Darius Printer: Left Behind Places as an Explanation for Geographies of Political Discontent - explaining right-wing populism rising trends

Darius Printer, BA Geography, joins us to discuss his research project "Left Behind Places as an Explanation for Geographies of Political Discontent - explaining right-wing populism rising trends"Abstract My Thesis is about mapping political discontent in the UK through the rise of RUK. Using ArcGIS I plotted left-behind neighbourhoods identified by the OSCII study in 2019 who were concerned with the most deprived areas in the UK in order to allocate the Stronger Towns Fund of £2 billion in the most deprived areas in the UK. My Thesis used electoral data to compare these left behind neighbourhoods to areas of high Right-Wing Populism (RWP) to identify patterns between deprivation and political discontent in the UK. Findings show a strong relationship between economic deprivation being a key driver for RWP rises through political discontent mostly in the North-East and East of England due to de-industrialisation or coastal communities experiencing long-term economic grievances. Through using economic and cultural explanations for RWP in these areas my study's application is to reduce inequalities between regions in the UK by identifying the reasons for political discontent in those neighbourhoods. Identifying the most Left-Behind neighbourhoods that require the most regional economic development and links to SDG 10, 8 & 11.Episode Guest: Darius Printer, BA GeographyEpisode Host: Prof Simon KempProducer and Editor: Jack Dinham