I specialise in intelligence and security, and have worked across politics, international relations and business. I have written previously for the European Parliament on financial tools as a means of exerting political power. My research interests include defence and security, intelligence (trade craft and assessments), technological disruption, disinformation, conspiracy theories and hybrid conflicts.
I joined Hull in February 2021, as Professor of Intelligence and National Security. I was Head of Department of the Department of Criminology, Sociology and Policing between 2021 and 2024 and I am currently a Dean of Faculty.
Between 2016 and 2021 I was Associate Professor of Intelligence and International Security at the University of Leicester, where I directed the Postgraduate Research Community in Politics and International Relations, the Enterprise function in the School and our CPD provision.
Prior to this I worked for 9 years at Loughborough University and was until 2016 the Director of the Glendonbrook Institute for Enterprise Development at Loughborough University in London and Associate Dean for Enterprise at Loughborough University in London (LUiL), which was the largest project the university had undertaken since it gained its charter. These posts made me responsible for establishing our enterprise footprint in London, managing our strategic enterprise relationships and embedding enterprise and employability through the activities of the campus. I was - until October 2013 - the Academic Theme Developer for the Secure and Resilient Societies Strand, which is a key element in the University’s process of revising its core strategic approach. I have served as an elected member of University Senate and an elected member of the Joint Senate-Council Human Resource Committee and its subcommittees (including probation and promotion committees). During 2011 and 2012, I was Senate’s representative on two senior appointment panels (including that which appointed the new the Vice Chancellor). I have previously worked at King’s College London and the University of Bristol.
At KCL, I was a member of the College’s Academic Board and Director of the Postgraduate Taught Programme in Defence Studies, the largest social science masters in the EU at the time.
Between 2011 and 2020 I was the Convenor of the PSA/BISA Specialist Group, the Security and Intelligence Studies Group and from 2007 til 2015 I was Secretary to the ECPR Standing Group on the EU and then managed its communications.