UCL Political Science Events

One of the tools of modern diplomacy against states like Afghanistan, Iran or Russia is to impose economic sanctions. These can take the form of prohibiting trade, asset freezes, impounding ships and property; and they can be imposed on high profile figures like Roman Abramovich, or thousands of lesser known individuals, with 5,300 people currently on the UK Sanctions List. 

But how effective are sanctions; how easily are they circumvented; and what is their impact on the countries targeted? 

Meet the speakers 

Recorded 23 October 2025

From headlines decrying ‘woke culture’ to a rollback of government support for initiatives in the US and other countries, Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) has become a polarising topic. But, beyond the headlines, what does EDI actually entail? What have been its institutional and wider-cultural achievements? How should we understand the growing backlash? And what might the future entail for progressive social action? 

Meet the speakers 

Recorded 9 October 2025

The health of democracy around the world is widely seen as being in decline. Many countries are seeing a surge in authoritarian leadership, support for extremist parties, weakening institutional checks and balances, and crackdowns on freedom of protest. The second Trump administration in the United States has spotlighted these trends, raising fundamental questions about the future of democracy. What are some of the root causes of the global democratic backsliding? What role do domestic and international courts play in upholding the rule of law? How can individuals and activists organise amidst restrictions on freedom of movement and assembly? What can be done to strengthen democratic systems?

Meet the speakers 

• Prof Brian Klaas, Professor of Global Politics at School of European Languages, Culture and Society-Centre for Multidisciplinary and Intercultural Inquiry (SELCS-CMII), UCL 
• Dr Malu Gatto, Associate Professor of Latin American Politics at the Institute of the Americas, UCL. 
• Dr Michal Ovádek, Assistant Professor in European Institutions, Politics and Policy, at the Department of Political Science and School of Public Policy, UCL. 
• Prof Tarun Khaitan, Professor (Chair) of Public Law at LSE Law School 
• Dr Katharina Lawall, Lecturer in Comparative Politics at University of Reading. 

Chair: Prof Alan Renwick, Professor of Democratic Politics in the UCL Department of Political Science, and Deputy Director of the UCL Constitution Unit. Mentioned in the disucssion: 

• Killing a Constitution with a Thousand Cuts: Executive Aggrandizement and Party-state Fusion in India, https://www.degruyterbrill.com/docume... 
• Care conscription as a progressive answer to the belonging question https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandpo... 
• Corruptible: Who Gets Power and How It Changes Us https://share.google/7oRtyidNA1AOO7f6O 
•  Resistance to Gender Quotas in Latin America https://share.google/u3HkdbxmzEgCwPCoN 

Recorded 2 October 2025 

Prof. Habib Naqvi MBE is the Chief Executive of the NHS Race and Health Observatory. Previously he worked at the Department of Health and Social Care, where he acted as the Policy Lead on the development of the Equality Delivery System. He also has experience in academia, having been awarded the title of Honorary Visiting Professor of Health Equity at the Queen’s Institute for Medicine, University of Bolton. Recently, he co-chaired the Advisory Board for the UCL Institute of Health Equity’s report titled Structural Racism, Ethnicity and Health Inequalities in London. 

Dr. Ramya Sheni is a Local Growth Policy & Senior Analysis Adviser with the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government. Prior to her current role, Dr. Sheni was a Research Manager with ClearView Research where, in partnership with the Black Equity Organisation, she co-authored two reports highlighting the Black experience with racism in Britain: Brick Wall After Brick Wall and Systemic Change Required. Her work focuses on marginalised communities, spotlighting Black voices and women’s voices. 

Ashitha Nagesh is an award-winning BBC News senior journalist and digital reporter, who has served as the BBC News Community Affairs Correspondent for the past two years. She also volunteers as a Senior Fellow with the John Schofield Trust, mentoring young journalists from diverse and underrepresented backgrounds. Ashitha’s reporting has covered numerous issues faced by ethnic minority communities, expanding the reach of these communities’ stories. In particular, she reported on the ethnic minority experience during the Covid-19 pandemic and within the NHS workforce. 

Chair: Dr. Devina Maru is a GP in Islington and the Clinical Academic lead for MBBS Year 1&2 Primary Care. She is also the UCL Co-Deputy Director Medical Education (Primary Care), Department of Primary Care & Population Health.

The COP 29 conference once again highlighted divergences between ‘developed’ and ‘developing’ countries with regards to states’ responsibility to limit their carbon emissions and transition away from fossil fuels. According to many poorer countries, restrictions on fossil fuel production and consumption would constrain economic and social development, a burden which they feel is unfair given that rich countries largely caused climate change. But are fossil fuels really necessary for development? Could the transition away from fossil fuels create opportunities for economic diversification, jobs, innovation, and improvements in public health and energy access? What can and should rich countries do to ensure that poorer countries can develop without reliance on fossil fuels?

