The Crime, Justice & Society Seminar Series and the Empirical Legal Research Network present:
'Governing by think tank? From experts to idealogues in UK criminal justice policymaking'
Professor Lucia Zedner FBA (University of Oxford)
About the event
The prominent role of think tanks in respect of criminal justice, public policy, and security goes back at least to the nineteenth century. In the early 20th century, organisations like the Brookings Institute were founded specifically to influence US federal government policy. In the UK, think tanks burgeoned much later, alongside declining faith in expert knowledge, the increasing influence of a demagogic tabloid press and of politically appointed Special Advisors (SpAds). To assess claims that privately funded, often politically aligned, think tanks now wield undue influence in public life, this paper explores their role in instigating, informing, and driving recent UK policy developments in criminal justice, immigration, and security. Using illustrative case studies of governance by think tank, this paper explores how policy institutes promote partisan interests, deploy political campaigns and headline-catching policy briefings to influence political debate, public policy, and legal reform. The paper asks - What happens to public policy when it is informed by private actors? Who now sets the legislative agenda? How, why, and at what cost to the influence of academic research and public knowledge production, and to an accountable social democratic criminal justice?
About the speaker
Professor Lucia Zedner FBA is a Senior Research Fellow in Law at All Souls College and Professor in the Law Faculty, University of Oxford. She is also a Conjoint Professor in the Law Faculty, UNSW Sydney and Overseas Fellow of the Australian Academy of Law. Her research interests include criminal justice, criminal law, security, and immigration control. She is author or co-editor of Privatising Border Control (2022), Changing Contours of Criminal Justice (2016), Preventive Justice (2014), Security (2009) and Criminal Justice (2004). She is currently serving as a Commissioner on an Independent Commission on Counter-Terrorism Law and Policy.