Projects and Publications

UK Constitutional Reform: What Has Worked and What Hasn’t?

This project, led by Dr Richard Johnson, aimed to provide a critical evaluation of recent constitutional reforms. Did they deliver what their proponents claimed? Have they generally improved governance, or added further complication? Have they helped to unite the UK or drive further division? Did they enhance or obscure accountability?

Coronavirus: Making Women Visible 

The MEI supported an early survey of the gendered impacts of COVID-19 in the UK by Professor Sophie Harman in partnership with the Fawcett Society, Women's Budget Group, and LSE. The survey led to three Policy Briefings on the impact of COVID-19 on Parenting, Disabled Women, and BAME Women that gained wider media publicity, interest, and public discussion. 

A Future Well and Fair: A Post-Covid Vision of the Welfare State 

This project, led by Dr Paul Copeland, will synthesize current leading research and thinking on the reform of the UK welfare state to produce a shared understanding of a renewed vision that will lead the future debate on reform. It will conduct four roundtables with academics and policy actors (active labour market policies, anti-poverty policy, social care, and long-term illness) and compile a report outlining a Post-Brexit/Post Covid vision of the British welfare state.

Not for Patching? Public Opinion and the Commitment to 'Build Back Better'

This project, led by MEI Deputy Director Dr Karl Pike, examines the views of the British public on what rebuilding after the pandemic might mean. What we offer are some preliminary indications of what policy areas the public want to prioritise, and how the machinery of government has managed and performed during this crisis.

A New Settlement: Place and Wellbeing in Local Government 

Following the upheaval of the past year, the time is right for a radical restructuring of power, politics and policy around the needs of local places. The interim report from this project argues that there does indeed need to be a new settlement, but it needs to be focused on place as the cornerstone of public action and policy-making.