Agents of change? The challenges of understanding empowerment through international development

Contributor(s): Professor Valerie Ramey | Join us for the 2025 Economica-Phillips Lecture which will be delivered by Valerie Ramey. Starting in the 1930s, Keynesian fiscal stimulus was the leading policy tool for fighting recessions, but it subsequently fell out of favor with the discovery of the permanent income hypothesis and evidence for the effectiveness of monetary policy. However, Keynesian fiscal stimulus re-emerged as an important policy tool when interest rates hit the effective lower bound during the Global Financial Crisis. Most policymakers and many academics now believe that temporary transfers, infrastructure spending, and other types of government purchases and tax programs are effective ways to fight recessions. This lecture revisits the evidence for this view. Using a variety of methods to check the plausibility of some of the leading estimates and models, it identifies cases in which these types of spending did not appear to stimulate the macroeconomy as intended. It also discusses the costs of fiscal stimulus, both in terms of the ratcheting up of the government debt-GDP ratio and the negative effects of distortionary tax finance on GDP.

Contributor(s): Dr Suleman Lazarus, Professor Andrew Murray, Lisa Mills, Nikki MacLeod | This episode of LSE iQ looks at how we can avoid falling for online scams. We think it couldn’t happen to us, but incidents of online fraud are escalating at an alarming rate, affecting all areas of our day-to-day lives, from social media and dating apps to banking and business. As AI deepfakes and impersonation tactics become more advanced, scammers are finding new ways to exploit us, leaving victims emotionally and financially devastated. In this episode Oliver Johnson talks to a victim of a devastating romance scam, he hears about what motivates some of the fraudsters and what legal protections we have in the battle against the scammers. Contributors: Dr Suleman Lazarus, Professor Andrew Murray, Lisa Mills, Nikki MacLeod Research: Fraud as Legitimate Retribution for Colonial Injustice, Dr Suleman Lazarus et al Examining fifty cases of convicted online romance fraud offenders Dr Suleman Lazarus et al Information Technology Law Professor Andrew Murray Rethinking the Jurisprudence of Cyberspace Professor Andrew Murray et al LSE iQ is a university podcast by the London School of Economics and Political Science. We’re keen to find out more about our audience so we can better tailor our content to suit your interests. With this in mind, we would be grateful if you could please take the time to fill out this short survey and share your feedback.

Contributor(s): Professor Michèle Lamont | Join us for this lecture in which Michèle Lamont will discuss her book Seeing Others: How Recognition Works and How it Can Heal a Divided World. She will also discuss ongoing collaborative research on whether and how American and British young workers in the “two Manchesters” are searching for recognition through politics; how indigenous people in Canada and Micronesia are seeking recognition through environmental justice and jobs, and the challenge of seeking recognition where it is impossible to obtain.

Contributor(s): Alexander Stubb | Join us for this special event with LSE alumnus and President of Finland Alexander Stubb. Cai-Göran Alexander Stubb is the 13th President of the Republic of Finland. His inauguration took place on 1 March 2024. During his career, Alexander Stubb has served as a member of the European Parliament, Minister for Foreign Affairs of Finland, Minister for European Affairs and Foreign Trade of Finland, Prime Minister of Finland and Finance Minister of Finland representing the National Coalition Party. He was also Chairman of the National Coalition Party from 2014 to 2016. Before his election as President of the Republic, Stubb was director and professor of School of Transnational Governance, European University Institute. Stubb is an enthusiastic friend of sports and literature.

Contributor(s): Dr Gary Marcus | Is Generative AI morally and technically inadequate? Can we separate the hype around AI from its real potential? Gary Marcus describes the current situation as a perfect storm of corporate irresponsibility, widespread adoption of AI tools, a lack of regulation and a huge number of unknowns. Marcus has a deep love for AI and its potential for humanity, for years he’s foreseen AI’s abilities and limitations well ahead of other experts – from anticipating current problems with driverless cars in 2016 to accurately predicting issues with ChatGPT-4 well before its release.