::People
Professor Andrew Chadwick - Co-Director
Andrew Chadwick (BSocSc Birmingham, MSc London School of Economics, PhD London School of Economics, FRSA) is Professor of Political Science in the Department of Politics and International Relations at Royal Holloway, University of London, where he founded the New Political Communication Unit in 2007 and was Head of Department from 2006 to 2009. He has authored numerous publications in the field of digital media and political communication. His books include The Hybrid Media System: Politics and Power (Oxford University Press, 2013, 272pp), The Handbook of Internet Politics, co-edited with Philip N. Howard (Routledge 2009, 528pp), and Internet Politics: States, Citizens, and New Communication Technologies (Oxford University Press, 2006, 400pp), which won the American Sociological Association Best Book Award (Communication and Information Technologies Section) and is among the most widely-cited books in its field. Andrew founded the Oxford University Press book series Oxford Studies in Digital Politics and was a founding Associate Editor of the Journal of Information Technology and Politics and continues as a Senior Editorial Board member for the journal, which is published by Routledge. He was also a member of the US National Science Foundation-funded International Working Group on Online Consultation and Public Policymaking, which ran from 2008 to 2010, and a founding member of the European Consortium for Political Research Standing Group on the Internet and Politics. Andrew's latest book, The Hybrid Media System: Politics and Power (2013) analyses the emerging integration and balance of power between older and newer media logics in political life. Read more here.
Click here for more information about Andrew Chadwick.
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Professor Ben O'Loughlin - Co-Director
Ben O’Loughlin is Professor of International Relations and Co-Director of the New Political Communication Unit at Royal Holloway, University of London. He is co-editor of the Sage journal Media, War and Conflict. In the next year he will publish two volumes on strategic narratives. In December 2013 Routledge in New York will release the monograph: Strategic Narratives: Communication Power and the New World Order. This is followed in July 2014 by an edited volume, Forging the World: Strategic Narratives and International Relations, published by University of Michigan Press and drawing together leading experts in communication and IR. His previous books include Radicalisation and Media: Terrorism and Connectivity in the New Media Ecology (2011) and War and Media: The Emergence of Diffused War (2010). He has carried out projects on media and security for the UK’s Economic and Social Research Council and the Centre for the Protection of National Infrastructure. He has contributed to the New York Times, Guardian, OpenDemocracy, Sky News and Newsweek. Alongside the completion of a book on Strategic Narratives, Ben is currently completing a study of global responses to the 2012 London Olympics with the BBC.
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Dr Akil Awan
Akil is an RCUK Fellow based in the Department of History. Previously he served as a key researcher on the ESRC project Shifting Securities: News Cultures Before and Beyond the Iraq War. He is an active member of the Muslims in Britain Academic Research Network. Among his research specialisms are the function, legitimacy, and radicalising efficacy of virtual Jihadist media and the use of the Internet by Jihadist groups.
Click here for more information about Akil N. Awan.
Dr James Sloam
James Sloam is Senior Lecturer in Politics and International Relations. His research interests are: political parties, the role of new media in young people's democratic engagment, German politics, European social democracy.
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Current PhD Students
Billur Aslan
Billur is a PhD candidate in the department of Politics and International Relations, supervised by Professor Ben O'Loughlin. She holds an MSc in International Relations from Royal Holloway and a BA in Communication from Galatasaray University. Billur's thesis is titled, 'Interactional Dynamics Among Political Institutions: How Actors Adapt to the Internet in Democratic and Non-Democratic Regimes'. Follow Billur on Twitter.
Puay Hoe Chua
Puay Hoe's working title is "Examining the Perceptions of Political Communication Control and Its Impact on Political Legitimacy within a Changing Media Ecology: A Comparative Analysis of Greater China and Singapore". He holds an MSc in International Political Economy and a BA in Communication from Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. Puay Hoe is supervised by Professor Ben O'Loughlin.
Simon Collister
Simon's working title is "Who Governs and Who Ought to Govern?”: Framing, Democracy and the Networked Information Economy." He is supervised by Professor Andrew Chadwick. Follow Simon on Twitter.
James Dennis
James's working title is "It's Better to Light a Candle than to Fantasise About a Sun": Exploring Social Media and "Slacktivism." He is funded by the Economic and Social Research Council South East Doctoral Training Consortium and is co-supervised by Professor Andrew Chadwick and Professor Ben O'Loughlin. Follow James on Twitter.
Adam Drew
Adam's working title is "Legislating Cyber Security". His research examines the definitional problems surrounding cyber security/war/conflict and the consequences for their governance and legislation. He is supervised by Professor Ben O'Loughlin.
Matthew Hall
Matthew is working in the area of political theory, ethics and technology. The working title of his PhD is, "Bureaucracies, Data Collection and Freedom. Is our freedom violated when a state bureaucracy collects our personal data, and if so, how?" Matthew was awarded a full ESRC 3-year scholarship by the ESRC. He is supervised by Jonathan Seglow and Ben O'Loughlin.
Aaron Peters
Aaron is working in the area of new media, collective action, and organizational change. He is supervised by Professor Andrew Chadwick. Follow Aaron on Twitter.
Mark Pope
Mark's working title is "Is human rights discourse framed from a cosmopolitan perspective in UK news media?" He is supervised by Professor Ben O'Loughlin. Follow Mark on Twitter.
