Undergraduate Essay Competition

UNDERGRADUATE ESSAY COMPETITION

Thank you to everyone who nominated a student for our annual undergraduate essay competition, and thank you to the students for writing such high-quality essays and thereby making our job of choosing the best ones difficult.

A massive thanks also to Dr Stephen Holden Bates from the University of Birmingham for taking the time to be our guest judge. The PSA Parliaments team shortlisted the best essays and then Dr Holden Bates reviewed the shortlisted entries and made the final selection.

We are excited to announce the winners of the 2024 competition:

The winner is Colin Wilson for his “Parliamentary Studies Research Portfolio”, a collection of three mini-studies of executive-legislative relations, select committee scrutiny and substantive representation. He was nominated by Prof. Philip Cowley from Queen Mary University of London. The judging panel were impressed by the “high-quality analysis throughout combined with a good level of primary research“ and highlighted that Colin demonstrates “a very good understanding of the role of government backbenchers, committee work and influence as well as MPs’ constraints and conflicting incentives”.

You can read Colin’s essay here:

Download

The runner-up is Lola Clugston, who wrote an excellent essay on “Enhancing the Impact of Select Committees in the UK Parliament: A Focus on MP Engagement”. She was nominated by Prof. Stephen Elstub from Newcastle University. According to the judges, Lola demonstrates “a good knowledge of select committees” and the “way in which the evidence is used to make recommendations is detailed and impressively argued”.

You can read Lola’s essay here:

Download

We would like to congratulate the winners and thank everyone who submitted an entry.

We will announce the details for the 2025 competition in spring.