LSE Podcasts

Understanding China’s role in the world has never been more important — or more complex. China projects itself variously as a moral global actor, a fiercely defensive power guarding its core interests, and a pragmatic, opportunistic player driven by economic incentives. At the same time, policymakers in the West interpret China through competing stories — from historical cycles and ideological clashes to narratives centred on national interests and the personalities of individual leaders. These overlapping perspectives shape how the US and its partners respond to China, and how stable — or unstable — the future might be.

To discuss these issues, in November 2025 the Phelan US Centre spoke to Todd Hall, Professor of International Relations at the University of Oxford and Director of the University of Oxford’s China Centre. In the interview, they explored China’s “three personalities,” the politics of emotion in international relations, and the narratives that shape US–China competition. They talk about economic interdependence, climate cooperation, and how shifting perceptions influence policymaking on both sides.

Further reading and resources

• University of Oxford China Centre - https://www.chinacentre.ox.ac.uk/

• Hall, T.H. and Ross, A.A.G. (2019), Rethinking Affective Experience and Popular Emotion: World War I and the Construction of Group Emotion in International Relations. Political Psychology, 40: 1357-1372.

• Karl Gustafsson, Todd H Hall, The Politics of Emotions in International Relations: Who Gets to Feel What, Whose Emotions Matter, and the “History Problem” in Sino-Japanese Relations, International Studies Quarterly, Volume 65, Issue 4, December 2021, Pages 973–984

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America is undergoing profound change. Demographic transformation, shifting global power dynamics, and a foreign policy establishment in transition are reshaping how the United States sees itself—and how the world responds.

These shifts raise fundamental questions: What does a more diverse America mean for its global role? As new voices emerge, how do longstanding foreign policy elites adapt, or will they lose influence? Given all these factors, how has the second Trump administration differed in its foreign policymaking? And how are rapid technological changes, including AI, reframing global governance?

To explore these issues, in November 2025, the Phelan US Centre spoke to Professor Anne-Marie Slaughter, CEO of New America and a leading thinker on global governance, democracy, and U.S. foreign policy. The conversation ranged from demographic upheaval to America’s evolving relationship with global partners, the legacy of East Coast foreign policy elites, and the challenges America faces in its 250th anniversary year.

This episode was produced by Chris Gilson and Avan Fata.

Further reading and resources

• For business, DEI should be an economic priority, Anne Marie Slaughter – Financial Times - 28 August 2024

• A New World Order, Anne-Marie Slaughter, (Princeton University Press, 2004)

• William H. Frey - Brookings Institution

• Justice by Means of Democracy, Danielle Allen (The University of Chicago Press, 2023)

• Substack resources mentioned – The Renovator; The All American

• New America

• America adrift: the end of the east coast foreign policy elite (for video and event podcast recording) – Phelan US Centre Event with Anne-Marie Slaughter, 12 November 2025

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What does the future of work really look like? 

Many workers today face unstable contracts, insecure employment, and widening inequalities. Yet, at the same time, rapid technological change and advances in AI are transforming productivity, reducing repetitive tasks, and opening new possibilities for creativity and flexible working.

In this episode of LSE iQ, Maayan Arad explores how work is changing, and what it will take to ensure these shifts benefit everyone. He speaks to leading experts on job quality, AI, and remote work models that could reshape economies and communities worldwide.

Dr Kirsten Sehnbruch from LSE’s International Inequalities Institute explains why improving job quality - not just quantity - is essential for tackling global inequalities and creating fairer labour markets.

Professor Raj Choudhury from LSE’s Department of Management reveals how the ability to work from anywhere could reverse the ‘brain drain’ from smaller towns and rural regions.

Fabien Curto Millet, Chief Economist at Google, discusses how artificial intelligence is reshaping creativity, productivity, and the nature of work - and gives advice for graduates entering the workplace.

Together, they explore big questions about the future of work, from the rise of location flexible jobs to the impact of AI on human skills, innovation, and economic opportunity.

