FRACTURED: Britain’s Right Wing Populism. What It Really Is, and Why It’s Growing
18 Jun @ 11:00 am - 12:00 pm
Join a fascinating panel of researchers as they draw on years of primary research to challenge some of the most common assumptions made by people working in research, policy, communications and public life. This talk offers a framework for thinking about what an effective response might actually look like as well as clues to why brands must lean back into purpose.
Our Speakers
Pauline McGowan is a director and Head of Strategy at The Nursery. She has worked in brand, communications and innovation research for over 20 years both in the UK and internationally. She runs the money and social team at The Nursery and speaks and writes regularly in both industry and wider conferences and press.
Pauline leads The Nursery’s Generations Research, a broad biennial survey, now covering the UK and US, which aims to shine a light on true differences across generations and what that means for society and business.
She’ll be presenting some fascinating and surprising data on young people’s attitudes and emerging trends from The Nursery Research & Planning ‘This is Us Generations’ research.
Steven Lacey (ICG member) is the founder and Managing Director of The Outsiders, a cultural insight agency he established in 2016, specialising in behavioural change research, hard-to-reach audiences, and understanding cultural undercurrents in the UK and globally. A foresight specialist, commercial anthropologist and strategist, Steven has extensive experience advising governments, opposition parties, global brands and international advertising agencies. He has worked across more than 60 markets and with clients including the Home Office, Mars, Bodyform, and the award-winning ‘This Girl Can’ campaign. An MRS Research Hero (2021) and co-founder of MRS Unlimited, Steven also established the Cultural Insights Forum in 2017 and founded No Man’s Land, a research agency focused on masculinity and men.
Steven is one of the UK’s leading research voices on the far right, populism and disinformation and has co-authored the landmark report ‘Disinformation, UK Democracy and Attitudes Toward Ukraine and Russia in the UK’ — launched in the House of Commons in January 2026.
Steven will be painting an incredibly vivid picture in his inimitable way on the state of the UK nation right now. He will help us to understand the Far Right, and how this is a more disparate group than you might think from research by The Outsiders and Resilience & Reconstruction.
Annabelle Phillips (ICG member) is Founder of AP Research, Co-Chair of the MRS’ Social Equity Group, sits on the MRS EDI Council, and Diversity Lead for the ICG (Insight Consultants Group). She specialises in research at the intersection of the private and public sector, and in particular comms, branding and customer closeness research with organisations that have a social value. She is passionate about giving a voice to often ignored audiences, breaking down barriers and dismantling biases to make sure policies, services, campaigns and strategies are relevant to everybody’s needs.
Annabelle will be taking you through research conducted by AP Research exploring the Populist Right communication’s playbook to help understand the lessons that can be learnt across the political landscape and for all marketing and comms teams. This has been a pro bono project and shout out to Field Notes and True Stories Ltd for allowing her to use their services.
Please note…
The speakers are not aiming to provide a balanced comparison, but rather, are sharing their observations on the current cultural landscape.
The findings they will be presenting are potentially challenging and certainly thought-provoking observations on a section of today’s UK society and do not aim to demonstrate any intended political allegiances.
REGISTER HERE
