David Rischel
@davidrischel.bsky.social
PhD in political philosophy, https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/pais/people/rischel/
Reposted by David Rischel
Starmer isn't Britain's worst ever prime minister, but he is Labour's worst ever prime minister and it's not even close
November 14, 2025 at 8:33 AM
Starmer isn't Britain's worst ever prime minister, but he is Labour's worst ever prime minister and it's not even close
How to win the next election: Extracting the maximal amount of political pain for the minimal amount of political good.
November 14, 2025 at 7:55 AM
How to win the next election: Extracting the maximal amount of political pain for the minimal amount of political good.
Excellent piece, this.
itcouldbesaid.substack.com/p/it-could-b... Did you know we ran a public sector deficit of 5% of GDP last year, a figure which adds up to £150billion? The public finances are in a far worse state than anyone admits to even before you consider public works backlog, gaps in defence & public services
It Could Be Said #73 Why Britain Needs £250billion In Tax Increases
Will explains why public finances are in far worse shape than people realise
itcouldbesaid.substack.com
September 22, 2025 at 11:27 AM
Excellent piece, this.
Reposted by David Rischel
Very few people seem to understand university finances and, distressingly, this includes many academics and most policymakers. This is an attempt to condense the key points you need to know. open.substack.com/pub/profseri...
Understanding University Finances
... a very short guide
open.substack.com
August 10, 2025 at 9:27 AM
Very few people seem to understand university finances and, distressingly, this includes many academics and most policymakers. This is an attempt to condense the key points you need to know. open.substack.com/pub/profseri...
Reposted by David Rischel
“If you aim directly at election victory you will never get there”—@benansell.bsky.social on Labour’s lost first year in government.
www.prospectmagazine...
www.prospectmagazine...
Labour has squandered its first year in government
Number 10 needs to remember that getting elected is a byproduct of doing a good job governing
www.prospectmagazine.co.uk
August 7, 2025 at 7:00 AM
“If you aim directly at election victory you will never get there”—@benansell.bsky.social on Labour’s lost first year in government.
www.prospectmagazine...
www.prospectmagazine...
what's that, another unworkable internet censorship law with stupid unintended consequences? the mind struggles to comprehend it
OSA is gonna make us lose access to fucking wikipedia
write to your MPs.
write to your MPs.
July 27, 2025 at 1:01 PM
what's that, another unworkable internet censorship law with stupid unintended consequences? the mind struggles to comprehend it
Reposted by David Rischel
Flagging my most recent column for @bylinetimes.bsky.social in which I expressed unfashionable sympathy for Rachel Reeves, whose "misfortune is to be the teller of hard truths in a country only interested in easy answers." If only her party listened to what the markets are saying about Britain
Political Economy - Between a Rock and a Hard Place – Byline Times Digital / Print Edition
It’s not a fashionable thing to say, but I have quite a lot of sympathy for Rachel Reeves. The Chancellor has endured a torrid first 11 months in office.
subscribe.bylinetimes.com
July 2, 2025 at 1:19 PM
Flagging my most recent column for @bylinetimes.bsky.social in which I expressed unfashionable sympathy for Rachel Reeves, whose "misfortune is to be the teller of hard truths in a country only interested in easy answers." If only her party listened to what the markets are saying about Britain
Reposted by David Rischel
I wrote about the social history of analytic philosophy @lareviewofbooks.bsky.social
lareviewofbooks.org/article/the-...
lareviewofbooks.org/article/the-...
The Politics of Apoliticism | Los Angeles Review of Books
Kieran Setiya reviews Christoph Schuringa’s “A Social History of Analytic Philosophy.”
lareviewofbooks.org
June 10, 2025 at 3:50 PM
I wrote about the social history of analytic philosophy @lareviewofbooks.bsky.social
lareviewofbooks.org/article/the-...
lareviewofbooks.org/article/the-...