Contributors: Kirsten Sehnbruch, Raj Choudhury, Fabien Curto Millet.

Research links:

Https://prithwirajchoudhury.com/the-world-is-your-office/

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2025/10/19/jobs-ai-skills-training/

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13504851.2022.2156460

https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/inequalities/2024/09/17/why-the-flexicurity-model-of-the-labour-market-is-not-sustainable/

To talk about the current state of US-China relations, in October 2025 the Phelan US Centre spoke to Scott Kennedy, Senior Adviser and Trustee Chair in Chinese Business and Economics at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, and a leading authority on Chinese economic policy and US-China commercial relations.

The discussion conversation covered the October 2025 deal between US president Donald Trump and China’s president Xi Jinping, the state of relations between China and the US two countries during the first months of the second Trump presidency, and the insights that can be gained by speaking to scholars and experts on the ground in China.

This episode was produced by Chris Gilson and Avan Fata.

Further reading and resources

• China Field Notes podcast – with Scott Kennedy

• The Center for Strategic and International Studies

• China’s Tech Obsession Is Weighing Down Its Economy – Scott Kennedy and Scott Rozelle – Foreign Policy, 10 October 2025

• Red Ink: Estimating Chinese Industrial Policy Spending in Comparative Perspective by Gerard DiPippo, Ilaria Mazzocco, Scott Kennedy, and Matthew P. Goodman – CSIS – 23 May 2022

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Recent years have seen growth in the capability and use of AI tools across society, including by business, academia, the media, and in the economy more widely. Many institutions have embraced AI tools and models such as ChatGPT (OpenAI) and Gemini (Google) to provide solutions to a variety of challenges, from the everyday to the global. At the same time, many commentators have expressed concerns about bias in AI, its contribution to other global challenges like climate change, and that it may even be a threat to society or democracy.

In 2025, the Phelan US Centre ran an essay competition for master’s students with the prompt, “Is AI a threat or an opportunity for the US?”

In this episode we spoke to the author of the winning essay, Kayode Adeniyi, and the runners-up, Natasha Chávez and Francesca Nicolodi. We discussed their essays, the competition, what it’s like for students to engage with a wider audience, and the opportunity they had to present their essays in the UK parliament to MPs and the British-American Parliamentary Group.

This episode was produced by Chris Gilson and Avan Fata.

Read the essays from the winner and runners-up on the Phelan US Centre’s USAPP blog

• AI in the US: The Next Space Race or the Next Subprime Crisis? - Kayode Adeniyi - LSE Department of Management (winner)

• The AI race: will the US lead or fall behind? - Natasha Chávez - LSE Department of International Relations (runner-up)

• Trump’s hunger for AI domination is allowing Silicon Valley to seize the state but not its people - Francesca Nicolodi - LSE Department of Social Policy (runner-up)

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The last 40 years have seen a sharp decline in America’s manufacturing industries with growing joblessness in many previously prosperous industrial regions of the US.

But how and why did these job losses happen, and how did the US move from an economy based on manufacturing to one that’s now based on services? And what can be done to help workers affected by technological disruption in what are called “left-behind places”?

To discuss the origins of job loss, left behind places, and the place-based policies that can help them, in November 2025, the Phelan US Centre spoke to Professor Gordon Hanson, the Peter Wertheim Professor in Urban Policy at Harvard Kennedy School. Professor Hanson is best known for his research on the labor market consequences of globalization, including pioneering work on the China trade shock.

This episode was produced by Chris Gilson and Avan Fata.

Further reading and resources

• We Warned About the First China Shock. The Next One Will Be Worse, New York Times, 14 July 2025

• Reimagining the Economy at Harvard Kennedy School

• What Works Centre for Local Economic Growth

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This year LSE is celebrating its 130th anniversary, and how it has shaped history and driven change across the world. Much of LSE’s history is linked to the United States, from philanthropic support from the US in LSE’s early days to famous alumni and American directors of the School.

