By Maria Lohan, Chair in Social Sciences and Health and UNESCO Chair in Gender Equality, Queen's University Belfast
In a recent BBC documentary, former England men’s football manager Gareth Southgate explored the challenges facing young men in Britain, including low school attainment, declining employment opportunities, low self-esteem and poor mental health. The positive masculinity Southgate promotes focuses on ambition to achieve, emotional openness, resilience and learning from setbacks, advocating for the role of positive male role models.
But there is a part of boys’ lives where low expectations cause the most lasting damage and where the consequences fall hardest on girls and women as well…
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By Richard Bull, Deputy Dean, School of Architecture Design and the Built Environment, Nottingham Trent University
Helen Carr, Professor in Law, University of Southampton
Stefania Fiorentino, Associate Professor in Planning and Urban Regeneration, University of Cambridge
Steve Millington, Professor of Place Management, Manchester Metropolitan University
After the mainstream parties suffered big losses in Britain’s local elections in May, they might be wondering how they can win back voters in left-behind parts of the country. Labour’s Pride in Place scheme – £5.8 billion to be shared between some of the UK’s most deprived communities – doesn’t seem to have won the government much support. From coastal towns to rural poverty, urban areas and post-industrial cities, we spoke to experts to find out what these communities need.
Tourism won’t fix…
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By Ronnie Das, Associate Professor in Data Science, Sports Analytics and AI, The University of Western Australia; Audencia
Wasim Ahmed, Senior Lecturer in Marketing, University of Hull
In sport, fairness matters. But when it comes to buying tickets to watch the world’s biggest ever sporting event, money matters too.
Attending the men’s Fifa World Cup 2026 will be much more expensive than any previous World Cup. And that’s not what fans were promised.
In fact, when the US, Canada and Mexico set out their original bid to host the tournament, they said a seat at the final would cost a maximum of US$1,550…
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By Tania Prinsloo, Associate Professor in Applied Information Systems, University of Johannesburg
Foot and mouth disease is common in South Africa’s wildlife reserves. There are constant efforts to make sure it doesn’t spread to farmed animals. But since 2019 the country has seen repeated outbreaks on farms. In 2026 the country’s R80 billion (US$5 billion) beef…
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By Nana Kesse, Assistant Professor of History, Clark University
The transatlantic slave trade was a multilayered, highly commercialised global enterprise that lasted from the early 1500s to the mid 1800s.
The events over this period are far too complex to fit into a straightforward perpetrator-victim narrative. While the trade catastrophically dehumanised and commodified over 12.5 million Africans, it was not just an external conquest.
Europeans lacked the geographical…
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By Ntshengedzeni Evans Netshivhambe, Lecturer, University of South Africa
Being an elderly person in South Africa presents a range of challenges. Apartheid shaped diverse experiences of ageing and elderly care along racial and ethnic lines. In the post-apartheid era, however, these patterns have begun to change.
Black elderly people are now more likely than before to live in old-age homes, particularly those who have pension funds from previous employment. There are also community centres that provide daytime care for elderly people through meals and social gatherings.
Hlanganani Malamulele Society for the Aged in Giyani, Limpopo province, is…
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By Dian Spear, Senior research scientist, Stellenbosch University
From Cape Town’s kelp forests to debates over hunting and sharks, human relationships with wildlife are reshaping conservation across South Africa.
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By Suleman Lazarus, Visiting Fellow, Mannheim Centre for Criminology, London School of Economics and Political Science
Understanding what drives recruitment into these academies is not a defence of fraud. It is a precondition for dismantling it.
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By Nandi Vijayakumar, Research Fellow, School of Psychology, Deakin University
Susan M. Sawyer, Professor of Adolescent Health The University of Melbourne; Director, Royal Children's Hospital Centre for Adolescent Health; and Murdoch Children's Research Institute, The University of Melbourne
Sylvia C. Lin, Postdoctoral research fellow, Deakin University; Murdoch Children's Research Institute
A new study involving 1,195 young people found found clear risks from heavier social media use on young people’s mental health.
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By Lucy Gill-Simmen, Associate Dean (Education & Student Experience) Faculty of Business & Law, Royal Holloway, University of London
Deep in Book VII of Plato’s Republic, Socrates describes prisoners chained inside a cave, mistaking shadows cast on a wall by firelight for reality itself. They name the shadows, debate them and develop expertise about them. The prisoners are completely, sincerely wrong, and they have no idea. The cave isn’t a place of stupidity, it’s a place of convincing, well-organised illusion.
But Plato’s real interest wasn’t the cave, it was in the periagoge…
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