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The Long Run Institute is delighted to have co sponsored the Economic History Society’s Centenary Conference at the LSE in April 2026, where global scholars presented research on migration, labour, trade, gender, and more. LRI directors Judy Stephenson and John Turner chaired key sessions, while Michael Aldous and Tiarnán Heaney each presented papers. The LRI salutes its contributors and congratulates the Society on its hundred years.
The Long Run Institute is delighted to sponsor doctoral students to attend the Economic History Society’s Centenary conference at the London School of Economics and Political Science from the 10th to the 12th of April 2026. See the program for some of the most fresh and innovative scholarship in economic and social history today.
In the fourth and final installment of the Futures @ Risk series published in The Globe and Mail, Dr. Laurence B. Mussio and Dr. Cosimo Pacciani use two parallel maritime catastrophes, one in 1816 and one in 2012, to argue that many great disasters are caused not by unknown risks, but by known dangers that institutions choose to ignore. Citing other examples where warnings were recorded, filed, and forgotten, the authors note that institutions excel at producing data and reports but fail at converting experience into action. The authors define this missing capability as “Mnemonic Capital”—an institution’s living capacity to turn historical experience into present judgment—and examine ways this can be achieved.
LRI Senior Research Fellow Dr. Tiarnán Heaney was recently quoted in the BBC article “What was the 1970s oil crisis, and are we heading for something worse?” by business reporter Rachel Clun. Dr. Heaney’s insights helped unpack the historical roots of the crisis and its relevance to today’s energy challenges, highlighting why this moment matters for global markets and policy.
Co-chaired by Mona Malone, Chief Administrative Officer of BMO Financial Group, and Professor Judy Stephenson of University College London, the roundtable was convened to examine the intersection of historical female human capital and modern technological innovation. Featured speakers included Cambridge Professor Amy Louise Erickson and Dr Jennifer Aston of the Northumbria University.
At this thought-provoking roundtable, chair Mona Malone, Chief Administrative Officer of BMO Financial Group, opened the session by framing the artificial-intelligence transition around three central tensions: speed against stability, automation against augmentation, and memory against momentum. Oxford Professor Carl-Benedikt Frey was the keynote speaker.
In this third “Futures @ Risk” essay, Dr. Laurence B. Mussio and Dr. Cosimo Pacciani use art and history to argue that modern society is governed by “Ghost Intelligence”: fast, automated digital systems that operate without the institutional memory needed to understand their physical foundations. While economies have optimized for algorithms, finance, and cloud computing, they have neglected the “Body” of civilization—energy grids, supply chains, materials, and infrastructure—leaving systems vulnerable to adversarial risks in what thinkers describe as a new era where risk is deliberately weaponized. The authors discuss the broader lessons and implications.
Writing in The Globe and Mail, Dr. Laurence B. Mussio recalls a childhood memory of seeing La Traviata in Sarnia and observes how opera can reveal deeper truths about society. While preparing to attend the Canadian Opera Company’s performance of Rigoletto in Toronto, Dr. Mussio notes that Rigoletto actually offers a powerful metaphor for Canada’s current economic and cultural condition.
In their second “Futures @ Risk” essay in The Globe and Mail, Dr. Laurence B. Mussio and Dr. Cosimo Pacciani note the existence of a “strategic amnesia” which allows institutions to document dangers without acting on them.
Dr. Laurence B. Mussio writes in The Globe and Mail that Prime Minister Mark Carney faces a fundamental challenge: translating long-term economic vision into real projects within a federal system known for slow execution. Government machinery is structurally resistant to rapid change, and political actors are more skilled at short-term tactics than delivering complex projects. The author argues, however, that Canada has a deeper problem, a lack of institutional memory and execution capacity—what the author calls a deficit in “mnemonic capital.”