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Primary Investigators

Marija Taflaga  

Marija Taflaga is a Senior Lecturer at The Australian National University and Director of the Australian Politics Studies Centre. Marija holds grants from the Australian Research Council and the European Research Council to investigate how institutions shape political careers and how politicians use information to make decisions about politics and policy. She is co-host of the Democracy Sausage podcast.       

Patrick Dumont

Patrick Dumont is a Visiting Professor of Political Science at The Australian National University. He has published extensively on coalition governments and is currently involved in several comparative projects on political elites, electoral campaigns and political representation. He co-founded the European Consortium for Political Research Standing Group on Elites and Political Leadership and chaired the International Political Science Association Research Committee on Political Elites. He currently co-edits the Routledge Research on Social and Political Elites book series.

Annika Werner

Annika Werner is Professor at the University of Southampton and a Visiting Professor at the School of Politics and International Relations - The Australian National University. She is an expert on comparative and European politics, with a special research focus on populism, party behaviour, representation and public attitudes in democracies. Her research has been published in journals such as the Journal of European Public Policy, Democratization, Party Politics, and Electoral Studies. Her book “International Populism: The Radical Right in the European Parliament”, co-authored with Duncan McDonnell, is published with Hurst/Oxford University Press. Annika is a Steering Group member of the Manifesto Project (MARPOR, former CMP) and of the ECPR Standing Group Extremism and Democracy.

Research Associate

Tony Smith

The Hon Tony Smith, former Speaker of the Australian House of Representatives, served as the Member for Casey from 2001 until his retirement at the 2022 federal election. During his parliamentary career, Tony served as Parliamentary Secretary to Prime Minister John Howard. He also held several Shadow Ministerial portfolios and chaired numerous Parliamentary Committees. In 2019 Tony was awarded the Accountability Round Tables’ John Button Award for integrity in performing his duties as Speaker. In 2021 he was named the McKinnon Political Leader of the Year, for his work in consistently upholding Parliamentary standards and ensuring bipartisan accountability within the Parliament. Tony is a part-time Professor in the Practice of Politics at the Australian National University and the CEO of the Australian-American Leadership Dialogue.

Research Assistants

Charis Yang

Charis Yang recently graduated from politics, philosophy, economics honours at The Australian National University. Her thesis investigated racially and ethnically diverse political representation from migrant communities in the Australian Labor Party. She has been studying Chinese in Taiwan as a fellow of the New Colombo Plan Scholarship.

Rashna Farrukh

Rashna Farrukh is a journalist and producer. Her work has been featured on some of Australia's most respected media outlets, including the ABC, The Guardian, and The Conversation. She is a recipient of the Walkley-Our Watch fellowship and sits on the ACT committee for Media Diversity Australia. She recently completed her Honours degree in philosophy at The Australian National University, where she researched modern relationships.

Nicole Lawder

Nicole is undertaking a PhD at the Australian National University, looking at post-political life for politicians and candidates in the ACT (Australia). She was a politician for three terms in the ACT Legislative Assembly and has worked in a range of public, private, and for-purpose roles. Her original undergraduate Arts degree was at ANU, majoring in psychology and sociology, followed by a Master's in Business at Swinburne University.

Sofia Kalashnikova

Sofia Kalashnikova is a PhD candidate at the Australian National University (School of Politics and International Relations). Her research focuses on political representation and how national identity is shaped in Western democracies. She holds a Master’s degree from the St. Petersburg University (Russia). Sofia has studied at the University of Hamburg (Germany) as a DAAD scholarship recipient and conducted research at Keimyung University (South Korea).

Declan Thomas

Declan Thomas is undertaking a double degree in Law (Honours) and Politics, Philosophy and Economics at the Australian National University. He has worked as a Research Assistant for scholars in the School of Politics and International Relations and the College of Law, Governance and Policy; including alongside visiting judicial officers from Japan. His honours dissertation focuses on comparative judiciaries. He will continue exploring this research area as he begins working as an Associate to a judge in the ACT after graduating.

Former Research Assistants

Angus Padley

Angus Padley recently graduated from The Australian National University with Honours in Political Science after completing a Double Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science and Economics. Angus received the L F Crisp Memorial Prize for achieving the highest overall mark in the political science honours cohort and has published in the ANU Undergraduate Research Journal. He is currently studying a PhD in Political Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

Thomas Velican

Thomas Velican is a recent BA (Honours) graduate from The Australian National University. His honours dissertation focused on examining the role of trust as a determinant of AI-related public opinion in Australia. Thomas is currently a graduate strategy analyst with Deloitte’s Canberra office.