Contents
Director’s Note
Notes Towards a Social University
Christopher Newfield
“Now all the ways in which you would have traditionally, historically, for two and a half thousand years understood something like the value of higher education: you haven’t got that anymore.”
This sentence appears mid-way through an epic three-part podcast by Alan Finlayson and Jeremy Gilbert called “Universities in Crisis.” Together the episodes ran for around six hours on Gilbert’s Culture, Politics, Power podcast; the transcript runs almost 60,000 words. This series is one of the best outlines I’ve seen of the British university’s strange and special history. It also offers excellent principles for the next university, principles that overlap with some of mine as well as with those of our working group, Reconstructing the British University, here at ISRF. The project has generated a dozen Dispatches from academic staff about their experiences while caught in an increasingly unworkable higher education system.
Book Launch: Constitutionalising Anarchy
23rd October 2026, 6:00 pm - 8:00 pm BST.
Bishopsgate Institute, London
In their important new book, Constitutionalising Anarchy, Ruth Kinna and Alex Prichard reconstruct 150 years of anarchist constitutional theory. They argue that anarchy is the rejection of arbitrary power, not the absence of any constitutional or legal order. In fact, anarchists have had a great deal to say about constitutional power. In conversation with a rich tradition of anarchist constitutional thought, Constitutionalising Anarchy forges the theoretical tools to reconceptualise constitutional power as a decentralised, bottom-up, everyday practice of non-domination.
Mid-Career Fellowships Award Announcement
Lars Cornelissen
In July of this year, ISRF awarded seven projects submitted to the eighth Mid-Career Fellowship competition. Learn more about our eight new Fellows and their research which explores a range of topics: from lovers rock reggae music to how the energy transition unfolds in Europe’s semi-peripheral economies.
Gifts from the Arms Trade
Jill Gibbon
Pens shaped like drones, toy bombs, rubber missiles and miniature tanks—all can be found at arms fairs, which are tightly guarded international trade shows for military equipment. Jill Gibbon’s latest book takes readers behind the scenes to explore how the marketing of weapons functions as a way to obscure the destruction of war.
New Publication: Policing Souls, Redeeming Nations: Evangelical Activism and the Far-Right Counterpolitics of Emotions in the Brazilian Police by Rodrigo D E Campos and Nicolai Gellwitzki
This article explores how Evangelical chaplaincy organisations are fundamentally transforming the Brazilian police from the inside out. Drawing on ethnographic work with PMs de Cristo (Officers for Christ), the authors introduce the concept of the “counterpolitics of emotions” to explain how these grassroots actors capitalise on the severe mental health crisis and precarity within the police force and reshape the emotional norms that sustain liberal institutions.
Intelligence History Book Prize 2026 winner: ‘Spying on Muslims in Colonial Mozambique, 1964-74’ by Sandra Araújo
The Intelligence History Book Prize is awarded to research on intelligence history that encourages further exploration of the past, from antiquity to contemporary history. This year’s prize was awarded to ISRF First Book Fellow Sandra Araújo. Her book focuses on Muslim communities and their response to counterinsurgency and armed nationalism during the colonial war in Mozambique. Congratulations Sandra!
New Publication:“Idyllischer Gartenzwergkapitalismus”: A Distinct Ordoliberal Environmental Framework? by Isabel Oakes
Drawing on works from ordoliberal thinkers, primarily Alexander Rüstow and Wilhelm Röpke, this article examines their engagement of nature. In doing so, Oakes explores how their ideas around the environment were embedded within their civilisational critique of modernity, functioning as a normative benchmark for social and cultural order.
New Publication: Unruly subjects: Migration, solidarity and resistance in Greece by Luděk Stavinoha
Tracing the daily lives of migrants on the Aegean islands, Stavinoha explores the pockets of resistance and solidarity that emerge between grassroots organisers, migrants and volunteers. The book highlights their attempts to challenge racialised borders and create alternative futures.
New Publication: The Rise of Germany’s Far Right Reflects a Systemic Crisis by Gábor Scheiring
The rise of the far right in Germany is often explained through the lens of eastern German political culture or as a broader cultural backlash. Scheiring argues that such narrow explanations fail to recognise that their resurgence is symptom of a deeper, systemic crisis in Europe’s social model.
9th Early Career Fellowship competition (ECF9)
Launching 30 November 2026
Scholars within 10 years of their PhD award are eligible to apply for support to complete a one-year piece of original research. Applications will be due 29 January 2027. To learn more about our Early Career Fellowship competitions, visit https://isrf.org/competitions/ecf8. Please note that the application form may be subject to change.