Book reviews
Book review: The Right to Buy? Selling off Public and Social Housing, by Alan Murie
Introduced under the Thatcher government, ‘Right to Buy’ has had a formative effect on housing in the UK for the past 35 years. In The Right to Buy? Selling Off Public and Social Housing, Alan Murie examines the policy’s long-standing and ongoing impact, and considers the implications of its more recent extension. While more explicit […]
Book review | Against Elections: The case for Democracy, by David van Reybrouck
If democracy is in a bad state and marred by chronic distrust, what is the remedy? In Against Elections: The Case for Democracy, David Van Reybrouck suggests an ancient solution: sortition, or the selection of officials from the general public through a lottery system. While the book does a great job of opening up discussions […]
Book review: Hunger Pains – Life Inside Foodbank Britain
In Hunger Pains: Life Inside Foodbank Britain, Kayleigh Garthwaite draws upon eighteen months spent volunteering as a foodbank worker in Stockton-on-Tees to take readers through the workings of a foodbank and to reflect on the experiences of those who use them, including discussion of shame and stigma. This is a revealing, impassioned and self-reflective book on […]
Book review: Blue Labour: Forging a New Politics, ed. Ian Geary and Adrian Pabst
Jeremy Corbyn has been re-elected leader of the Labour party. Yet the ‘Blue Labour’ strain – a tendency grouped around the social thought of Maurice Glasman that emerged within the party after the financial crash – is far from over . J.A. Smith reviews Ian Geary and Adrian Pabst‘s edited volume, Blue Labour: Forging a New Politics, […]
Long read review: Politics: Between the Extremes by Nick Clegg
The UK government of 2010-2015 was the first UK coalition since 1945 and faced the consequences of the 2008 financial crash. In Politics: Between the Extremes, former Deputy Prime Minister and Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg explains the challenges of being the small, Liberal partner in the coalition, and argues forcefully for the importance of […]
Book review: The Ways of the World by David Harvey
The Ways of the World offers an intellectual journey through the work of David Harvey over the past five decades, compiling chapters and article excerpts from different periods in his career accompanied by retrospective commentary and insight from Harvey himself. Taken together, this collection serves as an excellent introduction to the theorist’s influential body of thought […]
Book review: Ed Balls’ Speaking Out: Lessons in Life and Politics
Twenty-one years after leaving a career in journalism to work for Labour in opposition, following shock defeat in the May 2015 general election, then UK Shadow Chancellor Ed Balls abruptly found himself without a job. In his new memoir, Speaking Out: Lessons in Life and Politics, he reflects on his life in politics, offering a wider […]
Book Review: Strangers in Our Midst: The Political Philosophy of Immigration by David Miller
In Strangers in Our Midst: The Political Philosophy of Immigration, David Miller defends the ability of states to control their borders and exercise the right to exclude immigrants on the basis of community goals and preferences. Alex Sager argues that the book’s central argument regarding this ‘weak cosmopolitan’ position is largely founded on myth, omission and the misrepresentation of empirical evidence; thus, […]
Book Review: London’s Boroughs at 50 by Tony Travers
On 1 April 1965, a new system of city government was introduced to London, resulting in the birth of 32 boroughs. In London’s Boroughs at 50, Tony Travers traces the emergence and development of each of these individual and diverse boroughs that have played a key role in revolutionising the city and the lives of its […]
Reading List: 8 Must-Read Books on Religion and the Public Sphere
Image Credit: Faith (Steff CC2.0) Last month, June 2016, the LSE Religion and the Public Sphere blog launched, exploring the place and role of religion in British public life today. To celebrate the launch, the blog’s Editor Esther Kersley has brought together 8 must-read books on the topic, ranging from philosophical debates on religion, secularism and […]
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