Welcome to my website. I am a Professor of Politics and Public Policy at the University of East Anglia UK, in my home city of Norwich. I am also co-Director of the Electoral Integrity Project and Editor-in-Chief of the international journal Policy Studies.

I have held positions at the University of Sydney, the John W. Kluge Center in the Library of Congress, Washington D.C., USA, Swansea University, UK and International IDEA, Sweden.

My research focuses on:

• concepts of electoral integrity and democracy
• practical and policy-orientated solutions to improved elections
• the policy process and political change
• political leadership

You’ll find some of my work in journals such as International Political Science Review, Electoral Studies, Government and Opposition, Parliamentary Affairs, Public Money & Management and the British Journal of Politics and International Relations. I am the author or co-editor of eight books including: Elite Statecraft and Election Administration (Palgrave, 2012), Comparative Electoral Management (Routledge, 2020), Building Inclusive Elections (Routledge, 2020), and The Trump Administration (Routledge, 2022).

I have written commissioned policy reports for national and international organisations, and collaborated with organisations such as International IDEA, IFES, the Carter Center, Westminster Foundation for Democracy and the UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office. I have regularly given invited evidence to many Parliamentary committees and collaborated with organisations such as the Venice Commission. I was previously Senior Fellow to the UK All Party Parliamentary Group on Democratic Participation and been an invited speaker around the world including at Harvard University and for the UNDP.

My research has been externally funded by the British Academy, Leverhulme Trust, AHRC, ESRC, Nuffield Foundation, SSHRC, Joesph Rowntree Reform Trust, UK Electoral Commission and the McDougall Trust. I was a finalist for the ESRC Impact Prize for Outstanding Contribution to Public Policy in 2018.

I support Norwich City FC.  So if you follow me on Twitter, you’ll find tweets relating to my research, but also the occasional, over-excited tweet about the Canaries when they win. 

Current/Most Recent Research

I am currently writing on:

• COVID-19 and elections.
• The politics and policy of electoral data.
• Voter registration reform – such as the impact of automatic voter registration.
• Research papers on electoral observation, international electoral assistance and electoral integrity.
• Electoral integrity in general.
• Concepts of democracy and democratic theory.

My research is all available through this website.  I am always happy to send over copies of papers of material and keen to receive policy and media requests.

Publications