What is political deference? Is there any point today in trying to retrieve a type of political respect specific to the Anglo-British constitution which has been discarded as analytically worthless and politically broken since the 1970s? The aim of this lecture is to look at this slippery concept, retrace its genealogy back to Walter Bagehot in the mid-Victorian period and retrieve its value for the present UK system of government at a time when its vulnerability has been exposed by the Johnson years.

Vanuatu is leading a global coalition to table a UN General Assembly Resolution asking the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to clarify the legal obligations for States, under existing international treaties, to do more to protect the planet from climate change. The vote for adoption by the UNGA is expected in mid-March.

Legal tools with the potential to catalyse the sustainability transition are gaining global traction, with other human rights related examples.

Viviana is a DPhil (PhD) candidate in Politics at the Department of Politics and International Relations at the University of Oxford. She is also a member of Nuffield College and a Clarendon Scholar. Before starting her DPhil Viviana completed an MPhil in Politics (Comparative Government) also at the University of Oxford, and a BA in Politics at the Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú. Her main area of interest is political behaviour at the individual level, with a focus on corruption.

Scholars across the humanities and social sciences identify social norms and the dynamics