Some questions outlast the news cycle. Ideas Lab explores the big ideas, enduring debates, and emerging trends shaping politics, economics, and the world to come.
Ideas Lab
A refugee camp is supposed to be an intermission: a place of safety between flight and return, resettlement or a new home. Yet for millions, that intermission is extending into a lifetime. UNHCR estimates that 70 per cent of refugees now live in “protracted” situations, meaning displacement lasting five years
Ideas Lab
Somewhere in a factory in Dhaka, a woman is sewing a shirt she will never own. She might earn around 33 US cents an hour, while the shirt will hang in a shop in London or New York with a £30 price tag. Of that price, the wage of the
Beyond the West
Walk into any of the major British museums and you will find thousands of years of history from across the world without leaving the building. Ancient Greek sculptures and Egyptian artefacts sit metres from each other but the stories behind some of these objects cause uncomfortable questions to come to
The Forum
On the 2nd September 2020, under the Johnson Government, the merger of the Department for International Development (DFID) and the Foreign Commonwealth Office (FCO) was taken into effect and became the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO). The Government claimed that this merger would be a new opportunity for the
Ideas Lab
“Put a price on emotion.” Harry Styles’ Fine Line lyric poses, perhaps unintentionally, a question that both economists and governments have spent decades trying to answer: can human wellbeing be reduced to a number? Too often the modern-day meaning of wealth is substituted for money, but empirical data suggests
The Perspective
Over the summer, I went to Canada for three weeks. It was amazing! I saw bears, ate delicious food and saw some fantastic scenic views and landscapes. I also went swimming in Eleanor Lake in Blue River, Summit Lake near Nakusp and in Steelhead Provincial Park. It reminded me of
Ideas Lab
An AI Sovereign Wealth Fund Recently, Sam Altman proposed allocating a 5% equity stake in OpenAI to the Trump administration; the initial step to distributing AI-generated wealth among the American public through a newly established US sovereign wealth fund. Under this proposal, other leading AI development labs would be
Beyond the West
Rethinking our approach to development: the alternative path offered by microfinance, social bonds, and a search for innovative solutions. The roots of modern microfinance can be traced back to the 1970s, when Nobel Prize winner Muhammad Yunus began experimenting with small-scale lending to poor households in rural Bangladesh. His
Ideas Lab
Currently, the UK is on the edge of one of the biggest democratic shifts in the UK since the 1969 Representation of the People Act. The government is now pushing forward the Representation of the People Bill to lower the national voting age to 16. For many years the idea
Ideas Lab
How artificial intelligence is redefining policing in London and the challenge of preserving policing by consent. As a new technological revolution takes hold, we are forced to confront the question: just because we have the capability, should we use it? Artificial intelligence has already reshaped how we communicate, how we
Ideas Lab
Europe is already heading towards its hottest summer on record, and it's only July. Heatwaves have become more frequent, intense and prolonged across the continent. As the temperature in Saarbrücken reached 41 degrees celsius, the number of deaths in the water have risen dramatically. At home, Britain faced
Ideas Lab
Loneliness- we all experience it. In fact in 2025, almost one quarter of all British adults reported feeling lonely sometimes, often or even always [1]. Governments continue to treat loneliness as a personal health problem- rather than a political one, but is loneliness and isolation the secret factor, beginning to