Reposted by David Rischel
I genuinely think this particular aesthetic trend (Good Art Is Didactic And Also Assumes You Are Very Stupid) is a non-trivial source of anti-woke backlash, like unironically. It is really really annoying, and I think it has provided wedges by which anti-wokes can radicalise nerds.
Reading a fiction book rn which is *so* obnoxiously didactic bc the author is *so* anxious you might draw the wrong political conclusion that it's making me anti-woke. Catch me on the Tim pool podcast
June 11, 2025 at 8:26 AM
I genuinely think this particular aesthetic trend (Good Art Is Didactic And Also Assumes You Are Very Stupid) is a non-trivial source of anti-woke backlash, like unironically. It is really really annoying, and I think it has provided wedges by which anti-wokes can radicalise nerds.
Reposted by David Rischel
Reposted by David Rischel
Here's a very clever trick that German Romanticism pulled off. At about the time a bunch of people decided they wanted to decolonise the humanities, a bunch of intellectual movements that were successors to German Romanticism had become the popular way of speaking/thinking among lefty humanists....
May 5, 2025 at 7:10 AM
Here's a very clever trick that German Romanticism pulled off. At about the time a bunch of people decided they wanted to decolonise the humanities, a bunch of intellectual movements that were successors to German Romanticism had become the popular way of speaking/thinking among lefty humanists....
Reposted by David Rischel
I disagree with most of this thread, and I see that one of the failures of the discipline is the one-sided reading of the evidence and overly confident policy recommendations to european politicians.
Addressing some points:
Addressing some points:
Exceptionally long, but familiarly pompous and uniformed, puff piece on the “good” nativism of Mette Frederiksen in Denmark.
Completely ignores most basic data and, of course, any academic research. Some quick points 🧵
Completely ignores most basic data and, of course, any academic research. Some quick points 🧵
April 3, 2025 at 6:08 PM
I disagree with most of this thread, and I see that one of the failures of the discipline is the one-sided reading of the evidence and overly confident policy recommendations to european politicians.
Addressing some points:
Addressing some points:
Reposted by David Rischel
Y'days post: Labour’s strategic error on tax mainlymacro.blogspot.com/2025/03/labo...
The failure to raise taxes further reflects the absence of any serious analysis of what will be required to allow a noticeable (to voters) improvement in public services before the next election.
The failure to raise taxes further reflects the absence of any serious analysis of what will be required to allow a noticeable (to voters) improvement in public services before the next election.
Labour’s strategic error on tax
Two things have become clear to many people since Labour came to government. The first is that the party had done less preparation work fo...
mainlymacro.blogspot.com
March 26, 2025 at 9:17 AM
Y'days post: Labour’s strategic error on tax mainlymacro.blogspot.com/2025/03/labo...
The failure to raise taxes further reflects the absence of any serious analysis of what will be required to allow a noticeable (to voters) improvement in public services before the next election.
The failure to raise taxes further reflects the absence of any serious analysis of what will be required to allow a noticeable (to voters) improvement in public services before the next election.
Reposted by David Rischel
*slaps roof of Downing Street* This bad boy can fit SO much magical thinking about how you can avoid broadbased tax rises.
Lads, I am sorry, but you really are going to have to put taxes up.
March 11, 2025 at 10:06 AM
*slaps roof of Downing Street* This bad boy can fit SO much magical thinking about how you can avoid broadbased tax rises.
Reposted by David Rischel
When I worked in UK academia I recall hearing of a Japanese man who was baffled at how Britain had decided to run its universities like firms. “Why? Your universities are excellent and your firms are terrible.”
To repeat: "A country so stupid it actively trashes one of things it's good at and famous for."
Today's university slashing and burning is Edinburgh, where about 10% of the budget will be cut. There'll be another case every single day until UK govts actually do something. A country so stupid it actively trashes one of things it's good at and famous for.
www.bbc.com/news/article...
www.bbc.com/news/article...
