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Department of Politics and International Relations
  1. Department of Politics and International Relations
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Environment

Prof Maria Grasso

Maria is Professor of Political Science and Political Sociology. Her research focuses on political sociology, social change, social and political inequalities, political generations, social movements, youth politics, gender gaps and the shift from traditional means of political participation relating to parties, electoral politics and left-right conflict, to more diffuse and irregular forms of involvement such as demonstrations, consumer boycotts and issue campaigns.

Maria is currently Scientific Coordinator on a 3.5-year €4m Horizon Europe, UKRI and SERI-funded project, DEMETRA, which aims to demonstrate means to alleviate tensions between democratic governance and sustainability transitions through an analysis of new deliberative participatory processes in seven European countries.

Maria’s research has appeared in The Times, The Financial Times, The Economist, The Independent, The Guardian, The Telegraph among others.

Dr Giulia Carabelli

Giulia Carabelli staff profile imageGiulia is Senior Lecturer in Sociology. Giulia's research focuses on the politics of everyday life, and how we make sense of inconsistencies, creative attempts at navigating crises, and the possibility of building more just and inclusive futures.

Giulia's current research reflects on the roles played by houseplants during the Covid-19 pandemic. It asks why caring for plants became so important to people during social isolation and it studies the affective bonds created between humans and plants in order to account for vulnerability, intimacy, and the emergence of more-than-human solidarities.

Dr Joanne Yao

Joanne is a Reader in International Relations. Her research centers on environmental history and politics, historical international relations, international hierarchies and orders, and the development of early international organizations.

Her first book, The Ideal River (Manchester University Press, 2022) examines the construction of the ‘ideal river’ in the European geographical imagination and the establishment of the first international organizations. 

Dr Jamie Matthews

Jamie is a Lecturer in Sociology. Jamie’s research interests centre on contemporary movements organising around issues of economic justice, climate crisis and waterways.

He has published work on themes including: water politics; dam resistance; populism; occupation and the spatiality of protest; the role of collective speech in political organisation; and literary readings of social movement theory.

Dr Sebastian Koehler

Sebastian is a Lecturer in Comparative Politics. He studies political decision making and in particular legislative processes and lobbying, with a core focus on the making of climate change policy.  

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