Five things we learned about levelling up from the Conservative party conference

By Jack Newman, Research Fellow, Department of Sociology, University of Surrey

Every political party relies on slogans to sell their policies and justify their decisions. Most vanish instantly into the void, but some are more special. These are the slogans that hold the others together. They are designed to sell not just a policy, but a whole programme for government. These are the “mantras”.

By now it is generally agreed that part of the UK’s current Conservative government electoral successes can be attributed to its promise to “level up” the nation. By now, the term has been used to the point of cliché. But at their annual conference in Manchester, the Conservatives…

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