In addition to celebrating her Jubilee, thought is turning to the future of the monarchy, and what changes might be expected after she is gone. Dr Bob Morris (expert on church and state at the Constitution Unit, UCL) will talk about the next Accession and Coronation; Dr Craig Prescott (constitutional lawyer at Bangor University) will explain the need to update the Regency Acts; Dr Carolyn Harris (royal historian at the University of Toronto) will discuss previous jubilees, the role of Consorts, and the upbringing of future monarchs; and Prof Helle Krunke (Professor of Constitutional Law, University of Copenhagen) will talk about the Golden Jubilee of Queen Margrethe II of Denmark, also being celebrated this year, and the differences between the British and European monarchies.

In this panel discussion, three leading experts—Sarah Isgur (The Dispatch), Megan McArdle (Washington Post), and Matthew Weil (Bipartisan Policy Center)—will examine the causes of distrust in American elections and investigate its broader impact on the resilience of U.S. democracy.

About the speakers:

Sarah Isgur is a staff writer and host of the legal podcast Advisory Opinions for The Dispatch, a professor at George Washington's School of Media and Public Affairs and George Mason Law School, a contributing editor at Politico, and an ABC News contributor. She most recently served in the Department of Justice as the Director of the Office of Public Affairs and Senior Counsel to the Deputy Attorney General during the Russia investigation. She was backstage for more than a half dozen presidential debates as the Deputy Campaign Manager for Carly Fiorina’s presidential campaign. Isgur clerked for the Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. She is a graduate of Harvard Law School and Northwestern University.

Megan McArdle is a Washington Post columnist and the author of "The Up Side of Down: Why Failing Well Is the Key to Success." Previously, she was a Bloomberg View columnist. McArdle wrote for the Daily Beast, Newsweek, the Atlantic and the Economist and founded the blog Asymmetrical Information.

Matthew Weil is director of the Bipartisan Policy Center’s Elections Project where he is responsible for all of the organization’s voting-related policy development efforts at the state and federal level, the Business Alliance for Effective Democracy, and collaborations with social media platforms to provide authoritative election information to voters. Prior to joining BPC in February 2013, he worked at the Department of the Treasury on domestic finance issues in the office of public affairs. He also previously served as a research and policy analyst at the U.S. Election Assistance Commission and as a research assistant at the American Enterprise Institute. Weil holds a Master of Science in Government Analytics degree from Johns Hopkins University and a BA in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics from the University of Pennsylvania.

Chair: Dr Thomas Gift 

In this seminar we will hear from Professor John Edmunds OBE, Professor Dame Theresa Marteau, and Professor Michael Parker.

n this talk about his new book, Corruptible: Who Gets Power and How It Changes Us, UCL associate professor of global politics Brian Klaas draws on over 500 interviews with some of the world’s top leaders – from the noblest to the dirtiest – including presidents, war criminals, cult leaders, terrorists, psychopaths, and dictators to reveal the most surprising workings of power: how children can predict who is going to win an election based just on the faces of politicians; why narcissists make more money; what makes a certain species of bee more corrupt than others; whether a thirst for power is a genetic condition; and why being the second in command is in fact the smartest choice.

From scans of psychopathic brains, to the effects of power on monkey drug use, Klaas weaves cutting-edge research with astonishing encounters (including a ski lesson with the former viceroy of Iraq, tea with a former UK prime minister, and breakfast with Madagascar’s yogurt kingpin president). Written by the creator of the award-winning Power Corrupts podcast, Corruptible challenges our basic assumptions about power, from the board room to the war room, and provides a roadmap for getting better leaders at every level. 

Brian Klaas grew up in Minnesota, earned his DPhil at Oxford, and is now an associate professor of global politics at University College London. He is also a weekly columnist for The Washington Post, host of the award-winning Power Corrupts podcast, and frequent guest on national television. Klaas has conducted field research across the globe, interviewing despots, CEOs, torture victims, dissidents, cult leaders, criminals, and everyday power abusers. He has also advised major politicians and organizations including NATO, the European Union, and Amnesty International. He is the author of four books, including the most recent: Corruptible: Who Gets Power and How It Changes Us.

Moderator: Ian Dunt

FIND THE BOOK: CORRUPTIBLE: Who Gets Power and How It Changes Us

The Profit Paradox describes how a handful of companies have reaped most of the rewards of technological advancements—acquiring rivals, securing huge profits, and creating brutally unequal outcomes for workers. The consequences are immense, from unnecessarily high prices, to fewer startups that can compete, to rising inequality and stagnating wages. Jan Eeckhout also offers concrete solutions about how to fix the problem and restore a healthy economy.

Tensions have been mounting rapidly since Russia massed 100,000 troops on the Ukrainian border in December. What does Putin hope to achieve? How should the West respond if the Russians do invade? Can the tensions be defused by the US-Russia talks in Geneva? Four distinguished experts join us to answer these questions: General Sir Adrian Bradshaw, former Deputy Supreme Allied Commander Europe, Sir Roderic Lyne, former British Ambassador to Russia, Orysia Lutsevych, Research Fellow and manager of the Ukraine Forum at Chatham House, and Steven Pifer, former US Ambassador to Ukraine.

Speakers

• Dina Ionesco is Manager in the Adaptation Division at the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) secretariat, focusing on human mobility and climate change. 
• Lena Dobrowolska and Teo Ormond-Skeaping are an artist collaboration from Poland and the UK whose work focuses on climate change. They won the 2019 Coalition for Art and Sustainable Development (COAL) Prize with their project ‘You never know, one day you too may become a refugee’.
• Chair: Dr Elisa Calliari, Senior Research Fellow, UCL Department of Political Science

The Covid Inquiry is due to start work in the spring, chaired by Baroness (Heather) Hallett, a former Court of Appeal judge. It will be one of the most complex inquiries in legal history, and highly charged politically, with 150k deaths so far, and the pandemic far from over. This seminar brings together three speakers involved with previous high profile inquiries: Lord Phillips, chair of the BSE Inquiry (1998-2000); Sir Brian Leveson, chair of the Inquiry into Press Regulation (2011-12); and Margaret Aldred, secretary of the Iraq Inquiry (2009-16) chaired by the late Sir John Chilcot. They will pool advice on how best to set up a complex inquiry to ensure that it works speedily and efficiently, victims feel they have been heard, and the findings are accepted as legitimate.

In this seminar four senior political correspondents reflect on what journalism was like at the start of their careers; how it has changed during their lifetimes; and how that has changed the way the press reports on politics, and the way politicians respond. Trevor Kavanagh was for many years Political Editor of The Sun, Catherine MacLeod was Political Editor of the Glasgow Herald, Alice Thomson is a columnist on The Times, and Patrick Wintour is diplomatic editor for The Guardian.

Rory Stewart has been a diplomat, soldier, explorer, politician, and is now an academic at Yale. In 2003 he became deputy governor in two remote provinces of Iraq, recorded in his book Prince of the Marshes. In 2005 he moved to Kabul to establish an NGO, the Turquoise Mountain Foundation. From 2010 to 2019 he was an MP, becoming chair of the Defence Select Committee, and Secretary of State for International Development. In this seminar he is joined by Dr Weeda Mehran, an expert on warlords, conflict and peacebuilding in Afghanistan, adviser to national and international organisations, and to the House of Lords inquiry on Afghanistan. Together they will discuss the challenges of nation building in Afghanistan and Iraq: should the West intervene in such countries, and what can western intervention realistically achieve?