BURA Collection:

Governing Diversity through AI: DEI and Procedural Trust in Public Service Media

2026-08-05T00:00:00Z

Title: Governing Diversity through AI: DEI and Procedural Trust in Public Service Media Authors: Malik, Sarita; Khorana, Sukhmani; Dreher, Tanja Abstract: Public service media are adopting artificial intelligence at a moment when diversity, equity and inclusion policies are increasingly politicised. Drawing on comparative qualitative research in the United Kingdom and Australia, this article examines how AI is embedded within Public Service Media governance and platformised audience infrastructures. We argue that AI operates not merely as a technical tool but as a cultural and institutional logic through which diversity, risk and legitimacy are reconfigured. In this shift, trust in diversity moves from relational practices grounded in representation and accountability toward procedural confidence embedded in automated systems, standards and compliance regimes. We conceptualise this transformation as the rise of procedural trust: a reorganisation of institutional legitimacy through technical infrastructures rather than social relations. Our thematic analysis shows how platform capitalism reshapes public service media by depoliticising diversity and redistributing responsibility across governance systems, with significant implications for democratic legitimacy. Description: Data availability statement: This study did not generate or analyse any datasets, as it is based entirely on conceptual and theoretical reasoning.

‘A bit of a halfway house’: Practice tutor assessors, professional identity and practitioner socialisation

2026-07-27T00:00:00Z

Title: ‘A bit of a halfway house’: Practice tutor assessors, professional identity and practitioner socialisation Authors: Tidmarsh, Matt; Cracknell, Matt Abstract: This article explores professional identity among Practice Tutor Assessors (PTAs), including how they seek to socialise new recruits into the profession. PTAs are an under-researched group who play a key role in assessing the vocational component of the Professional Qualification in Probation (PQiP) in England and Wales, completion of which is a prerequisite for qualifying as a Probation Officer. Drawing on focus group data from a wider study exploring staff experiences of the PQiP, the paper analyses how PTAs understand their role, values, and contributions to probation training. The findings show that PTAs occupy a ‘halfway house’ between frontline practice and organisational structures, which enables them to remain connected to probation practice while being insulated from the pressures of case management. Participants emphasised their commitment to longstanding probation values while also highlighting tensions between these values and organisational challenges, such as risk assessment and staffing shortages. The study demonstrates that PTAs act as important agents of practitioner socialisation; they are ‘guardians’ of a professional identity who, in a demanding environment, are crucial to the transmission and reproduction of knowledge, skills, and values to new recruits.

Lift the migration ban on domestic work

2026-08-01T00:00:00Z

Title: Lift the migration ban on domestic work Authors: Bhagat, Ayushman Abstract: The ban pushes women into precarious and undocumented journeys, making them invisible to the state that must protect them. Description: AI Generated Image.

The social role of humour in classroom management: towards a theoretical understanding

2026-08-02T00:00:00Z

Title: The social role of humour in classroom management: towards a theoretical understanding Authors: Chappell, Anne; Lockyer, Sharon; Sandling, Jonathan; Weaver, Simon Abstract: This theoretically-informed paper brings together the fields of education and humour studies to examine the complexities of humour in social interaction and relationships in school classrooms. We address the lack of understanding of humour in the classroom, and the nuances of education and humour, in examples of contemporary English education policy. We argue that education and humour are theoretically aligned in their social purpose of creating and disrupting social interaction and relationships. We illustrate that examples of English policy discourse that foreground behaviour management rather than classroom management are narrow and fail to consider important aspects of social interaction and humour. Humour’s social role provides a critical lens to examine the complexity of classroom interactions and social relationships that are crucial in classroom management. We conclude that humour is a part of the complexity of classroom management and challenge examples of reductionist regulatory discourses of behaviour management in current policymaking.