speech, a report by the Health Foundation, a think-tank, found that trusts using Palantir’s discharge tool cut delays no faster than those that did not. Nor does low uptake explain why Chelsea and Westminster, a trust in west London, has been the best trust at using the platform to reduce waiting lists, yet its lists have still risen faster than almost any other’s. Similar marketing hype surfaces in defence. Sir Tom Copinger-Symes, a recently retired lieutenant general, says that Palantir is “world-leading” at turning a complex military mission into actionable data flows. His concern is the way its marketing can present the firm as a “full-solution AI company rather than one supplier in a much broader supply chain”. The government has sometimes encouraged the same impression. A “strategic partnership” with the Ministry of Defence announced last September is less sweeping than it sounds: “a complete fantasy”, says one former official, pushed by government advisers who thought it would “look good”. Such salesmanship, abetted by government, has helped thrust Palantir into the centre of a panic about “tech sovereignty”, the loosely defined but real sense that Britain lacks control over critical technology at a time when America is no longer such a predictable and dependable ally. On this front, though, many of the concerns directed specifically at Palantir are misguided. The NHS recently apologised after failing to disclose that some Palantir staff would be able to see identifiable patient data, adding to fears about the 2018 Cloud Act, which gives the American government the power to request data from tech companies even when the data are hosted by foreign subsidiaries. In practice, there seems little chance that Palantir could be compelled to disclose such data: the information stays within the trust, which remains the data controller. Engineers lack the legal permission or access to browse patient data for secondary purposes. Another fear is a “kill-switch” moment, such as when the American government banned the use of Anthropic’s latest models for non-Americans. But if dependence on American tech giants is the worry, there are more alarming examples. The NHS relies on Microsoft for email and other communications (like Microsoft Teams), cloud and, increasingly, AI: it has just bought 500,000 Microsoft Copilot licences. Oracle, another American tech giant, is its largest supplier of patient records. Palantir “wouldn’t even
make my top 100 of the things I would worry about”, says Ben Moore, until last year the procurement adviser to Britain’s defence secretary. More broadly, controversy around Palantir is a distraction from an uncomfortable truth: there are few good British or other European alternatives to the top American tech companies. The state can do some things itself. Last year the housing ministry replaced a Palantir refugee- matching system with its own, saving “millions of pounds” in running costs. In June France said ChapsVision, a domestic AI firm, would take over the contract with DGSI, the country’s internal-security agency—but not before 2028. For other things, it needs American suppliers. If Britain exercises a break clause for the FDP, as a select committee of MPs has recommended, it will be nigh-on impossible to find a consortium to replace Palantir before next February. “All the other companies are miles behind,” says Mr Bartlett. On the battlefield, inferior tech could get British soldiers killed, argues Sir Tom. Colleagues, in love with American tech, should be careful not to buy its “full stack”, he suggests. But “would we buy the third-best tank just because it’s British?” ■ This article was downloaded by zlibrary from https://www.economist.com/britain/2026/08/20/why-everybody-hates-palantir
What the tragic death of Jason Arday says about Cambridge University It has many questions to answer Aug 20th 2026 ALICE (not her real name) never felt comfortable at Cambridge University. It was too elitist. But during her MPhil in education in 2024, one professor stood out. Gentle and dreadlocked, he took the time to learn students’ names, the sports they liked. He made them feel any one of them could be an academic. Autistic and, he claimed, non-verbal until he was 11, he did not learn to read and write properly until 18, but still became Cambridge’s youngest black professor at the age of 37. “Most of my cohort agree,” says Alice. “He’s genuinely the best teacher we ever had.” Granted, Jason Arday wasn’t for everyone. Traditionalists disliked his classes, which included little critical study of texts and lots of ramblings
about song lyrics. He often went off on unfocused rants, Alice recalls, and was “very attached” to his personal story. Still, it was a shock when, in July, allegations grew that he had plagiarised extensively, fabricated research and lied about his CV. When he resigned on August 5th, hours after Cambridge opened an investigation into his qualifications, Alice was confused and disappointed. Nine days later, when he was found dead (in circumstances police called unexpected but not suspicious), she was angry. By conventional measures, Mr Arday should never have been appointed to a chair at one of the world’s top-ranked universities. Only six years earlier he had been lecturing in physical education at Leeds Beckett University, a former polytechnic. His first academic paper appeared in 2018. Cambridge was looking at different criteria. It had been shaken by the institutional reckonings that followed the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis in 2020. In March 2023 a damning internal report noted that over the previous three promotion rounds none of the 216 eligible applicants for professorships was black. The report spoke of an “urgency to build the pipeline of Black scholars at the University through recruitment and promotion”. That month Mr Arday took up his post as a professor of sociology of education. A press release said a “major focus of his work” would be helping Cambridge recruit a “more diverse range of students and staff”.
