What does the post-pandemic future hold for office workers? Will we drift back to old ways of working, or continue with hybrid/remote working? What do the experts advise on how best to adapt?

Joanna Bale talks to LSE’s Connson Locke, Grace Lordan and Carsten Sorensen, as well as Hailley Griffis, a social media management company executive, who believes that offices will soon become extinct.

LSE iQ is a university podcast by the London School of Economics and Political Science.

LSE IQ podcast

Has COVID killed the office?

Speaker(s): Euclid Tsakalotos | What are the prospects of the Left in government after the summer agreement? Can that agreement be incorporated into a political strategy that furthers social justice and a different economic model? Can Greece act as catalyst for wider progressive changes in the Eurozone and the EU? Euclid Tsakalotos (@tsakalotos) is the Greek Finance Minister. Kevin Featherstone is Hellenic Observatory Director, Eleftherios Venizelos Professor of Contemporary Greek Studies & Professor of European Politics and LSEE-Research on South Eastern Europe Co-Chair.

Economic Blues: the left in government times [Audio]

Speaker(s): Professor Robert J. Shiller | Ever since Adam Smith, the central teaching of economics has been that free markets provide us with material well-being, as if by an invisible hand.  Robert Shiller delivers a fundamental challenge to this insight, arguing that markets harm as well as help us. As long as there is profit to be made, sellers will systematically exploit our psychological weaknesses and our ignorance through manipulation and deception. Rather than being essentially benign and always creating the greater good, markets are inherently filled with tricks and traps and will “phish” us as “phools.” This represents a radically new direction in economics, based on the intuitive idea that markets both give and take away. We spend our money up to the limit, and then worry about how to pay the next month’s bills. The financial system soars, then crashes. We are attracted, more than we know, by advertising. Our political system is distorted by money. We pay too much for gym memberships, cars, houses, and credit cards. Drug companies ingeniously market pharmaceuticals that do us little good, and sometimes are downright dangerous. Phishing for Phools explores the central role of manipulation and deception in each of these areas and many more. It thereby explains a paradox: why, at a time when we are better off than ever before in history, all too many of us are leading lives of quiet desperation. Robert J Shiller (@RobertJShiller), the recipient of the 2013 Nobel Prize in economics, is a best-selling author, a regular contributor to the Economic View column of the New York Times, and a professor of economics at Yale University. His books include Finance and the Good Society, Animal Spirits (co-written with George A. Akerlof), The Subprime Solution, The New Financial Order and Irrational Exuberance. Wouter Den Haan is Professor of Economics at LSE and Co-Director of the Centre for Macroeconomics. The Department of Economics at LSE (@LSEEcon) is one of the largest economics departments in the world. Its size ensures that all areas of economics are strongly represented in both research and teaching. The Centre For Macroeconomics (@CFMUK) brings together world-class experts to carry out pioneering research on the global economic crisis and to help design policies that alleviate it.

Phishing for Phools: the economics of manipulation and deception [Audio]

Speaker(s): Dr Susan George | Can Progressives slow the success of neo-liberalism? In recent years links between big business and government have become stronger and more far-reaching than ever, impeding the possibility for progress. Ahead of the Spanish elections and climate change negotiations, Susan George will draw on her new book about the power of big business and her decades of activism and writing to analyse the possibilities for progress. Susan George is a political activist, widely-translated author and President of the Transnational Institute. Her latest book is Shadow Sovereigns: how global corporations are seizing power. Robin Archer is Director of the Ralph Miliband Programme at LSE. The Ralph Miliband Programme (@rmilibandlse) is one of LSE's most prestigious lecture series and seeks to advance Ralph Miliband's spirit of free social inquiry. The next lecture in the “Progress and its Discontents” series will be taking place on Thursday 19 November with Professor Michael Cox Red Flag over Houghton Street? The Radical Tradition at the LSE - Myth, Reality and Fact.

Shadow Sovereigns: how global corporations are seizing power [Audio]

Speaker(s): Dr Kate Devlin, Dr Mateja Jamnik, Professor Huw Price, Dr Mark Sprevak 
Chair: Dr Jonathan Birch

Recorded on 7 December 2015 at Sheikh Zayed Theatre, New Academic Building

AI is progressing fast. What level has it reached? Is human-level AI a realistic possibility? And if it is achieved in the near future, what will the consequences be for humanity? Could AI threaten our very existence? In this panel discussion, philosophers Huw Price and Mark Sprevak and computer scientists Mateja Jamnik and Kate Devlin discuss these and other questions concerning AI and the future of humanity. 

