Articles

International development beyond aid – an opportunity to change the political debate

By Sarah Mulley, Senior Research Fellow, ippr
Liberal Democrat Voice - 09 March 2010

A major shift in political attitudes to international development has occurred in the UK during the last decade. But the cross-party commitment to aid, and to DFID, is not as clear cut as it might first seem.

Capable communities

By Rick Muir, Senior Research Fellow, ippr
Progress - 04 March 2010

Greater public involvement in service delivery could bring great rewards, but challenges remain, not least the lack of volunteers.

Public service reform in the 2010 election: society versus the state

By Jonathan Clifton, Researcher, ippr
eGov monitor - 01 March 2010
Society vs State: "It should not be about ‘more’ or ‘less’ state, but about the state working in a different way to achieve better outcomes." Jonathan Clifton from ippr explores this key debate.

Comment: Decision time for DfID's future

By Sarah Mulley, Senior Research Fellow 
politics.co.uk - 26 February 2010
Don't be fooled by the apparent lack of debate on international development policy - the parties face tough choices as the 2010 general election nears.

Power to the people

By

Jonathan Clifton, Researcher

Public Finance - 25 February 2010

Greater citizen involvement in running public services is building a popular front of support from Westminster to Tooting and beyond. But Jonathan Clifton cautions that it is harder to achieve in practice than in theory.

Labour must be positive on immigration (and honest about the costs)

By Tim Finch, head of migration
leftfootforward.org - 25 February 2010
Reflecting on Labour’s time in government so far there are many areas of policy in which we might ask ‘how has it come to this?’ But none more than immigration. Labour ends its third term with one of the most comprehensive regimes for the management and control of immigration in the world – and its rhetoric on the subject is relentlessly tuned to appeasing those who would like to see even more restrictions. It is a far cry from the early days of government when the prevailing view was that migration was generally good for the UK economy and our society. So what caused the change?

Connecting welfare-to-work services to local labour markets

By Carey Oppenheim, Co-Director, ippr
Keep Britain Working - 25 February 2010
Labour supply and demand are two sides of the same coin, but employers are often the missing link in employment support that focuses heavily on personal barriers to work. We argue here that Job Rotation schemes could offer a way for employment services to better link jobseekers with the local labour market and act as catalysts for skills development and small business growth. Job Rotation involves giving an unemployed person temporary employment, filling in for an existing employee who is away from work on a training or educational course.

International Development in the 2010 Election

By Sarah Mulley, ippr Research Fellow
egov monitor - 22 February 2010
International development policy may not be attracting the same kind of attention as the economy or ‘broken Britain’ as political parties warm up for a General Election in 2010, but much is at stake.

Ethical policymaking

By Carey Oppenheim, ippr Co-Director
Citizen Ethics in a Time of Crisis - 22 February 2010
Values are needed to make the thorny decisions necessary to deal with the public debt, argues Carey Oppenheim

Hung out to dry?

By Lisa Harker, Co-Director, ippr
Public Finance - 11 February 2010
Unequal Britain can’t be changed simply by giving individuals ‘opportunities’, argues Lisa Harker. It needs a government prepared to invest in more skilled jobs for the future and to narrow the earnings and geographical gaps.

Englishness: the forbidden identity

By Michael Kenny, ippr
Commentisfree - 11 February 2010
Unpleasant nationalism thrives when polite society holds its nose and treats Englishness as a white working-class problem

The state must build a new relationship with citizens

By Dame Julie Mellor, PricewaterhouseCoopers
Society Guardian - 10 February 2010
Recession and public debt provide an opportunity to rethink the way public services work

More fuel for the fire in the debate over biofuels

By David Nash, Researcher, ippr
Left Foot Forward - 08 February 2010

The environmental community is particularly concerned by carbon emissions caused by “indirect land-use change” – where farmers are forced to clear carbon-rich rainforests and drain peatlands for agricultural harvest because existing land has been swallowed up for energy crop cultivation.

England, England

By Guy Lodge and Michael Kenny, ippr
Progress - 04 February 2010
If Labour wants to reconnect with working-class voters, it must start articulating a progressive form of English patriotism

A climate of opportunities: Domestic actions now

By Uloma Onuma, Global Climate Network
Daily Trust - 03 February 2010
Now is the time for Nigeria to act on climate change. In the light of the outcomes of the climate change conference held in December 2009, governments at all levels must plan for and implement mitigation actions. Mitigation actions are steps that are needed to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases that result in changes in the global climate. The ‘Copenhagen Accord’, reached by over one hundred world leaders in Denmark did not lead to legally binding emission reduction targets. Therefore, domestic actions in Nigeria must be prioritized, now more than ever.

Time for concrete action on electoral reform

By Lisa Harker, Co-Director, ippr
politics.co.uk - 03 February 2010
Hearing the prime minister on an ippr platform yesterday, speaking with some passion about constitutional reform and the need for a 'new politics', took me back to the summer of 2007.

English question would haunt David Cameron's government

By Guy Lodge and Michael Kenny
The Telegraph - 01 February 2010
Of all the issues that will confront a new government after the election, the question of English governance may not seem like a priority. But our research suggests that the current paralysis at Westminster over how England fits into the devolution settlement will have to be addressed sooner rather than later.

The lost generation

By Tess Lanning, Researcher, ippr
Public Finance - 20 January 2010
Today’s unemployment figures will be hailed as signalling the ‘green shoots’ of recovery, with the news of a fall of 7,000 to 2.46 million. But we don’t yet know whether this will be sustained over the next year or so. And with unemployment among young people at a 15-year high, fears of a generation ‘lost’ to unemployment are still very real.