ISRF Newsletter – December 2025
It's our final newsletter of 2025! Read this month's Director's Note on the Great Contraction of British universities. Also included is ISRF events, our latest competition, Fellows news & blog posts.
Contents
Image by Paulina B on Unsplash
Director’s Note
Ducking and Facing the British University’s Great Contraction
Christopher Newfield
I was very pleased with our workshop, “Reconstructing the British University,” that ISRF held on 24-25 November in York. It was completely engaging from start to finish as we discussed our papers about our unhappy object of attention.
We reviewed work on the British university’s broken budget model, whose study has been led by James Brackley for the last eighteen months (see his paper with colleagues who were also in York). We talked about a dysfunctional managerialism defining the system. We reviewed material on staff stress and overwork under what often feels like management’s structural disrespect for academics, their knowledge, and their work. We analysed student struggles with tuition costs, debt, and adequate university investment in their studies.
Mid-Career Fellowship competition (MCF8)
Deadline: 5pm GMT (6pm CET), Friday 30th January 2026
The Independent Social Research Foundation wishes to support independent-minded researchers to explore and present original research ideas which take new approaches, and suggest new solutions, to real world social problems.
Applicants will normally hold a full-time or part-time salaried position – which may be permanent or fixed-term – at an Institution of Higher Education and Research. Candidates should be more than 10 years post-PhD award at the time of application. The awards are intended to provide full relief from all teaching duties and all associated academic administration for a period of (up to) one year.
Book Launch: Neoliberalism and Race, by Lars Cornelissen
Tuesday 9th December 2025, 6:00pm-7:30pm (GMT). In person & online.
University College London
Neoliberalism and Race uses historical methods to reconstruct neoliberal ideas of race and position them within the broader field of racist ideology. Using archival sources, Cornelissen identifies relationships between the neoliberal tradition and fascist race theory, the British Colonial Office, and the transnational eugenics movement, each of which markedly impacted neoliberalism’s trajectory.
This launch will be co-hosted with the UCL Sarah Parker Remond Centre for the Study of Racism and Racialisation.
The Politics in Political Gambling
Anthony Pickles
Fuelled by the ideology of political gambling as a pure form of intellectual brinksmanship, gambling interests gain access to the state via individuals on their way into power and profit from that continued association. In this Bulletin contribution, Anthony Pickles examines how gambling shapes the political landscape and corrupts politics in the UK and the US.
States of transition? From Governing the Environment to Transforming Society
Peter Newell
States play a key role in facilitating the transition to a more sustainable world. However they are deeply embedded in contested social, political, cultural and economic systems. Peter Newell’s new book examines state power within broader social relations to explore the possibilities and challenges of building a ‘transition state’.
COP30: Children and young people at climate talks: seen, photographed, but not allowed to decide anything
Florencia Paz Landeira, Alicia O’Sullivan, Aoife Daly and Katie Reid
The global youth climate justice movement uses protests, strikes and court cases to block fossil fuel expansion. But do they have any say in what their governments do to address climate change, or a voice at the annual COP climate change conferences, where the world’s leaders make important climate decisions?
Why Is There So Much Research About Us Without Us?
Helen Kara and George Watts
While there is continued support for engaging ‘experts by experience’ in research, the stigma around neurodivergent people makes it difficult for them to be openly involved in the process. Helen Kara and George Watts outline why neurodivergent led research is essential to building trust in communities and affirming neurodivergent ways of being.
New publication: ‘From predicting dissent to programming power; analyzing AI-driven authoritarian governance in the Middle East through TRIAD framework’ by Arash Beidollahkhani
This paper explores the adoption of AI driven technologies by authoritarian regimes in Iran, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Using a novel analytical model, this paper examines how such tools enhance governance efficiency while simultaneously reinforcing political repression.
Podcast episode: ‘Colonial Terror: Torture and State Violence in Colonial India’ Deana Heath in conversation with New Books Network
ISRF Mid-Career Fellow, Deana Heath, joins podcast host Roland Clark for a conversation on Heath’s most recent book. Focusing on India between the early nineteenth century and the First World War, Colonial Terror explores the centrality of the torture of Indian bodies to the law-preserving violence of colonial rule and some of the ways in which extraordinary violence was embedded in the ordinary operation of colonial states.
8th Mid-Career Fellowship Competition (MCF8)
Live now: deadline 5pm GMT, Friday 30th January 2026
Scholars more than ten years post-PhD are eligible to apply for support to complete a one-year piece of original research.
12th Flexible Grants for Small Groups Competition (FG12)
Launching January 2026
Funding support for small groups (2-10 scholars) to complete a piece of research or undertake face-to-face joint group work.
11th Flexible Grants for Small Groups Competition (FG11)
Application window closed on 10th January 2025
Funding support for small groups (2-10 scholars) to complete a piece of research or undertake face-to-face joint group work.
8th Early Career Fellowship Competition (ECF8)
Application window closed on 14th February 2025
Individual scholars and pairs are eligible to apply for a one-year fellowship to complete a significant piece of new research.
11th Independent Scholar Fellow Competition (ISF11)
Application window closed on 31st October 2025
Independent scholars not employed at a university or research institution can apply for a one-year fellowship to complete a significant piece of new research.