He specialised in racial inequality in academia. Two books he had co-edited, including “Dismantling Race in Higher Education: Racism, Whiteness and Decolonising the Academy”, were added to the sociology curriculum. He was happy to tell his sensational story on camera. In July a blog post challenged his narrative. It found dozens of plagiarised passages in his doctoral thesis and queried some of his sensational feats, such as running 30 marathons in 35 days. The author, Nathan Cofnas, was hardly impartial: a self-described “race realist”, he had left Cambridge in 2024 after a backlash to his chauvinistic view that in a true meritocracy black people would “disappear from almost all high-profile positions outside sports and entertainment”. Yet the Times Higher Education had planned to publish a similar story in 2025, only to drop it after Mr Arday instructed lawyers. In a quiet month, national newspapers and social media piled in (see chart). The release in America of Mr Arday’s memoir, the aptly named “Great and Unfortunate Things” (and the leaking of an at times contradictory book proposal), raised more eyebrows. He claimed he had spent months in a coma with locked-in syndrome, had testicular cancer, two brain tumours, and epilepsy after being beaten by teenage thugs. The book also included a moment of prescience. After sending his application to Cambridge, Mr
Arday wonders if he has “completely overestimated” his capabilities. “What if”, he writes, “my story ends up being a cautionary tale like Icarus about flying too close to the sun?” Cambridge faces many questions. “All of this could’ve been avoided if Cambridge did its due diligence, a basic background check,” says Clive Aruede of the Association of Black Humanists. The university told The Economist it continued to provide support after Mr Arday resigned, screening his emails and posts for racist messages, and providing counselling. Many will wonder if it did enough for the man it placed on a pedestal once he fell off it. The myths about Mr Arday are already being written. Both sides of the culture war portray him as a black victim. A totem for a cult of wokeness in an academy which prioritised diversity over merit; a hero hounded to death by a racist press. The likelier story is both duller and more depressing: an institution wanted a symbol badly enough not to look too closely, and a vulnerable man supplied one.■ This article was downloaded by zlibrary from https://www.economist.com/britain/2026/08/20/what-the-tragic-death-of-jason-arday- says-about-cambridge-university
The Hundred’s big-city revolution is reviving an old county-cricket tradition The sport is having a surprising local renaissance Aug 20th 2026 “METRO BANK fever” is sweeping English cricket. Named after the sponsor of the county One-Day Cup, symptoms include an unlikely enthusiasm for second-string cricketers and obscure provincial grounds. Demand for tickets at such “outgrounds” has been febrile. Surrey even threatened to punish members who failed to use their tickets for sold-out games at Guildford. An outground revival was not part of cricket administrators’ modernising plans when they launched The Hundred in 2021. Rather than 18 counties, eight city-based franchises compete in a brash 100-ball tournament featuring fireworks and six-hitting aplenty. Manchester Super Giants won the men’s
final on August 16th, and Trent Rockets won the women’s contest. The Hundred has transformed the women’s game in particular, bringing bigger audiences and salaries. But traditionalists hate it, and counties without a host venue fear being left behind. This year investors paid more than £500m ($680m) for stakes in the eight franchises; four attracted American investors, and four went to owners of Indian Premier League teams. The Oval Invincibles were renamed MI London, part of Mumbai Indians’ global stable. The One-Day Cup is county cricket’s 50-over competition. It now runs alongside The Hundred, which nabs the best talent. But it gains a consolation prize: a prime slot during the August school holidays. Pre- Hundred, the 2019 One-Day Cup took place mostly in April and May and just 8% of group-stage matches were played at outgrounds. This year 40% were. The shift is sharpest among counties whose grounds host Hundred games. The Hundred team based in Yorkshire, for example, is SunRisers Leeds; Yorkshire’s One-Day Cup side plays its home games in York and Scarborough. Small grounds bring advantages. A crowd of a few thousand that looks sparse at a major ground used for international cricket feels