SPERI Blog

Sheffield Political Economy Research Institute

SPERI develops and promotes new analysis and understanding of contemporary capitalism, and the major economic and political challenges arising from it.

Latest posts

Why the NHS is in crisis: an answer at three levels

Benjamin Stokes - 18 March 2024

If we can only face looking back so far as the Covid pandemic and the political dynamics set in motion from 2010 - highly significant as they are - we’ll be missing the full story. 

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Materialising the immaterial, via the Belfast peace walls

Michael Livesey - 05 February 2024

During the ‘Troubles’, the British Army and Government built ‘peace walls’ in Northern Irish cities to separate predominantly Catholic/nationalist from predominantly Protestant/unionist neighbourhoods. These walls imprinted ‘immaterial’ ideas about the relationship between social class and violence within ‘material’ structures of city space. 

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The political economy of managing conflict: the state-corporate nexus and 'greening' extractivism

Vicki Reif-Breitwieser - 21 November 2023

Resistance and activism against extractivism is prompting repression by state and corporate actors. This blog is the third in the series The Political Economy of Conflict by members of SPERI's Doctoral Researcher Network.

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Partisan geographic sorting in the UK: do political views influence to where we choose to move?

Georgios Efthyvoulou, Vincenzo Bove & Harry Pickard - 11 September 2023

New research shows that, when we move within the UK, we tend to move to areas that share our political values and ideals. 

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Social media as a site of social conflict

Winnie Lam & Remi Edwards - 15 August 2023

Online spaces are designed for fast content consumption, rather than meaningful political debate, which can fuel social conflict. This blog is the second in the series The Political Economy of Conflict by members of SPERI's Doctoral Researcher Network.

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In a post-Brexit world, we need health policy reform that respects the NHS

Matt Wood, Ivanka Antova, Mark Flear & Tamara Hervey - 19 July 2023

New research shows preferences for increased NHS investment in so-called left behind communities in a post-Brexit context - despite Brexit, not because of it.

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