An appeal to academics

One of Britain’s standout characteristics is the number of world-class universities: we have several top-50 institutions and the Eurozone has none. The brainpower – academics and their students – is a massive national asset. But one that’s not really reflected in our public debate.

Whereas American academics are shaping their debate, and often ours, British academics are seldom heard from. This in part a defect in the funding system that incentivises academics to have ‘impact’ in academic papers but not real-world debate (as opposed to the US, whose universities have far closer links to real-world companies and their research divisions). 

In the UK, the national debate about the great social, economic and public health puzzles is often driven by think-tank reports whose laughably scant resources seldom allow them to go beyond superficial data-skimming (the US think tanks have far more resources, and make a far bigger impact). The result of all of this is that a great many UK policy conundrums are being looked at with reference to out-of-date studies and analysis often forged 15 or 30 years ago.