Why did I write this?

I had to - it was an integral part of my degree! An 8,000 word dissertation (that is, a big essay that involves an element of individual research) on the subject of "Globalisation and British Public Policy". This was the final module of my BA Politics degree at Sussex Uni. As with nearly all academic work at Sussex, we got to choose our own titles (subject to approval), and for some unfathomable reason, they let me off with this one!

When was it written?

Over a course of many, many weeks in the Spring of 1998. Helen helped enormously, reading endless drafts and helping immensely with the editing - we managed to shed almost 2,000 words to get it within the word limit. As I worked four nights a week until 9pm at night, I did the vast majority of the writing in the middle of the night, sometimes right through until after dawn. The day it had to be handed in, I worked on it until 10am, went to bed, then got up around 4pm to hand it in before the deadline. Even these days, a lot of my more creative work (on the web sites) takes place in the wee hours.

What happened to it?

I think the people marking it were over-awed by my familiarity with the subject, and were intimidated into giving it a mark of 72% - this was the single highest mark I received for any of my university work, and would have resulted in a First Class Degree if I'd managed to keep it going. As it happened, I had to settle for a 2:1 (and with it, the lack of the stigma of not having had any social life at Uni!)

Would I change anything about it?

Too bloody right I would! The version online has not been altered in any way whatsoever, however I know that large tranches of it are either dated or way off the mark. Consider this - I wrote this in 1998 after growing up in south coast England, and not having attended a Scotland game. Just a few weeks after its submission, I was at France 98 with the Tartan Army - even by then I knew several of my assumptions were way off beam.

The other thing is that this was written before the internet had really evolved to its current levels, and so little research was done online. If I was writing this again now, I'd write more for the internet than I did.

Still want to read it? It's right here.