Many tweeters have been laying into Oxford PPEists. Faisal Islam says they are "to blame for most UK problems", and the Renegade Economist says "PPE at Oxford University has had a disastrous effect."

Being a PPEist myself, I'm flattered to think I have such influence, but I don't think this is right, for three reasons.

1. It's not obvious what pernicious beliefs are instilled by PPE. The syllabus is so diverse that it can't convey a united body of knowledge and ideology; it's possible for two PPEists not to study a single common course after their first year. What is it that Nick Cohen, Seamus Milne, Toby Young, Ann Widdecombe, David Cameron and I have in common*? And Oxford certainly doesn't endorse right-wing ideology. Corpuscules and Balliolites in the mid-80s tutors and lecturers' included Andrew Glyn, Steven Lukes, Wendy Carlin and David Soskice, none of whom were famed for supporting neoliberalism or austerity - a tradition followed by Simon Wren Lewis**.

2. A PPE degree is like fame or wealth - it doesn't create character, so much as reveal it. Granted, PPEists include a lot of rum characters. But this could be a simple selection effect. The most able and ambitious young people who are interested in politics are disproportionately likely to do PPE at Oxford, and they are disproportionately likely to go onto careers in politics. There will therefore be a huge proportion of Oxford PPEists in politics. But this might not have anything to do with PPE causing people to become MPs and ministers.

3. The belief that PPE is responsible for neoliberal politics attributes too much power to politicians' agency and not enough to power structures. The fact is that we live in a post-democratic age (to use a phrase of another former PPE tutor) in which politics is shaped by the power and ideology of capital. These constraints influence politicians' behaviour much more than does their educational background.

* Self-opinionated arrogance, you might say. Whether this is because of selection (such qualities equipped us well for the admission interviews) or causality is, however, unclear.

** One could argue that PPE tutors have or had a leftist bias, but this is not the allegation being levelled on Twitter now.