Powerful ideas.
Demos is Britain’s leading cross-party think-tank. We have spent 20 years at the centre of the policy debate, with an overarching mission to bring politics closer to people.
Demos Quarterly: Summer 2015
The Summer Issue of Demos Quarterly, our magazine of political ideas, is now published.
With a theme of modernisation and reform, it includes original pieces on renewal in the Conservative Government and Labour Party, the Anglicisation of English politics, how to change the prison system, making welfare popular, social media and politics, and more.
Browse the magazine.
CASM
The Centre for the Analysis of Social Media (CASM) at Demos is leading the study of how social media is interacting with the political and policy spheres in the UK and beyond. In particular, it is exploring how digital platforms can enrich democracy and public policy - as tools of campaigning, feedback, coordination and communication.
A Health Revolution?
CASM have recently launched an exciting new research project into e-health forums, in collaboration with The King's Fund, and supported by the Wellcome Trust. The 12-month project will explore the ability of big data analytics (specifically web-crawling and machine learning) to help access and harness new forms of citizen-generated health data.
Other recent projects include a study of how immigration is discussed on Twitter, and a research paper into how terrorist organisations are harnessing modern encryption technologies to evade surveillance.
The CASM team are regular media commentators in both national and global publications, and are frequently requested to bring their unique expertise and learnings to conferences and events held by governments, NGOs and media organisations around the world.
Youth
At Demos, we work on a wide range of projects specifically addressing youth - particularly focusing on young people's engagement and participation in politics, and also on how to instill in them the important character traits they will need to access quality jobs and contribute positively to society.
Some recent youth projects include:
Service Nation 2020
It is now recognised that high quality social action has a ‘double benefit’: benefits to the individuals taking part through their new skills and personal wellbeing, and to society by benefitting a cause, community or social problem, such as loneliness in old age, social care, educational underachievement, youth unemployment and social cohesion. In our report - Service Nation 2020 - we present a series of recommendations to the Government on how it can harness and maximise the potential for youth social action.
Character and Moderation Series
Demos has been undertaking research into the relationship between good character and young people's capacity to apply moderation to their consumption of alcohol, drugs and other potentially risk-taking behaviours. The first paper in this series - Character and Moderation: Alcohol, launched on 15 July 2015 - featuring exclusive surveys of young people themselves, and the results of two expert panel roundtables Demos has conducted over recent months.
Mapping Integration
The Demos Integration Hub launched in May 2015. Drawing on data from a wide range of public sources and leading independent research, the Hub provides a data-driven picture of the nation’s changing social and ethnic fabric, to encourage a more evidence-led debate about the integration and segregation of ethnic minorities, and the openness and cohesion of British society.
The Integration Hub reveals a varied picture of modern Britain, in which many minority groups are benefiting from rapid upward social mobility, and others continue to face entrenched poverty and an intensifying disconnection from mainstream life. It explores how both cultural preferences and economic inequality have played a role in determining communities’ differing levels of segregation, and their overall prosperity in British society.
The Demos Integration Hub can be accessed at integrationhub.net.
A wide range of exclusive Demos research and analysis from the Hub has been reported on in UK and international media. For example, The Guardian recently covered our new analysis of how young Muslim women born in Britain are becoming increasingly progressive in their attitudes to gender roles.
Character in Education
In 2015, Demos launched its research programme focusing on building students' character in the UK education system. The programme includes policy recommendations, independent research and a series of pilots within schools.
Read the first report in the series, Character Nation, which was produced in partnership with the Jubilee Centre for Character and Virtues at the University of Birmingham and launched on 4 June.
On 29 June, Demos launched Learning by Doing, a report that focuses on the importance of non-formal learning in building character in students.
Changing of the guard
While the UK is one of the most diverse countries in the world, this diversity is not reflected in Britain’s offices of power.
The organisation UpRising is working to change that - and a new report from Demos evaluates their success so far.
Read the interim report.
British aisles
Britain's increasing reliance on food banks has grabbed the headlines, but are they a sustainable solution?
A new Demos report looks at British and international examples of community supermarkets to see if they could be a better response to food poverty.
Read the report. Come to the event.
What makes a job 'good'?
In the midst of a jobs-rich recovery, attention inevitably shifts to the quality of the jobs being created.
This new Demos and PwC essay collection tackles outstanding questions over pay, productivity, security and job satisfaction.
Read the collection. Read the blog.
LATEST FROM THE DEMOS BLOG
Web forums and the ‘core self’ of mental illness experience
Theo Bass explains why people's increasing use of online health forums provides such a unique and important data-set for social science researchers.
Fit for Purpose
Research Director, Duncan O'Leary, comments on Ian Duncan Smith's speech on sickness benefits reform.
UPCOMING EVENTS
Demos at 2015 Party Conferences
As a genuinely cross-party think-tank, Demos delivers a full programme of incisive and broad...
Nick Clegg in Conversation on Europe
Time & Date18.15 - 19.45, Monday 21 September SpeakersRt Hon Nick Clegg MP Phil...
LATEST PRESS
Students cut out the boozy nights as freshers’ week sobers up
Ralph Scott, head of citizenship at the thinktank Demos, said the stereotype of...
Why university may not be best course to take
A report by the think-tank Demos estimated that increasing the numbers of apprentices...