Louis Stockwell

Teaching Fellow in European and Comparative Politics

Room: E1.10

Advice & Feedback Hours (Term 2):

Wednesdays 14:30 -15:30

Thursdays 14:30 - 15:30

Room E1.10 or online via Teams

Please email me to book a 15 minute slot.

Profile

I am a Teaching Fellow in European and Comparative Politics. I completed my PhD in Politics & International Studies at PAIS, Warwick in 2025. I also hold a BA (hons) in International Politics from the University of Huddersfield and an MSc (cum laude) in Political Science from Leiden University. Prior to undertaking my PhD, I worked for several years across local and national government programmes in the UK.

Research interests:

My research mainly centres on the uses and effects of direct democracy in a comparative perspective, with a specific focus on the relationship between referendums and issue (de)politicisation. My doctoral research examined the '(un)settling' effects of referendum processes across eleven countries and offered a new typology for conceptualising the indirect effects of direct democracy.

More broadly, I am also interested in methodologically diverse research into alternative and radical models of democracy, and am currently working on the issue of failed indigenous rights referendums in settler-colonial states.

Teaching:

In 2025/26 I am the module director for PO238: Themes in European Integration. I am also convening three seminars for PO132: Contemporary Themes in Comparative Politics.

Previously, I have been a senior GTA teaching on PO238, PO132, and PO107: Introduction to Politics.

Publications:

Stockwell, L. and Atikcan, E.Ö. (forthcoming). On the determinants of referendum boycotts in Europe: democracy, quorum rules, and party motivations. European Political Science Review

Houde, A.-M. and Stockwell, L. (2025). ‘'I Don’t Want Another Five Years of ‘The Only Thing We Talk About Is Brexit’”: The Dynamics of EU (De)politicisation in Post-Brexit Britain’, JCMS: Journal of Common Market Studies. https://doi.org/10.1111/jcms.70038

Stockwell, L. (2025). Contesting regional sovereignty from below: the unsettling effect of unilateral independence and autonomy referendums. Territory, Politics, Governance, 1–24. https://doi.org/10.1080/21622671.2025.2510653

Awards and scholarships:

• Monash-Warwick Alliance PhD travel grant for visiting research at Monash University, Melbourne (2024)
• Jean Monnet Network travel grant for visiting research at Carleton University, Ottawa (2024)
• Winner of the ECPR Standing Group on Federalism and Regionalism Best Paper Prize 2023 for the paper: "The efficacy of unofficial referendums as regionalisation and independence protest events: issue salience, polarisation, and mobilisation"
• Department of Politics and International Studies (PAIS) PhD Scholarship (2021), University of Warwick

Other activities:

Co-Chair of the 2022-2023 Critical International & Political Studies (CRIPS) graduate working group