Amy Smith
Amy joins us in September 2013. She will be examining elite control of political communication in the new media environment during the 2015 UK general election. Amy is funded by the Economic and Social Research Council South East Doctoral Training Consortium and is co-supervised by Professor Andrew Chadwick and Professor Ben O’Loughlin. Follow Amy on Twitter.
Recently Completed PhDs
Dr Lawrence Ampofo (2012)
Lawrence was supervised by Professor Ben O'Loughlin. He holds an MSc in International Security and Global Governance from Birkbeck College, University of London (2007). His thesis was titled, "Terrorism 3.0: Understanding Perceptions of Technology, Terrorism and Counter-Terrorism in Spain". Lawrence now runs his own social media analytics company, Semantica Research.
Dr Nick Anstead (2009)
Nick’s thesis, supervised by Professor Andrew Chadwick, was concerned with how structural differences between the British and American party systems shape political uses of the Internet during election campaigns. He was appointed Lecturer in Politics at the University of East Anglia in September 2008 and in September 2010 he became a Lecturer in Political Communication in the Department of Media and Communications at LSE. See Nick’s blog.
Dr Christopher Frazier-Crawford Boerl (2012)
Christopher Frazier-Crawford Boerl, who was supervised by Professor Andrew Chadwick, wrote his thesis about the Internet's role in civic engagement, mobilization and social capital, based on an analysis of the role of religious organizations in US politics. For more information, see Christopher’s website.
Dr Yenn Lee (2009)
Yeon-ok Lee (Yenn Lee) was a PhD candidate in the Department of Politics and International Relations, supervised by Professor Andrew Chadwick. Her thesis focused on mobilisation and civic engagement on the Internet, on the basis of a case study of the Nosama movement in South Korea. Yenn blogs at Yawningtree.net. She now lectures in social science research skills at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London.
Dr Chris Perkins (2011)
Chris has a BA in Japanese Contemporary Society and Education Studies from Oxford Brookes University, with one year spent studying at Kitakyushu University in southern Japan. After two years teaching in Gifu, Japan, he returned to the UK and completed an MSc in International Relations at Royal Holloway College. His PhD thesis in the Department of Politics and International Relations, supervised by Professor Ben O'Loughlin, focuses on how images of foreignness are constructed in Japan, and what this can tell us about current theories of cultural exchange, the nation and globalization. Chris is Reviews Editor of the journal Media, War & Conflict. In January 2011 Chris became a Lecturer in Japanese Studies at the University of Edinburgh. Read his Alumni mini-profile in which he discusses his time as a NPCU PhD here.
Dr Guido Reinke (2009)
Guido’s thesis investigated the policy-making process for EU ICT policy, and focused in particular on the role played by business organisations in defining the the EU’s Information Society project. Guido currently works for Ernst and Young as a consultant. He was supervised by Professor Andrew Chadwick.
Visiting and Affiliated Academic Staff
Maria Luisa Azpíroz
Maria Luisa Azpíroz completed her PhD candidate in the University of Navarra (Spain) in December 2011. Her PhD thesis focuses on public diplomacy in the “War on Terror” and its impact on European media. Maria was a Visiting Graduate Student from September to December 2008.
Dr Mary Francoli
Mary Francoli was Leverhulme Visiting Fellow in New Media and Internet Politics in the Department of Politics and International Relations in 2006-2007. She is interested in the impact of new media such as the Internet on governance, the state and society. Currently, her research is largely focused on the idea of the 'digital commons and how new forms of 'e-participation' impact the relationship between citizens and their elected representatives. She has also been looking at how governments – particularly the Canadian government – are adopting e-government strategies, and researching the institutional and policy changes that are required for these strategies to be realised. Beyond issues related to e-government and e-democracy, she is interested in challenges that new technologies – including spam, VoIP and satellite radio – pose for communication policies and communication industries. Mary is now an Assistant Professor in the Department of Communication at Carleton University, Ottawa.
Dr Mike Jensen
Mike grew up in Southern California. After a brief detour to Iowa, he returned to Southern California to pursue a Ph.D. in political science. He completed his dissertation, entitled “Electronic Democracy in America: The Internet and Participation in American Local Politics,” in 2007. He was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of California Irvine's Center for Research on Information Technology and Organizations (CRITO). Mike was a Visiting Postdoctoral Researcher here during the autumn of 2008. He is now a researcher at the Australia and New Zealand School of Government’s (ANZSOG) Institute for Governance at the University of Canberra.
Dr Lina Khatib
Lina Khatib is an expert on media in the Middle East, particularly cinema in the Arab world and Iran, Arab television and new media. Formerly a member of the Department of Media Arts at Royal Holloway, Lina is now Program Manager at the Center for Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law at Stanford University (within the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies), managing their new Program on Good Governance and Political Reform in the Arab World. Lina's work focuses on the relationship between media and politics as well as social issues. She is also a political media analyst and consultant specializing in the Middle East. She has been involved in a number of international workshops and conferences on topics such terrorism and the new media, Arab-Israeli relations, and media, democracy and terrorism in the Arab world and has featured in media outlets across the globe, most recently on Al-Jazeera, BBC World (Arabic Service) and CNN International. Lina is the editor of the Journal of Media Practice, and serves on the editorial boards of New Cinemas: Journal of Contemporary Film, and Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture.
Policy on Academic Visitors: Please note that we do not normally accept unsolicited applications for temporary visiting positions outside of when we advertise. Advertisements inviting applications for visiting positions will be placed on the Unit's home page and publicised internationally from time to time.