Dr Matthew Wood

Matthew Wood is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Politics and International Relations. His first book, Hyper-active Governance (Cambridge University Press), explores how political economy can help explain different approaches governments use to using expertise within policy-making. It advocates an inclusive approach, integrating expertise within democratic governance. Matt is interested in how state institutions seek legitimacy, and how this is disrupted by different forms of political distrust. Matt is currently researching the politics of urban air pollution governance with Sheffield Air.

Matthew’s research is driven by a concern for how political and economic elites can critically reflect on and address legitimacy deficits by changing how they interact with the public. Working out how to do this requires multiple methods, and Matthew’s work moves between bottom-up ethnographic analysis of marginalised urban communities, and co-produced surveys and interviews with elite government agencies.