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Events
Politeia's events. If you are interested in attending any of our events, then please e-mail secretary2@politeia.co.uk to apply.
Places are limited at events with an asterisk.
Markets or Nationalised Systems: What model is best for benefits and public services?
Recession or Recovery - What Policies are Best for Business?
On 14 March, Professor Dennis Snower, President of the Kiel Institute for World Economy, gave the second lecture Markets or Nationalised Systems: What model is best for benefits and public services? in Politeia’s 2012 Economic Series.
Professor Snower explored how government activities could be opened up to the markets and non-state providers to create new opportunities for growth. He considered:
- The impact of opening up public services in the UK to greater competition.
- How changes to the system for distributing public funds could be instrumental in accelerating growth.
- How the ‘individual social accounts’ model could be used to encourage business and voluntary sectors to provide services and respond to growing demand.
The 2012 Politeia Economics Lecture Series
Recession or Recovery - What Policies are Best for British Business?
Mark Prisk MP, Minister of State for Business and Enterprise, gave the opening lecture, Cutting the Burden and Cost of Regulation,to Politeia's new series.
As the UK competes in an ever more competitive global economy, the Business Minister considered the best way to help British business succeed. He discussed:
- What priority should be given to curbing regulatory, fiscal and employment costs in the UK?
- What impact do external factors play?
- How best can businesses be helped to compete with lower cost orprotected economies?
We were pleased to welcome Peter Sinclair, Emeritus Professor of Economics at the University of Birmingham, to respond to Mark Prisk after the lecture.
Safeguarding the Future of British Universities?
Universities Minister David Willetts delivers Politeia's New Year Address
Giving Politeia’s New Year Address on 19th January, David Willetts discussed the importance of universities as institutions for the transmission of learning and wisdom over generations.
His Address also explored the different ideas of a university which had developed over centuries with the focus on teaching and research, and a future in which a diversity of aims and institutions should be encouraged to flourish. The Coalition’s aim had been to put the universities on a sound financial footing for the future, and its proposals for future universities’ finance were designed to strengthen the link between the student and the institution, something which a system based on a ‘graduate tax’ would not do.
Is the Idea of a University Dead?
David Willetts MP, Universities Minister, gives Politeia's New Year Address
Across the world British Universities have been applauded for their tradition of learning and scholarship, for freedom and open intellectual enquiry and for excellence in the humanities and pioneering research in the sciences. Today, British universities attract students from around the world for undergraduate courses as well as post-graduate training and research.
But there are fears that the UK universities are under threat. Costs are rising at a time when the levels of available public funds are shrinking. Over the past decades increasing central control has undermined freedom and official standardization has threatened excellence. Meanwhile, rival institutions worldwide attract able scholars and students from the UK.
Is the idea of a university as it has developed over generations in this country, now dead? On 19th January David Willetts will speak on the future of UK universities in the 21st century.
How To Cut Public Spending: Is Fiscal Policy a Waste of Time? Politeia Lecture Series 2011
The Coalition has prioritized its policy of cutting the deficit. The cuts, say protagonists, are necessary to return growth and confidence to the economy. Critics, however fear that cutting too far and too fast will damage hopes of recovery, and urge higher levels of spending to stimulate growth.
In the last lecture of Politeia’s current series, "How to Cut Public Spending", Professor Tim Congdon* suggested that the emphasis on fiscal policy is misplaced.
American and British experience over the last 30 years shows that reductions in the budget deficit have not prompted a withdrawal of demand from the economy. Indeed, cuts in the budget deficit have been accompanied by above-trend growth in demand and output. He will also suggest that the widely feared danger of 'a liquidity trap' once money market rates have been reduced to zero is illusory.
* Professor Tim Congdon is founder of International Monetary Research Ltd. He has was a member of the Treasury Panel of Independent Forecasters (the so-called “wise men”) between 1992 and 1997. Professor Congdon’s new book is Money in a Free Society, in which he takes issue with U.S. economists Larry Summers and Paul Krugman.
