Chris Warhurst, Director of the Warwick Institute for Employment Research

I attended a meeting with Sir Mark Walport recently where he said that academics need to work more effectively with government policymakers. The Warwick Institute for Employment Research (IER), of which I am Director, does this almost on a daily basis. Working with the Foresight team, we have just produced a number of short reports to help better communicate research to policymakers and academics on the future of skills and skill needs across the life-course, for example.

In this respect, IER is an exemplar of how academics can work effectively with government. For over 30 years it has been making a positive impact on policy. This work started in the 1980s, developing what is now called Working Futures - a regularly updated forecast of skills in the UK labour market. This research also now underpins LMI for All, which makes government-held labour market information accessible to the wider public to enable individuals to make informed career decisions.

But such engagement is the exception, not the norm. More academics need to work productively with government if we are to help create better informed policy and to keep academic research relevant. To do so, academics need ‘critical proximity’: getting closer to government whilst maintaining independent judgement on what is needed and what works. Read more.

On Monday 13 March 2023, Vanessa Munro and Lotte Young Andrade launched a report that they co-authored with Sarah Dangar (Advocacy After Fatal Domestic Abuse) entitled ‘Learning Legacies: An Analysis of Domestic Homicide Reviews in Cases of Domestic Abuse Suicide’. The aim was to learn more about the profiles and experiences of victims, the adequacy of service responses during their lives and after their deaths, and the ways in which DHRs are commissioned and conducted in suicide cases.

Tom Long joined Mark Leon Goldberg on the podcast Global Dispatches to discuss small states in world politics. Goldberg is an experienced foreign affairs journalist and the editor of the UN Dispatch. They discussed Tom's recent book, A Small State's Guide to Influence in World Politics, and the lessons for small states facing growing competition among great powers. As Goldberg summarized, "If you overlook small states, you are missing a complete picture of world politics today."

You can listen to the podcast on their website: https://www.globaldispatchespodcast.com/how-small-states-can-influence-world-politics/

Dr Andrew Cooper has been named a BBC/AHRC New Generation Thinker for 2023. Each year a select group of ten early career researchers from across the UK are chosen by the Arts and Humanities Research Council and BBC Radio 3 to become a New Generation Thinker. This prestigious NGT status will provide Dr Cooper with a unique opportunity to make radio broadcasts for the BBC, and disseminate his research on German philosopher Amalia Holst to a wider audience. Dr Cooper will also benefit from training and development provided by the AHRC. For further details about the scheme see here: https://www.ukri.org/news/career-changing-opportunity-for-researchers-with-big-ideas/