We hope that, wherever you are, you are keeping safe and well. We have some updates for you, including:
- Our Annual Conference: Call for Papers/Blogs
- Who’s Watching Parliament: Survey of Parliament Data Users
- Join the PSA Parliaments Team: Membership Officer Vacancy
- Join our New PSA Parliaments Facebook Group
- Recently on the Blog
If you have any notices/messages you would like us to circulate to the group, please let us know.
Best wishes,
Stephen (@Stephen_R_Bates), Louise (@LouiseVThompson), Gavin (@GavinHart10) and Seán (@S_Haughey)
1. Our Annual Conference: Call for Papers/Blogs
This year’s annual conference will be held in Birmingham in the city’s Council House on the 12th and 13th November 2020.
The theme for this year’s conference is Parliaments in 20/20 Vision, allowing us to reflect upon the impact on legislatures of this year’s unprecedented events and to think about the past, present and future of parliaments and parliamentary studies.
Please see our website for our call for papers and for full details of the conference, which is co-sponsored by the School of Government at the University of Birmingham.
2. Who’s Watching Parliament: Survey of Parliament Data Users
A new project, funded by the Leverhulme Trust, looks at how new data is being used to monitor parliament. The researchers want to know more about who is using the data, what they are using it for and how this could impact on their thinking about Parliament and democracy in the UK.
If you have used Parliament data, please help the project by filling in their short survey.
The project is being overseen by Dr Ben Worthy, an academic at Birkbeck College. Please email him with any questions.
3. Join the PSA Parliaments Team: Membership Officer Vacancy
Want to get more involved with PSA Parliaments? We’re looking for someone to become our Membership Officer. The main responsibility will be to maintain and update our membership list but there will be scope to take on more tasks if you wish. The officership offers a fantastic opportunity to develop valuable skills, as well as building relationships with colleagues and practitioners. As such, it would be an ideal role for an early career researcher. No experience is necessary and a full induction will be provided. We are particularly keen to receive applications from people who are members of groups under-represented in the sub-discipline of parliamentary studies and political science more generally.
For an informal chat about what the role entails or to indicate your interest, please contact Stephen Holden Bates.
4. Join our New PSA Parliaments Facebook Group
PSA Parliaments has a new Facebook group for all the latest news in the world of parliamentary studies. Join here!
5. Recently on the Blog
Thanks once again for the great contributions made to our blog by group members and from our wider network of scholars and policy-makers. Some of our recent blogs include:
- Self-reflections and Measuring Effectiveness of Public Accounts Committees from across the Commonwealth by Matthew Hamilton
- Adapt or Perish. The Social and Material Conditions of the Transformations of the French National Assembly Over the Past Century by Jonathan Chibois
- The Senate of Canada: Coming of a New Age? by Matthew Williams
If you have an idea for a blog on some aspect of parliamentary study please get in touch with our communications officer Gavin Hart or message us on Twitter (@psa_parl).