Rose Mutiso is the Research Director for the Energy for Growth Hub. The Hub’s research and policy network focuses on issues such as improving how we define and measure energy poverty, pragmatic solutions for clean energy technology finance and deployment, and just energy transitions in energy-poor countries. Rose is also the Co-Founder and ex-CEO of the Mawazo Institute—a non-profit research institute based in Kenya which aims to support the next generation of female scholars and thought leaders in East Africa. She was previously a Senior Fellow in the Office of International Climate and Clean Energy at the U.S. Department of Energy, where she co-led DOE’s engagement on technology and policy dimensions of energy access in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. 

Dr Amir Lebdioui is Associate Professor in the Political Economy of Development and the Director of the Technology and Industrialisation for Development (TIDE) Centre at the University of Oxford’s Department for International Development. His research has focused on the economic diversification of resource-dependent nations, green industrial policy and low-carbon innovation. He is the author of Survival of the Greenest: Economic Transformation in a Climate-conscious World, published by Cambridge University Press in 2024. 

Alache Fisho is Policy Lead, Transition Pathways at the Beyond Oil and Gas Alliance (BOGA) Secretariat. She has over 20 years’ experience in energy and extractives, advising governments across Africa, the Pacific, and the Caribbean and as in-house counsel in a large integrated state-owned enterprise. Alache leads BOGA’s engagement with producer countries, particularly in EMDEs geared towards supporting the design and implementation of an evidenced-backed vision of a ‘beyond oil and gas’ economy. She also supports dialogue and peer learning through BOGA’s thematic working groups and wider community of practice. 

Chair: Julia Tomei is the Deputy Director of the UCL Institute for Sustainable Resources and an Associate Professor at the Bartlett School of Environment, Energy & Resources.  

Co-organised with UCL Institute for Sustainable Resources 

This seminar demystifies the secret world of consultancy and lobbying. It is an industry which has grown hugely in recent decades, and become an inevitable part of modern policy making. But lobbyists and lobbying are frequently misunderstood. To explain what lobbyists do we have four very senior practitioners, with a wide range of experience between them. Two are consultants, and two in-house lobbyists; two work primarily in the UK, and two engage in consultancy and lobbying worldwide. 

They will explain the different roles of lobbyists, from communications and reputation management to strategy and policy work. They will also discuss the growing demands for lobbying in the UK to be more tightly regulated: on one estimate, the Lobbying Act 2014 captures only 4 per cent of lobbying activity. Lobbying necessarily informs policy; but by operating largely behind the scenes, does it also undermine democracy?

Charles Lewington OBE is the Chairman of Hanover Communications, which he founded in 1998 after a high-profile career in Downing Street and political journalism. It has grown to more than 200 consultants. He is also President elect of the Public Relations Consultancy Association, representing more than 1,000 agencies in the UK, Europe, the Middle East and Asia-Pacific.

Yasmin Diamond CB, Executive Vice President of Global Corporate Affairs at IHG Hotels & Resorts. Yasmin is responsible for all external and internal communications; global government affairs work; and leading IHG’s corporate responsibility strategy. Before joining IHG in 2012, Yasmin was Director of Communications in the Home Office, and before that at DEFRA.

Tamasin Cave is the Head of Strategic Communications at Uplift UK. Prior to her current position, she worked with Spinwatch, a non-profit that investigates corporate PR and lobbying, and led the campaign for transparency regulations for lobbyists in the UK. She also co-authored A Quiet Word: Lobbying, Crony Capitalism and Broken Politics in Britain (2015).

Chair: Prof David Coen, UCL Pro Vice Provost Global Engagement and Professor of Public Policy

Sir Rob Behrens was the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman between 2017 and 2024. Prior to this, he held roles including Complaints Commissioner at the Bar Standards Board, Secretary to the Committee on Standards in Public Life, and Independent Adjudicator for Higher Education (Office of the Independent Adjudicator) in England and Wales. 

Greg Clark is the Executive Chair of Warwick University’s Warwick Innovation District and a former politician. During his time as an MP, he held various ministerial portfolios, most notably having been the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy under Theresa May’s premiership. After returning to the backbenches, he served as the Chair of the Science, Innovation and Technology Select Committee between 2020 and 2024. 

Kitty Donaldson is the Chief Political Commentator at the i newspaper. Prior to this, she covered politics and the House of Commons for Bloomberg nearly two decades, first as a Political Correspondent, then as UK Political Editor. 

Chair: Prof. Robert Hazell is Professor of Government and the Constitution in the UCL Department of Political Science and School of Public Policy. 

- Meet the speakers - 

Dr. James D. Boys is a Boston-based analyst focused on US political history. He was most recently a Visiting Research Scholar at the Center for Strategic Studies at Tufts University’s Fletcher School. An expert on US politics and grand strategy, he frequently shares his insights as an on-air commentator on CNN, BBC News, Sky News, Al Jazeera, CNBC, etc. Dr. Boys has appeared before the House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee and was quoted extensively in its 2013 report on US-UK relations. He has also authored several books, mainly centred around the Clinton administration. 

