Leadership, Parties and Institutions Research
We have particular expertise in institutional mechanisms, and have engaged on collaborative work on the European Parliament and decision-making procedures in the EU, media and politics in Pacific Asia, and original work on political science, methodology and British politics.
British leadership
Professor Kevin Theakston's recent research involved a study of academic opinions towards British Prime Ministers, a survey of Foreign Secretaries, and research on Churchill's constitutional thought.
Research staff also created the new Political Leadership Specialist Group in order to give focus and impetus to the study of political leadership in the UK academic political science community.
British Parliamentarians
Dr Ed Gouge, Professor Theakston, and Dr Victoria Honeyman have recently researched the views and activities of former Members of Parliament.
British Politics
Dr David Seawright currently researches Parliamentarians' attitudes to European integration. Dr Stuart McAnulla does collaborative work on modernising local government, and original work on political science, methodology and British politics. Dr Timothy Heppell is currently researching the electing and ejecting of party leaders in British politics
Political Parties
Our research work on political parties includes work on European Social Democrats, Professor David Bell's work on French socialists and the French elections, and Dr Seawright's research into 'One Nation' British Conservatism.
EU
Professor Bell has written a biography of Mitterrand; Dr Christine Harlen, a biography of Gerhard Schröder.
Dr Charlotte Burns researches the European Parliament and decision-making procedures in the EU, and Dr Ricardo Blaug examines the interface of political theory, public policy and organisational design.
South East Asia
Dr Duncan McCargo specialises in Thai politics, and the media and politics in Pacific Asia, and recently completed a controversial biography of former Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra.
Professor Duncan McCargo currently holds an ESRC grant to study the complex low-intensity conflict in Thailand's Muslim majority southern border provinces, in which more than 3000 people have been killed since January 2004. He has already published an edited volume on the subject, Rethinking Thailand's Southern Violence (NUS Press 2007).
Professor of Southeast Asian politics Duncan McCargo gave ten academic presentations on the Southern Thai conflict during the Easter break, all in the United States. He conducted a briefing for the State Department; gave conference papers at the East-West Center in Washington DC and at the Association for Asian Studies annual meeting in Atlanta; and made seminar resentations at Johns Hopkins University (SAIS), University of California (Berkeley), University of North Carolina (Chapel Hill) and University of Wisconsin (Madison). He also addressed the World Affairs Council in San Francisco.
Professor Theakston is now one of the judges of the Samuel H. Beer Prize for best PhD thesis on British Politics written by a US-based scholar. The Beer prize is awarded annually by the British Politics Group, an associate group of the American Political Sciences Association.