Research Project on Tax and Austerity Awarded British Academy/Leverhulme Research Grant

Dr Jen Birks from Culture, Film and Media has just been awarded £10k through the British Academy/Leverhulme Small Research Grant scheme for the project 'Contestation and Crisis: Flows of Discourse on Tax and Austerity in the Public Sphere'.

Starting in May and running for two years, the project will examine the role of protest group UK Uncut in the emergence of corporate tax avoidance on the agenda of mainstream media and politics. It will analyse the origins and circulation of particular arguments, frames and discourses around taxation over time and between protesters, politicians and news media, using a 'process tracing' methodology. The findings will contribute to developments in public sphere theory.