February 25, 2025 at 10:24 PM
When I worked in UK academia I recall hearing of a Japanese man who was baffled at how Britain had decided to run its universities like firms. “Why? Your universities are excellent and your firms are terrible.”
Such a mystery to me why they won't just raise taxes. It's constraining everything they want to do, defence spending seems like the perfect excuse, and they can't possibly believe that they'll be able to win the next election hobbling along like this.
I slightly disagree in that basically, I look at those numbers and go 'wow, the opposition is royally fucked if the government does things half-right', then I turn on the TV or sit in the Commons chamber and see government saying 'persistent inflation, public realm fraying, no tax rises needed'.
for all that Badenoch appears to be a complete fiasco as leader of the opposition, she is actually only a couple of percentage points behind Labour. I'm not saying the tactical voting assumptions are wrong, but they are becoming very load bearing
February 25, 2025 at 2:07 PM
Such a mystery to me why they won't just raise taxes. It's constraining everything they want to do, defence spending seems like the perfect excuse, and they can't possibly believe that they'll be able to win the next election hobbling along like this.
Reposted by David Rischel
If, like me, you are a UCU member and agree the union should stop wasting time and effort on a fruitless round of pay strikes at a time when tens of thousands of academic jobs are at risk, then please consider signing this open letter (link early on the document): ucucommons.org/2025/02/13/m...
Motion to HEC: Focus on Defending Jobs and Reforming UK HE
Two UCU Commons HEC members are bringing the following motion to the special HEC meeting on Wednesday 19th February. We are looking for UCU members in HE to add their names in support of the motion…
ucucommons.org
February 18, 2025 at 10:29 AM
If, like me, you are a UCU member and agree the union should stop wasting time and effort on a fruitless round of pay strikes at a time when tens of thousands of academic jobs are at risk, then please consider signing this open letter (link early on the document): ucucommons.org/2025/02/13/m...
I think one bad-making feature of platforms like twitter and (to a lesser extent) bluesky is that they may widen the circle of people you end up disliking (because they're being nasty etc). That doesn't seem good for us, e.g. if it changes our overall view of how good people generally are.
February 11, 2025 at 7:33 PM
I think one bad-making feature of platforms like twitter and (to a lesser extent) bluesky is that they may widen the circle of people you end up disliking (because they're being nasty etc). That doesn't seem good for us, e.g. if it changes our overall view of how good people generally are.
Reposted by David Rischel
Now available Open Access:
📰 Does (immigration) framing influence public opinion?
🧵
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
📰 Does (immigration) framing influence public opinion?
🧵
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
The Impact of Media Framing in Complex Information Environments
To what extent do news frames influence public opinion? While a large body of experimental research suggests sizable effects, it is unclear how these findings translate to authentically complex inf...
www.tandfonline.com
February 9, 2025 at 3:19 PM
Now available Open Access:
📰 Does (immigration) framing influence public opinion?
🧵
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
📰 Does (immigration) framing influence public opinion?
🧵
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
Reposted by David Rischel
If the UK was really, really smart, it would now plough tens of billions into research centres and take in all the American academics fleeing the US. Spoiler: the UK is not smart. 🇬🇧
8. It is difficult to overstate what a catastrophe this will be for the US research and education systems, particular in biomedical fields.
It is deliberate and wanton devastation entirely out of scale with any concern about DEI activities on campuses.
The goal is destroy US universities.
It is deliberate and wanton devastation entirely out of scale with any concern about DEI activities on campuses.
The goal is destroy US universities.
