The University of Oxford has launched ‘The National Conversation’, a new initiative to understand the public attitudes towards community, division, and Britain at large.
The project, led by researchers from Oxford Population Health’s Leverhulme Centre for Demographic Science and Nuffield College, will collect data through a ten-minute survey, interactive mapping, postcode-based questions, and voice notes in what is expected to become one of the largest ongoing efforts to map the public’s shared vision for the future of Britain.
The survey will ask contributors questions such as “What unites us?”, “What divides us?”, and “What does it mean to be British (and English, Irish, Scottish, or Welsh)?”, with the findings directly informing the work of the national Independent Commission on Community Cohesion (ICCC). The National Conversation project also includes facilitating ‘Group Conversations’, in which groups of up to ten people “ready for a conversation” participate in guided discussions on the themes of the survey. Oxford researchers and members of the commission have all pointed to recent riots, attacks against migrant communities, and increased political polarisation as evidence of the current “critical moment for Britain’s social fabric”, necessitating the initiative.
The National Conversation has been backed by a wide variety of groups across the UK, including the NHS, TikTok, the UK Muslim Network, and the Church Urban Fund. The ICCC is also comprised of a diverse coalition of stakeholders. Led by former Cabinet Minister Sir Sajid Javid and honorary Nuffield fellow and former Labour MP Jon Cruddas, the commission also includes Oxford Theology Regius Professor Luke Bretherton; Dame Sara Khan (former counter-extremism commissioner); Dr Chaand Nagpaul (former Chair of the British Medical Association); and Tim Montgomerie (conservative political commentator and defector to Reform UK).
After the survey concludes in August, the results will be used to establish a new long-term “social barometer” to track feelings of cohesion and division over time, with particular attention to trust in institutions, the impact of media narratives, and changing perceptions of local and national identity.
