William T. Daniel, PhD

Welcome to my professional page. 

I am currently Associate Professor in Comparative Politics in the School of Politics and International Relations at the University of Nottingham (UK). I am a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy and teach on modules in comparative politics and research methods. I also serve as the School's Director of Admissions and External Relations. I co-direct the Research Centre for the Study of Parties and Democracy (REPRESENT). 

Prior to the University of Nottingham, I was Assistant Professor of Political Science at Francis Marion University (FMU) in Florence, SC. I obtained my PhD from the Department of Political Science at the University of Pittsburgh in 2013, where I was also affiliated with the University's European Union Center of Excellence and held visiting doctoral studentships at Sciences Po - Paris, Université Libre de Bruxelles, and the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven.

What I like to research.

My research interests are located at the intersection of comparative politics and international relations, with regional expertise in European politics and a substantive interest in representation. 

I'm currently working on a book project with Andrea S. Aldrich about the uneven implementation of gender quotas in Europe and how they have disrupted traditional patterns of career advancement and political representation.

I'm also leading a team of researchers analyzing the digital behaviour of French legislative candidates, as part of a larger study funded by the Digital Society Project. 

I am also working on a separate research stream to explore how the national identities of EU political support staff condition the broader behaviours of the institutions in which they serve.

My book on the career paths of Members of the European Parliament.

My book, Career Behaviour and the European Parliament: All Roads Lead through Brussels?, was published by Oxford University Press in 2015. The project explores institutional change in the European Parliament and its effect on the career paths of its membership. To do so, I examine the role of legislative professionalization and national political party gatekeepers on the career behavior and advancement strategies of European Parliament legislators. The project uses a major new source of quantitative data that I have collected on the personal and professional backgrounds of all European deputies, 1979-2014, that is available on the research tab of my page. It also relies on over fifty qualitative interviews that I have conducted with legislators and other political experts in Belgium, France, Germany, Luxembourg, and Poland.  

Related research that I have published since my book.

Related research on the legislative behavior of Members of the European Parliament that builds on this volume has appeared in JCMS: Journal of Common Market Studies, European Union Politics, Party Politics, Journal of European Integration, The Journal of European Public Policy, The Journal of Legislative Studies, Politics & Gender, Research & Politics, and in the form of various ongoing working papers and book chapters. For additional information on these projects, please consult my Publications & Data page.

A bit more about me.

I am originally from Charlotte, NC, and also hold an MA in Political Science from the University of Pittsburgh, as well as a BA magna cum laude with Honors in Political Science and French from Wake Forest University. I hold graduate studies certificates in European Union studies and Western Europe studies from the European Union Center of Excellence at the University of Pittsburgh and studied German language and culture as a FLAS scholar at the Middlebury College German School in Vermont. I speak both French and German and have also studied Dutch and Polish. 

When not crunching numbers and researching, I am probably teaching, traveling, or at the gym. 

For complete information on my educational background and ongoing projects, please refer to my CV, Publications & Data, and Teaching pages.