February 8, 2025 at 10:01 AM
If the UK was really, really smart, it would now plough tens of billions into research centres and take in all the American academics fleeing the US. Spoiler: the UK is not smart. 🇬🇧
Reposted by David Rischel
It's perfectly legit for the Tories to oppose and attack the Chagos deal. Many will agree. But when a front-bencher
@robertjenrickmp.bsky.social
refers to Keir Starmer as a "quisling" (a traitor or collaborator) you have to wonder if the Tories are simply losing it in the face of Farage
@robertjenrickmp.bsky.social
refers to Keir Starmer as a "quisling" (a traitor or collaborator) you have to wonder if the Tories are simply losing it in the face of Farage
February 4, 2025 at 4:26 PM
It's perfectly legit for the Tories to oppose and attack the Chagos deal. Many will agree. But when a front-bencher
@robertjenrickmp.bsky.social
refers to Keir Starmer as a "quisling" (a traitor or collaborator) you have to wonder if the Tories are simply losing it in the face of Farage
@robertjenrickmp.bsky.social
refers to Keir Starmer as a "quisling" (a traitor or collaborator) you have to wonder if the Tories are simply losing it in the face of Farage
This is good and I broadly agree that they're not failing because they're secretly or openly right-wing. But I wonder if there's a more general reason here, which is that a lot of centre-leftish politicians are overly risk-averse (more so than right-leaning ones) 1/
"I’m far from the first to ask this, but – what do they think we elected them for, exactly?" On how I am losing patience with this government's failure to challenge the right.
But what’s it *for*?
This week: come on, Labour, surely you can do better than this. Also: some noteworthy nicknames for Russian monarchs; and a still extant dinosaur.
jonn.substack.com
February 5, 2025 at 3:15 PM
This is good and I broadly agree that they're not failing because they're secretly or openly right-wing. But I wonder if there's a more general reason here, which is that a lot of centre-leftish politicians are overly risk-averse (more so than right-leaning ones) 1/
This country (and this city) are being ruined by a miserable, fun-hating minority and a system of local governance that tilts power in favour of them. Something should be done about that!
I found and mapped every London pub almost shut by council noise complaints last year for @londonermag.bsky.social
Often only one neighbour would complain about issues as small as "faint giggles" but they'd still succeed.
www.the-londoner.co.uk/noise-compla...
Often only one neighbour would complain about issues as small as "faint giggles" but they'd still succeed.
www.the-londoner.co.uk/noise-compla...
Noise complaints are killing London’s pubs
We mapped the dozens of pubs forced to shut early or that faced closure last year due to everything from “faint giggles” to “constant honking” from cars.
www.the-londoner.co.uk
February 5, 2025 at 1:45 PM
This country (and this city) are being ruined by a miserable, fun-hating minority and a system of local governance that tilts power in favour of them. Something should be done about that!
Reposted by David Rischel
If you’ve ever complained about free speech on college campuses but aren’t upset about this, you’re not serious.
Can’t even do mainstream economics while avoiding this list.
Can’t even do mainstream economics while avoiding this list.
🚨BREAKING. From a program officer at the National Science Foundation, a list of keywords that can cause a grant to be pulled. I will be sharing screenshots of these keywords along with a decision tree. Please share widely. This is a crisis for academic freedom & science.
February 4, 2025 at 2:27 AM
If you’ve ever complained about free speech on college campuses but aren’t upset about this, you’re not serious.
Can’t even do mainstream economics while avoiding this list.
Can’t even do mainstream economics while avoiding this list.
Reposted by David Rischel
The biggest question raised here must be: who on earth is choosing to drive in London, the city with by far the best public transport system in Britain?
me in the Guardian on the most congested city in Europe, apparently
me in the Guardian on the most congested city in Europe, apparently
London has a congestion charge – and traffic in gridlock. We need other ways to end the obsession with cars | Jonn Elledge
The charge was seen as draconian, but new thinking is now essential. Look to the cities trying a range of bold ideas, says author Jonn Elledge
www.theguardian.com
January 9, 2025 at 12:24 PM
The biggest question raised here must be: who on earth is choosing to drive in London, the city with by far the best public transport system in Britain?
me in the Guardian on the most congested city in Europe, apparently
me in the Guardian on the most congested city in Europe, apparently