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The last four decades have been a roller-coaster ride for economic liberalism. Riding high from the early 1990s, falling trade barriers boosted international trade, integrated countries such as China into the global economy and significantly reduced the number of people in absolute poverty. Developments in technology ‘supercharged’ these impacts, radically altering our lives as workers and consumers. In this interview, Peter Urwin speaks to economist Vicky Pryce about where it all went wrong – is the rise of populism simply a reaction to the 2007-08 financial crisis, or is it a wider backlash against liberalism? Not everybody welcomes the changes brought about by globalisation, and change always implies disruption – is there a case for government compensation, targeted at those who bear the brunt of disruption and are less able to take advantage of the gains from liberalisation?

Peter Urwin is joined by economist Vicky Pryce to talk about her latest book, discussing gender equality. Vicky argues we cannot rely on the free market to bring about gender equality. In theory we might expect discrimination to be short-lived in competitive markets, as it is an inefficient use of resources; this is clearly not happening, however, and Vicky makes a strong case for more forceful intervention to rectify the market failures that perpetuate gender inequality. An inherent short-termism in the capitalist system, a continuing level of support for motherhood that is insufficient, and various conscious/unconscious forms of bias all contribute to this failure of markets. The proposed solutions are radical, but without significant public intervention we will continue to waste vast amounts of female potential.

In this interview, Peter Urwin considers the ‘collective failures’ suffered by the polling industry in recent years; from their inability to predict the 2015 British general election outcome, to Brexit, to Trump. Joining him is Professor Patrick Sturgis, who discusses findings from his chairing of the British Polling Council/Market Research Society Inquiry into the 2015 General Election Polls; and in his role as Specialist Advisor to the House of Lords Select Committee on Political Polling and Digital Media. They explore whether the same mistakes are being made by Pollsters across these different ‘failures', and whether it is getting harder to predict outcomes. Plus, they ask whether analysis of social media presents an opportunity to help capture voter sentiment – or is the media industry part of the problem?