To talk about the LSE’s long and close relationship with the United States, in October 2025, the Phelan US Centre spoke to Professor Michael Cox. Professor Cox is a Founding Director of LSE IDEAS, LSE's foreign policy think tank, and was its Director between 2008 and 2019. He is also Emeritus Professor of International Relations at LSE and has been writing a history of LSE.

This episode was produced by Chris Gilson and Avan Fata.

Further reading and resources

• Cox, Michael, John Ikenberry, and Takashi Inoguchi (eds), American Democracy Promotion: Impulses, Strategies, and Impacts (Oxford University Press, 2000)

• Cox, M., & Stokes, D. (Eds.), US Foreign Policy (Oxford University Press, 2026)

• Celebrating LSE's 130th anniversary

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Since returning to the White House for his second term in January 2025, Donald Trump has renewed his “America First” agenda by pursing a transactional approach to diplomacy and a desire to limit the US’ involvement overseas. This in turn is remoulding the global order.

To discuss Donald Trump’s “America First” foreign policy and the US’ place in the changing world order, in October 2025 the Phelan US Centre spoke to Professor Charles Kupchan, Professor of International Affairs in the School of Foreign Service and Government Department at Georgetown University, and Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.

This episode was produced by Chris Gilson and Avan Fata.

Further reading and resources

• Charles A. Kupchan., No One's World: The West, the Rising Rest, and the Coming Global Turn (Oxford Academic, 2012),

• Charles A. Kupchan, Isolationism: A History of America’s Efforts to Shield Itself from the World (New York: Oxford University Press, 2020).

• The promise and peril of Trump's America first – LSE Phelan US Centre event, including links to event video and podcast recording

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It seems every week we hear a new report of a cyber-attack. Recent examples include the hacks on Marks and Spencer's, Jaguar Land Rover, and the Co-op, all causing massive economic disruption.

While these attacks seem to have come from cyber criminals working within the UK rather than other nation states, they highlight the destruction that cyber-attacks can wreak. What if those attacks were on our critical infrastructure? Our national grid? Our water supply? Is the UK prepared?

Charlotte Kelloway meets former Director of Operations and Intelligence for the British Secret Intelligence Service (MI6), Nigel Inkster, who discusses when a cyber-attack could constitute a declaration of war.

She also talks to former Director Cyber in the Foreign Office and Associate Dean for Strategic Development at the LSE School of Public Policy Professor Alexander Evans about what the UK is doing defensively and offensively to prevent cyber-attacks.

Dr Lauren Sukin from Nuffield College at the University of Oxford explains why there is a lack of regulation in the cyberwar space and explores if depictions of cyberwar in the media are realistic.

Contributors: Professor Alexander Evans, Dr Lauren Sukin, Nigel Inkster

Research links:

Lauren Sukin: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/00220027231153580

Nigel Inkster: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Great-Decoupling-Struggle-Technological-Supremacy/dp/1787383830

LSE iQ is a university podcast by the London School of Economics and Political Science.

As long as there has been photographic and video imagery, there have been manipulated videos and photos. But only in the last decade or so have the public become aware of what are known as “deepfakes”, computer or AI generated fake images, often of celebrities. The spread of deepfake imagery raises questions about truth and authenticity online – can we still trust what we see on screen?

To discuss deepfakes, and the idea of trust and authenticity in the digital sphere more broadly, the Phelan US Centre spoke to Dr Gili Vidan, Assistant Professor of Information Science at Cornell University’s Ann S. Bowers College of Computing and Information Science.

This episode was produced by Chris Gilson and Avan Fata.

Further reading and resources

• Robert Chesney & Danielle K. Citron, Deep Fakes: A Looming Challenge for Privacy, Democracy, and National Security,107 California Law Review 1753 (2019).

• Habgood-Coote, Joshua (2023). Deepfakes and the epistemic apocalypse. Synthese 201 (3):1-23.

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The Ballpark will be ten years old in 2026, and we want to hear from you to make the podcast even better, so we’re running a listener survey until 2 February 2026.

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