universalism’ is the title of an essay in New Literary History, in 2000.717 Eight years later, Nicholson, in her history of identity, observed that ‘identity politics seems now to be largely dead, or at minimum, no longer able to command the kind of public attention that it did from the late 1960s through the late 1980s’.718 In the wake of the Brexit Referendum and the election of Donald Trump, the British journalist Janet Daley declared that ‘Identity politics is dead’.719 The failure to grasp the ever-growing influence of identity politics was in part due to the inability of traditional political categories to make sense of this phenomenon. It was, and continues to be identified as a species of radical left-wing politics.

The Road to Ruin: The Global Elites' Secret Plan for the Next Financial Crisis by James Rickards

"World Economic Forum" Davos, Affordable Care Act / Obamacare, Alan Greenspan, Albert Einstein, asset allocation, asset-backed security, bank run, banking crisis, barriers to entry, Bayesian statistics, Bear Stearns, behavioural economics, Ben Bernanke: helicopter money, Benoit Mandelbrot, Berlin Wall, Bernie Sanders, Big bang: deregulation of the City of London, bitcoin, Black Monday: stock market crash in 1987, Black Swan, blockchain, Boeing 747, Bonfire of the Vanities, Bretton Woods, Brexit referendum, British Empire, business cycle, butterfly effect, buy and hold, capital controls, Capital in the Twenty-First Century by Thomas Piketty, Carmen Reinhart, cellular automata, cognitive bias, cognitive dissonance, complexity theory, Corn Laws, corporate governance, creative destruction, Credit Default Swap, cuban missile crisis, currency manipulation / currency intervention, currency peg, currency risk, Daniel Kahneman / Amos Tversky, David Ricardo: comparative advantage, debt deflation, Deng Xiaoping, disintermediation, distributed ledger, diversification, diversified portfolio, driverless car, Edward Lorenz: Chaos theory, Eugene Fama: efficient market hypothesis, failed state, Fall of the Berlin Wall, fiat currency, financial repression, fixed income, Flash crash, floating exchange rates, forward guidance, Fractional reserve banking, G4S, George Akerlof, Glass-Steagall Act, global macro, global reserve currency, high net worth, Hyman Minsky, income inequality, information asymmetry, interest rate swap, Isaac Newton, jitney, John Meriwether, John von Neumann, Joseph Schumpeter, junk bonds, Kenneth Rogoff, labor-force participation, large denomination, liquidity trap, Long Term Capital Management, low interest rates, machine readable, mandelbrot fractal, margin call, market bubble, Mexican peso crisis / tequila crisis, Minsky moment, Money creation, money market fund, mutually assured destruction, Myron Scholes, Naomi Klein, nuclear winter, obamacare, offshore financial centre, operational security, Paul Samuelson, Peace of Westphalia, Phillips curve, Pierre-Simon Laplace, plutocrats, prediction markets, price anchoring, price stability, proprietary trading, public intellectual, quantitative easing, RAND corporation, random walk, reserve currency, RFID, risk free rate, risk-adjusted returns, Robert Solow, Ronald Reagan, Savings and loan crisis, Silicon Valley, sovereign wealth fund, special drawing rights, stock buybacks, stocks for the long run, tech billionaire, The Bell Curve by Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray, The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, The Wisdom of Crowds, theory of mind, Thomas Bayes, Thomas Kuhn: the structure of scientific revolutions, too big to fail, transfer pricing, value at risk, Washington Consensus, We are all Keynesians now, Westphalian system

Elites agree that a Ph.D. in economics from a short list of schools is a prerequisite for serious consideration in policy discussions, although a few brilliant lawyers, like Bob Rubin and Christine Lagarde, or bright journeymen like Tim Geithner, also make the grade. Consistent views and exclusive vetting perpetuate this elite. The neoliberal consensus is deeply flawed. This can be demonstrated empirically. The flaws are also proved politically in the Brexit referendum and the civic flowering of Donald J. Trump. Both Brexit and Trump were first ridiculed by the herd, then provoked vituperation as their causes evolved, and finally induced shock at their unforeseen success. We are witnessing an elite crack-up. Markets are not efficient; they are shaped by irrationality.

Rage Inside the Machine: The Prejudice of Algorithms, and How to Stop the Internet Making Bigots of Us All by Robert Elliott Smith

"World Economic Forum" Davos, Ada Lovelace, adjacent possible, affirmative action, AI winter, Alfred Russel Wallace, algorithmic bias, algorithmic management, AlphaGo, Amazon Mechanical Turk, animal electricity, autonomous vehicles, behavioural economics, Black Swan, Brexit referendum, British Empire, Cambridge Analytica, cellular automata, Charles Babbage, citizen journalism, Claude Shannon: information theory, combinatorial explosion, Computing Machinery and Intelligence, corporate personhood, correlation coefficient, crowdsourcing, Daniel Kahneman / Amos Tversky, data science, deep learning, DeepMind, desegregation, discovery of DNA, disinformation, Douglas Hofstadter, Elon Musk, fake news, Fellow of the Royal Society, feminist movement, Filter Bubble, Flash crash, Geoffrey Hinton, Gerolamo Cardano, gig economy, Gödel, Escher, Bach, invention of the wheel, invisible hand, Jacquard loom, Jacques de Vaucanson, John Harrison: Longitude, John von Neumann, Kenneth Arrow, Linda problem, low skilled workers, Mark Zuckerberg, mass immigration, meta-analysis, mutually assured destruction, natural language processing, new economy, Northpointe / Correctional Offender Management Profiling for Alternative Sanctions, On the Economy of Machinery and Manufactures, p-value, pattern recognition, Paul Samuelson, performance metric, Pierre-Simon Laplace, post-truth, precariat, profit maximization, profit motive, Silicon Valley, social intelligence, statistical model, Stephen Hawking, stochastic process, Stuart Kauffman, telemarketer, The Bell Curve by Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray, The Future of Employment, the scientific method, The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, The Wisdom of Crowds, theory of mind, Thomas Bayes, Thomas Malthus, traveling salesman, Turing machine, Turing test, twin studies, Vilfredo Pareto, Von Neumann architecture, warehouse robotics, women in the workforce, Yochai Benkler