BROWSE OUR CURRENT RESEARCH PROJECTS

Good Business

The financial crisis revealed a series of underlying weaknesses in the economy, from an over-reliance on low-paid, low-skilled jobs to an underinvestment in productive enterprise. Led by Duncan O'Leary, this programme explores how companies can do ‘good business’, aiming for solutions that lead to the decentralisation of power – to employees, consumers and communities.

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Generation strains

Duncan O'Leary, Jo Salter

This project will analyse the generational shift in attitudes towards the welfare state and its far-reaching implications.

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Sweet charity

Jonathan Birdwell, Ally Paget

This project aims to quantify and measure the actual economic and social value of Britain's 5,500 charity shops within communities.

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Welfare and public services

In an age of austerity, budgets are shrinking yet demand for services like education, health and social care is rising. Policymakers must establish what people’s real priorities are – and learn to do more with less. Led by Claudia Wood, this programme investigates those priorities through research on public attitudes to key areas of the welfare state.

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Time and place

Claudia Wood, Ally Paget, Jo Salter

This research aims to identify precisely what values people associate with dying in a home environment and establish why so many more people say they want to die at home.

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Transitions at the end of life

Claudia Wood, Ally Paget, Jo Salter

Demos is exploring the possibility of personalised end of life care that reflects personal values and also involves maximum choice and control for care users and their families.

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A wider lens

Duncan O'Leary, Jo Salter

Through this project, Demos hopes to paint a detailed and evidence-based picture of the lives of families who are struggling with the cumulative effect of multiple disadvantage in Scotland today.

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The Power of Prepaid

Jo Salter, Claudia Wood, Ally Paget

This research is exploring the potential of prepaid card technology to achieve a personalised, integrated, empowering state.

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The Home Cure

Claudia Wood, Jo Salter

This project looks at the role social housing providers can play in helping people back to independent living following a period in hospital.

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Under One Roof

Claudia Wood, Phillida Cheetham

Demos is currently looking at how social housing providers can act as co-ordinators and hubs for support and earlier intervention for their clients.

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Citizenship and political participation

Britain continues to experience declining public trust and participation in formal politics, in addition to rising loneliness and social isolation. Led by Jonathan Birdwell, this programme explores the ideas and institutions that can help bring together a more fragmented society.

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Be prepared: Scouts and employability

Jonathan Birdwell

This research will seek to explore the extent to which the Scouting movement helps impart employability skills such as team work, confidence, interpersonal skills and leadership

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Families, parenting and harmful drinking

Jonathan Birdwell, Emma Vandore

This project examines how a parent's problematic relationship with alcohol can impact on parenting and children’s perceptions of alcohol.

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Faith and society

Jonathan Birdwell

This project explores the role of faith groups in 21st century British society – in particular, their role in progressive politics.

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Eurovisions

Jonathan Birdwell

This project will investigate young people's attitudes towards the EU across Europe.

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Backsliders: measuring democracy in the EU

Jonathan Birdwell, Sebastien Feve

This project will explore how the European Union can prevent 'backsliding' on democratic commitments among member states.

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Ending Forced Marriage

Max Wind-Cowie, Phillida Cheetham

This project aims to identify an effective cross-border approach to tackling forced marriage in Britain.

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Integration and national identity

Questions of national identity are all around us, on Englishness and the future of the Union, to appropriate responses to historically high levels of immigration into the UK. Led by Max Wind-Cowie, this programme aims to close the gap between the ordinary voter and the political class to develop a sense of how we live together.

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The politics of demography

David Goodhart, Max Wind-Cowie, Eric Kaufmann

This research will analyse the phenonemon of 'majority retreat', using the 2011 Census and demographic surveys to investigate the true nature of immigration and integration in Britain. 

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Patriotism and Pride

Max Wind-Cowie

This project will focus on 'practical patriotism', investigating the things that make people feel proud and give them a sense of belonging.

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The Centre for the Analysis of Social Media (CASM)

A collaboration between Demos and the Text Analytics Group at the University of Sussex, CASM combines computer science with social science to analyse social media. Led by Jamie Bartlett, its work will develop social media analysis as a valid instrument of research that meets the needs of policy and decision-makers.

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The Centre for the Analysis of Social Media

Jamie Bartlett, Carl Miller, Rutger Birnie, Noelle Rumball

The Centre produces new political, social and policy insight and understanding through social media research.

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Populism in Europe

Jamie Bartlett, Jonathan Birdwell

Building on The New Face of Digital Populism, Demos is publishing a series of country-specific reports on the growth of populism in Europe.

 

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Demos Finance

Demos Finance is a new financial services research unit, providing industry leaders, policymakers and the public with a reliable source of objective and easily comprehensible analysis of the sector. Led by Andrew Freeman, it will generate new ideas and public policy solutions, will help to explain and ‘translate’ complex arguments to a non-specialist public.

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Demos Finance

Andrew Freeman, Jodie Ginsberg

Demos Finance is a new financial services research unit, providing industry leaders, policymakers and the public with reliable, objective and easy to understand analysis of the sector.

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Political Ideas

Alongside and connected with our research programes, Demos has political projects focused on the burning issues in current political thinking.

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The Disrupters

James Wilsdon, Molly Webb, Rebecca Willis

Growing awareness of climate change has not yet been matched by serious cuts in the amount of carbon the UK emits. This NESTA-funded joint project will explore environmental innovation in the UK.

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Networked Security

Charlie Edwards

The security of the UK has been the focus of an extraordinary level of interest since 9/11. This has given rise to new legislation, partnerships between the private and public sectors and created a plethora of initiatives, all accompanied by a vigorous public debate.

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Private Lives?

Charlie Edwards, Peter Bradwell, Catherine Fieschi

This Demos collection will highlight new thinking about privacy in the UK, and seek to address the future challenges of the privacy agenda in an increasingly open society.

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Futures Thinking

Charlie Edwards

Thinking about the future is tough – it’s all too easy to take a fatalistic approach and assume there’s nothing we can do to shape impersonal global forces, or to cling to ‘official’ versions of the future set out in government visions and policy documents.

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Story.Org

Grahame Broadbelt, Tony Manwaring, John Grant

John Grant and Tony Manwaring, two senior Demos associates, are working with us to produce a pamphlet about leading change in modern networked organisations.

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Children Make Places

Peter Bradwell, Celia Hannon, Joost Beunderman

Children’s access to the public realm is currently heavily restricted – as much by physical barriers as by adult attitudes and anxieties. As heavy investment in play provision is currently set to deliver physical improvements, there is a need to address the wider social, cultural and political context in which the children’s public realm is being shaped.

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