Alexandra Cirone is an assistant professor in the School of Public Policy (SPP) at the London School of Economics, and has a joint appointment in the Department of Government. She also holds a research appointment at the BI Norwegian Business School, and she is a non-resident fellow in the Democratic Innovations Program at Yale University ISPS. She is one of the editors and co-founders of Broadstreet.blog, a blog on historical political economy. Her research interests center on political selection and institutional design in democracies, lottocratic governance and policy, and historical political economy. 

Dr. Julie Norman is an Associate Professor in Politics and International Relations and the Foreign Policy Lead of the Centre on US Politics (CUSP) at UCL. She has published widely on security, conflict, and foreign policy, including five books on nonviolent resistance and multiple articles on political violence, divided societies, and polarization. Norman also works as a policy consultant, providing research-based recommendations to the UN, US State Department, FCDO, US Institute of Peace (USIP), British Council, and other governmental bodies and NGOs. She is also a Senior Associate Fellow at RUSI and a frequent political analyst on the BBC, CNN, Bloomberg, and other media outlets. 

Chair: Dr Thomas Gift is Associate Professor of Political Science and Director of the Centre on US Politics (CUSP) in the UCL Department of Political Science and School of Public Policy.

Recorded 24 October 2024. A new government has been in power in Westminster since July. In our Policy & Practice mini-series, Priorities for the new UK Government, we will explore key issues on which the government is—or ought to be—focusing its attention. In the first event in this miniseries, we discuss the Government's central focus: economic growth. 

- Meet the speakers- 

Emily Fry is a Senior Economist at the Resolution Foundation. Her research primarily covers productivity, trade, energy and how they intersect with living standards in the UK. Previously, she spent several years in finance and academia primarily focused on sustainability and net zero. 

Shanker Singham is an international trade expert and CEO of Competere Ltd, a company that provides law and policy advice to governments and companies, and that promotes international trade and competition policy throughout the world. He also serves as Co-Chairman of The Growth Commission and Co-Vice-Chairman of the Trade Facilitation Commission. He has advised parliamentarians and government ministers on the overall approach to UK trade policy, including the Brexit negotiations. 

Luke Raikes is a research director and Deputy General Secretary at the Fabian Society. His expertise covers a range of economic issues, including regional economies and inequalities, devolution, productivity, and industrial strategy. Prior to his current role, he led IPPR North’s research on regional economies and devolution. 

Chair: Prof. Lucy Barnes is Professor of Political Economy in the UCL Department of Political Science and School of Public Policy. https://www.ucl.ac.uk/political-science

For our first Policy & Practice seminar of academic year 2024-2025 we were joined by ex-Ambassador Simona Leskovar. The ex-Ambassador talked about her own experience both in trying to get Slovenia elected to the UN Security Council, but also more broadly about her experience in the UK and within the UN. The talk included a discussion as to why small states matter in international security. We are delighted that Sir Mark Lyall Grant  GCMG  joined us to give a response.

ex-Ambassador Simona Leskovar 
Simona Leskovar is Ambassador of the Republic of Slovenia to the Court of St James's until August 2024. Prior to this appointment, she was State Secretary at the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs of the Republic of Slovenia. 

Ambassador Leskovar is a career diplomat for 28 years of service in Slovenian diplomacy. She served as Slovenian Ambassador to Japan and Republic of Korea, was Deputy Permanent Representative of Slovenia at Permanent Mission of Slovenia to the United Nations in New York and member or head of several Slovenian delegations and missions to various conferences and events within the UN. Her first post as a diplomat was Washington DC. 
  
Ambassador Leskovar holds a position of the EU adviser to Slovenian Foreign Minister during the first Slovenian EU presidency in 2008. She was later Director of Young Bled Strategic Forum and the national Focal Point for Responsibility-to-Protect. 

Simona Leskovar studied international relations at the Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Ljubljana, and at the Netherlands Institute of International Relations Clingendael in The Hague. Ambassador Leskovar initiated the MFA programme 'Young Ambassadors', a mentoring project that was organized together with foreign female Ambassadors in Slovenia, and aimed at encouraging young women to consider a career in diplomacy and international relations. 

Ambassador Leskovar was appointed Program Director of Bled Strategic Forum at the end of August 2024. 

Sir Mark Lyall Grant  GCMG 
Sir Mark Lyall Grant served as the United Kingdom’s Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the UN from 2009 to 2015. During this tenure, he served as President of the Security Council four times. He subsequently served as a National Security Adviser during David Cameron and Theresa May’s premierships. Following his retirement from the civil service, he is now a Visiting Professor at King's College London and a strategic advisor. 

Chair: Prof. Veronika Fikfakis Professor of Human Rights and International Law in the UCL Department of Political Science and School of Public Policy.