Kate Devlin is a Lecturer in Computing at Goldsmiths, University of London. 

Mateja Jamnik is Senior Lecturer in Computing at Cambridge. 

Huw Price is Professor of Philosophy, Centre for the Study of Existential Risk, Cambridge. 

Mark Sprevak is Senior Lecture of Philosophy at the University of Edinburgh. 

Dr Jonathan Birch is Assistant Professor, Department of Philosophy, Logic and Scientific Method, LSE and Forum for European Philosophy Fellow. 

The Forum for European Philosophy (@ForumPhilosophy) is an educational charity that organises a full and varied programme of philosophy and interdisciplinary events in the UK.

Will Machines Rule the World?

Speaker(s): Professor David Harvey | David Harvey's politicised work on geography, social theory, urban political economy and capitalism has shaped academic debate for decades. He is one of the most cited social scientists in the world, and his works have been translated into multiple languages. Here, Harvey joins a panel of experts to explore his ideas - and alternative views. David Harvey (@profdavidharvey) is Distinguished Professor of Anthropology & Geography at The Graduate Center, City University of New York. Michael Storper (@michaelstorper) is Professor of Economic Geography at LSE, and holds Professorships at Sciences-Po and UCLA. Jane Wills is Professor of Human Geography, Queen Mary, University of London. Murray Low is Associate Professor of Human Geography in the LSE Department of Geography & Environment. The LSE Department of Geography & Environment (@LSEGeography) is a centre of international academic excellence in economic, urban and development geography, environmental social science and climate change.

The Power of Ideas: a discussion with David Harvey [Audio]

For more episodes visit http://lse.ac.uk/iq. To subscribe on iTunes visit http://apple.co/2r40QPA or search for 'LSE IQ' in your favourite podcast app.

Welcome to LSE IQ, a new monthly podcast from the London School of Economics and Political Science. This is the podcast where we ask some of the smartest social scientists - and other experts - to answer pressing questions about economics, politics or society. 

In this episode, Jo Bale investigates how big company bosses continue to command ever increasing salaries despite shareholder rebellions, government intervention and public criticism. She talks to Sir Vince Cable of LSE's Institute of Global Affairs, Deborah Hargreaves of the High Pay Centre, Dr Dirk Jenter, Associate Professor of Finance at LSE, Professor Sandy Pepper of LSE's Department of Management and Max Steuer of LSE's Centre for Philosophy. 

To subscribe on iTunes please visit - https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/lse-iq-podcast/id1223817465

Or search for 'LSE IQ' in your favourite podcast app or add our RSS feed -http://www.lse.ac.uk/assets/richmedia/webFeeds/lseiqpodcast_iTunesStore.xml

For further information about the podcast visit http://lse.ac.uk/iq and please tell us what you think using the hashtag #LSEIQ https://twitter.com/hashtag/LSEIQ?f=tweets

Why is CEO pay so high?

To subscribe on Apple podcasts please visit http://apple.co/2r40QPA or search for 'LSE IQ' in your favourite podcast app or visit http://lse.ac.uk/iq

Welcome to LSE IQ, a new monthly podcast from the London School of Economics and Political Science. This is the podcast where we ask some of the leading social scientists - and other experts - to answer intelligent questions about economics, politics or society. 

It is with alarming regularity that reports of prison violence, overcrowding and concerns over the impact of funding cuts are hitting the headlines. With 46% of all prisoners reoffending within a year of release last year, the system could be considered not just expensive and unpleasant, but failing. In this episode, Jess Winterstein takes a look at the prison system in England and Wales and asks, is our prison system broken?   

This episode features: Dr Simon Bastow, LSE Fellow, Department of Management; Professor Nicola Lacey, School Professor of Law, Gender and Social Policy at LSE; and Dr Sharon Shalev, a fellow of the Mannheim Centre for the Study of Criminology and Criminal Science at LSE and founder of SolitaryConfinement.org

For further information about the podcast and all the related links visit http://lse.ac.uk/iq and please tell us what you think using the hashtag #LSEIQ.

Is our prison system broken?

The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) is a world-leading university, specialising in social sciences, with a global community of people and ideas that transform the world. Our podcasts focus on the social sciences and the world today.

The Power of Ideas: a discussion with David Harvey [Audio]

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