Research

 

You will find a complete range of our monographs, muti-authored and edited works including peer-reviewed, original scholarly research across the social sciences and aligned disciplines. We publish long and short form research and you can browse the complete Bristol University Press and Policy Press archive of over 1500 titles.

Policy Press also publishes policy reviews and polemic work which aim to challenge policy and practice in certain fields. These books have a practitioner in mind and are practical, accessible in style, as well as being academically sound and referenced.
 

Books: Research

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From Strategy to Decision

Between 2021 and 2031, the UK government is set to spend over £230 billion on its military. Who decides how to use these funds, and how can we be sure that the UK’s armed forces can meet the threats of tomorrow?

This book provides the answers to these crucial questions. Concentrating on decisions taken below the political level, it uncovers the factors that underpin the translation of strategic direction into military capability. In a series of interviews, over 30 top admirals, generals and air marshals give their own views on the procurement and maintenance of the nation’s current and future military capability. Their unrivalled professional knowledge and experience affords a fascinating insight into the higher management of national defence.

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Building Bridges, Not Barriers
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How many questions could you answer in a pub quiz about British values?

Designed to ensure new migrants have accepted British values and integrated, the UK’s citizenship test is often portrayed as a bad pub quiz with answers few citizens know. With the launch of a new post-Brexit immigration system, this is a critical time to change the test.

Thom Brooks draws on first-hand experience of taking the test, and interviews with key figures including past Home Secretaries, to expose the test as ineffective and a barrier to citizenship. This accessible guide offers recommendations for transforming the citizenship test into a ‘bridge to citizenship’ which fosters greater inclusion and integration.

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The word ‘refugee’ is both evocative and contested; it means different things to different people. For lawyers, the main legal reference point is the UN Refugee Convention of 1951.

This concise and engaging book follows the structure of the Convention to explore international refugee law. Including an introduction to the historical and legal context, Colin Yeo draws on his experience as an immigration barrister to explain the present-day legal framework for global refugee protection. Chapters consider:

  • well-founded fear;

  • persecution;

  • the loss of refugee status and exclusion;

  • the rights of refugees;

  • and state responses to refugee claims.

The book includes studies of key legal cases, reviews the successes and failures of the Convention and looks ahead to the future, including the impact of climate change and the Global Compact on Refugees.

Communicating important legal concepts in an approachable way, this is an essential guide for students, lawyers and non-specialists.

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In recent years, the United Kingdom's Home Office has started using automated systems to make immigration decisions. These systems promise faster, more accurate, and cheaper decision-making, but in practice they have exposed people to distress, disruption, and even deportation.

This book identifies a pattern of risky experimentation with automated systems in the Home Office. It analyses three recent case studies including: a voice recognition system used to detect fraud in English-language testing; an algorithm for identifying ‘risky’ visa applications; and automated decision-making in the EU Settlement Scheme.

The book argues that a precautionary approach is essential to ensure that society benefits from government automation without exposing individuals to unacceptable risks.

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Trade Unions and Gender Inequality in the British Film and Television Industries
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Frances C. Galt explores the role of trade unions and women’s activism in the British film and television industries in this important contribution to debates around gender inequality.

The book traces the influence of the union for technicians and other behind-the-camera workers and examines the relationship between gender and class in the labour movement. Drawing on previously unseen archival material and oral history interviews with activists, it casts new light on women’s experiences of union participation and feminism over nine decades. As concerns about the gender pay gap, women’s rights and harassment continue, it assesses historical progress and points the way to further change in film and TV.

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Representation and Marginalization in British Politics
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In the century since women were first eligible to stand and vote in British general elections, they have relied on news media to represent their political perspectives in the public realm.

This book provides a systematic analysis of electoral coverage by charting how women candidates, voters, politicians' spouses, and party leaders have been portrayed in newspapers since 1918.

The result is a fascinating account of both continuity and change in the position of women in British politics. The book demonstrates that for women to be effectively represented in the political domain, they must also be effectively represented in the public discussion of politics that takes place in the media.

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EU Spending and Well-Being
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Throughout the history of European integration, economic wealth has increased to the benefit of citizens in the European Union (EU). However, inequalities in well-being persist within and between Europe’s regions, undermining the legitimacy of the EU in the eyes of citizens. This book investigates how the EU can use its regional funding programmes in ways that increase citizen well-being.

The book shows that while EU social investments improve labour market performance in rich regions, they exacerbate income inequality in poor regions. Based on this insight, the book presents a theory on the conditions under which EU funding will enhance well-being. Crucially, it argues the case for enhancing the inclusivity of EU growth, which yields the promise of a more legitimate and stronger union.

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‘Being more like America again and less like Europe is the heart of the UK model of capitalism … [but] there are many respects in which Britain remains unlike America despite its strong appeal to the British political class ...’

In 'After Brexit' Andrew Gamble sets out the economic models and external relationships that Britain has pursued since the Second World War and examines the choices it now faces as it adjusts to life outside of the European Union.

This volume brings together this essay with some of Andrew Gamble’s most important and influential writings on British politics and political economy from the last forty years. They reflect on many of the issues that animate British politics, from the relative decline of the economy and the reshaping of the welfare state to the transformation of the Conservative and Labour parties and the changing constitutional order with the devolution of power to Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.

The volume is introduced by the author and includes his notes on each of the essays as well as an epilogue, which considers their original context and what has changed since. Taken together, the essays in this volume are testament to the acuity of one of Britain’s foremost political thinkers and provide rich insight into debates and ideas that continue to influence British politics and Britain’s place in the world.

A companion volume of Andrew Gamble’s essays, The Western Ideology and Other Essays, focusing on political ideas and ideologies, is also available from Bristol University Press.

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‘Capitalism may be teetering once again on the edge of a terminal crisis, but there are no gravediggers in sight. This time around not only are there no gravediggers there are no longer any rival economic systems either …’

In ‘The Western Ideology’ Andrew Gamble demonstrates the contradictions and the resilience of the doctrines that define liberal modernity, and examines the contemporary possibilities for dissent and change.

This volume brings together for the first time this seminal essay with a collection of Andrew Gamble’s writings on political ideas and ideologies, which have been chosen by the author to illustrate the main themes of his writing in intellectual history and the history of ideas. Themes include the character of economic liberalism and neoliberalism, especially as expressed in the work of Friedrich Hayek, as well as critiques from both social democratic and conservative perspectives and from critics as varied as Karl Marx, Michael Oakeshott and Bob Dylan.

The collection includes a new autobiographical introduction, notes on the essays and an epilogue putting the essays into the context of today’s society. Andrew Gamble provides a unique exploration of the debates and the ideas that have shaped our politics and Western ideology.

A companion volume of Andrew Gamble’s essays, After Brexit and Other Essays, focusing on political economy and British politics, is also available from Bristol University Press.

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Volume 1: Union and Devolution 1997–2007

This is the first of a major two-volume work which provides an authoritative account of devolution in the UK since the initial settlement under New Labour in 1997.

This first volume meets the need for a comprehensive, UK-wide analysis of the formative years of devolution from the years 1997 to 2007, offering a rigorous and theoretically innovative re-examination of the period that traces territorial politics from initial settlements in Scotland and Wales and the Good Friday agreement in Northern Ireland to early maturity. Bradbury reviews the trajectory and influencing factors of devolution and its subsequent impacts, using a novel framework to set a significant new agenda for thinking and research on devolution.

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