Centre for Evolution of Global Business and Institutions (CEGBI)
CEGBI/SPRU/SBS Seminar Autumn 2026/27
"The Great British Housing Disaster: A Short and Unhappy History of the Failure of the Housing System"
2nd December 2026 (13:00-14:30) location CL/A/025, Church Lane Building
A sustained and effective attempt to improve the housing of millions of people across the UK began to collapse after 1980. Ideology, gigantic financial interests, history and culture have all contributed to the great British housing disaster. This is a story of the privatisation and commodification of a basic human right and the way in which an increasingly socially destructive financialization of housing has undermined the cohesion, equality and basic functionality of many aspects of British society. York is used as a lens to explore why and how access to stable, adequate and secure housing in attractive neighbourhoods has become increasingly stratified by wealth and why the great British housing disaster now serves as one of the ultimate expressions of profound and debilitating inequality permeating every aspect of society.
Please follow the link below to register.
Please welcome Léa Meyer - CEGBI Visiting PHD student 2026/27
Léa Meyer is a Ph.D. candidate in Economic and Social History at the Paul Bairoch Institute of Economic History of the University of Geneva , under the supervision of Prof. Mary O’Sullivan. She obtained a Bachelor’s degree in Economic History and Political Economy in 2021 and a Master’s degree in Political Economy of Capitalism in 2023, both from the University of Geneva. She is currently a Visiting PhD Researcher at the University of York, hosted by Prof. Teresa da Silva Lopes.
York professor wins prestigious ERC grant to study centuries of global corporate risk
A University of York professor has been awarded a prestigious European Research Council (ERC) Advanced Grant for an ambitious, multi-year project that aims to rewrite the history of risk by tracing how global firms have acted as ‘risk laboratories’ across seven centuries and four continents.
Professor Teresa da Silva Lopes, Professor of International Business and Business History at the School for Business and Society and Director of the Centre for the Evolution of Global Business and Institutions (CEGBI), will lead the five-year project, entitled Risk Societies: The Global Firm as a Laboratory of Risk Management, 1280–2030.
CEGBI-SBS Summer Conference 2026:
'The End of the Rules-Based Order? Institutions in Crisis'
Friday, 4th September 2026, 09:15 - 17:45, Heslington Hall
The CEGBI Summer Conference 2026 welcomes submissions from scholars across disciplines whose work engages with the theme “The End of the Rules-Based Order? Institutions in Crisis.” We invite contributions that explore how institutions are being reshaped, challenged, or reconfigured in response to political, economic, social, technological, and environmental pressures.
The conference aims to bring together scholars from across the School for Business and Society and beyond to reflect on one of the defining challenges of our time: the apparent erosion of the rules-based international order and the growing strain placed on political, economic, legal, and social institutions.
Across business, government, and civil society, long-standing institutional arrangements are being challenged by geopolitical fragmentation, economic nationalism, climate change, technological disruption, and growing societal polarisation. This conference provides an interdisciplinary forum to examine how institutions adapt, fail, or are reshaped under these pressures, and what this means for business, policy, governance, and society more broadly.
The conference also provides space to reflect on teaching, research, and engagement in times of institutional uncertainty, including questions of pedagogy, inclusion, academic practice, and the role of universities in shaping future leaders.
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