News and Blog

A child’s characteristics and family background provide important indicators of whether they are more likely to have special educational needs (SEN), a Cardiff University study concludes. Academics analysed data from 284,010 pupils attending schools in Wales. Males, pupils of White ethnicity, pupils who were persistently absent, those from households with a lower socio-economic background all…

Half of people working at home are doing so in the kitchen, on a dining table or in the corner of a room used for other purposes. This is one of the results from the Skills and Employment Survey 2024, the longest-running and most detailed academic study exploring UK workers’ experiences. Bringing together academics from Cardiff…

On Monday 10 March, Professor Alan Felstead – Emeritus Professor and former WISERD co-director – gave oral evidence to the Home-Based Working Committee in the House of Lords. His evidence was broadcast live on parliamentlive.tv. The House of Lords Select Committee on Home-Based Working was appointed on 30 January 2025 and is chaired by Baroness…

We are pleased to announce that cultural sociologist, Professor Michèle Lamont, of Harvard University will be visiting WISERD from 24 – 26 of March, as part of her Leverhulme Visiting Professorship. The programme of events will comprise an evening talk and workshop at Cardiff University, before Professor Lamont travels to Bangor University, where there will…

Dr Anwen Elias, WISERD co-director based at the Centre for Welsh Politics and Society at Aberystwyth University, is lead author of the latest report by the Institute of Welsh Affairs (IWA): Fostering Democratic Innovations in Wales: Lessons From Around the World. Dr Elias will be in conversation with IWA co-director, Joe Rossiter, on Tuesday 4…

This year’s WISERD Annual Conference will take place at Aberystwyth University on Monday 30 June and Tuesday 1 July 2025. The theme of the conference is ‘Participation and partnership in a time of precarity and polarisation’. The theme for the WISERD Annual Conference 2025 talks to widespread concerns regarding the form and function of civil…

A new Data Insight from the ADR Wales Housing and Homelessness research theme presents findings from research into the underlying causes of death among people experiencing homelessness in Wales. Currently, the main source of information on this topic in Wales comes from annual estimates produced by the Office for National Statistics. The purpose of the analysis in this Data…

The latest book in WISERD’s Civil Society and Social Change series with Policy Press has been published today, entitled Commons, Citizenship and Power: Reclaiming the Margins. Since the 2010s, populism and illiberal politics have been on the rise. Demagogue leaders preach simplified rhetoric to vilify the powerless, polarising city and rural areas and sparking such…

A Special Edition of the Mug of Research short films has been released on ‘How to achieve impact and ensure policy change’. In celebration of its publication, the full Mug of Research series has been re-released with updated edits. They are available here on the Aberystwyth University YouTube channel. Mug of Research is a video…

A new book review of The Russo-Ukrainian War, by W. John Morgan, Leverhulme Emeritus Fellow at WISERD was published in the Journal of Eurasian Geography and Economics earlier this year. Professor Morgan has himself published regularly on the Soviet Union and on contemporary Russia. He has an honorary doctorate from the Institute of Sociology, Russian…