I am senior lecturer and programme leader of the Master in Public Administration (MPA) at the University of the West of Scotland. I currently serve as Vice Chair Communications in the United Kingdom Association for Public Administration - UKAPA. I am member of the Editorial Board of the UKAPA journal Teaching Public Administration. I am also research fellow at the Public Governance Institute at KU Leuven, Belgium.

I am a political scientist with expertise across the subfields of comparative politics, comparative public policy and public administration. I specialise in politico-administrative relations, with a particular focus on the heart of policy advisory systems: the executive triangle of ministers, political advisers and senior civil servants. My research focuses in particular on politicisation, policy implementation, and the ethical architecture of public life, especially ethical standards, integrity, transparency and accountability, as well as the scandals and controversies that emerge when these frameworks are weak, contested or breached. A linked strand of my work examines elite circulation in comparative perspective, especially legislative turnover and its implications for democratic renewal, political accountability and policy outcomes. My work is multi-method, primarily internationally comparative, and spans research, teaching, pedagogy and policy engagement.

Here are my active research lines

Executive Triangle

I study executive politicians, top civil servants, and ministerial advisers (‘the executive triangle’) from an internationally comparative perspective. I currently represent the UK in the Management Committee of the EU Cost-Action Project CA22150 – Comparative Research on the Executive Triangle in Europe (CoREx) and also lead Working Group 4 on Accountability and Transparency in Executive Triangle in Europe. Action CA22150 - COST.

I am also partner to the international Scientific Research Network: The Executive Triangle: politicians, ministerial advisers, and senior civil servants, which is led by the KU Leuven Public Governance Institute and funded by the Research Organisation Flanders (FWO) FWO Scientific Research Network — Public Governance Institute

Parliamentary elites

I study the circulation of legislators in parliaments, also known as legislative or parliamentary turnover. My research originally focused on Western Europe and was part of my PhD Doctoral research: Determinants of Parliamentary Turnover in Western Europe (2014-2017) — Public Governance Institute It has now expanded to cover most legislatures around the world.  

Policy advice, knowledge utilization, advisory systems

I study policy advice and its utilization, as well as policy advisory systems. I have been involved as an invited expert in working group 4 'The policy advisory roles of political scientists in Europe', in the Cost Action project Professionalization and Social Impact of European Political Science, which is now closed. CA15207 - COST. 

Environmental policy implementation

Together with colleagues at the University of Exeter we study  environmental policy implementation deficits through our own newly developed framework, the Capacity - Intentionality Framework, that focuses both on institutional/governance capacity problems as well as on the strategic preferences of actors.