Jonathan Healey

Social historian Jonathan Healey tells the story of the 17th century, a revolutionary period that brought in a new world and whose history he says has many parallels with today.

English politics at the start of the 17th century centered on the king and court. By the turn of the 18th century, it was a world more familiar to our own with parliamentary politics, thriving arts and culture and an embryonic welfare state. Healey uses the stories of public figures and ordinary people to explain how this happened. And he argues that today’s bending of the constitution and clash of ideologies have echoes in the past.

Healey is a fellow of Kellogg College, Oxford, and a lecturer in English local and social history. He is author of The First Century of Welfare Poverty and Poor Relief in Lancashire, 1620-1730 and editor of the journal Local Population Studies.