About
A brief description of who you are and what you do.
This section will only display on your public profile if you’ve added content.
You can update this in Pure (opens in a new tab). Select ‘Edit profile’. Under the heading and then ‘Curriculum and research description’, select ‘Add profile information’. In the dropdown menu, select - ‘About’.
Write about yourself in the third person. Aim for 100 to 150 words covering the main points about who you are and what you currently do. Clear, simple language is best. You can include specialist or technical terms.
You’ll be able to add details about your research, publications, career and academic history to other sections of your staff profile.
Research
Research interests
- The role, evolution, influence and significance of the Downing Street Chief-of-Staff (1997-present); and
- Leadership of directly-elected mayors
Current research
Max's research is focused on the environments that political leadership occurs within. This includes "environments" interpreted in an abstract sense. He is currently particularly interested in:
1. The role, evolution, influence and significance of the Downing Street Chief-of-Staff (1997-present); and
2. Leadership of directly-elected mayors.
Max takes comparative and biographical approaches to his research topics.
Forthcoming
1. Stafford, M. W. (2024). 'The UK Prime Minister’s Chief of Staff’s management of special advisers', in J. Lees-Marshment (Ed.). Routledge Handbook of Political Management. London: Routledge.
2. I currently have a journal article on the political management roles of the Downing Street Chief-of-Staff submitted for review with a leading journal.
3. I am currently writing up a comparative study of the leadership of the urban centre-left in England (London, Manchester, Liverpool, Bristol) with Dr. Georgina Blakeley (Huddersfield) and Dr. Thom Oliver (UWE). This will be included in a forthcoming edited collection on the urban centre-left in Europe.
Journals
Sancino, A., M. W. Stafford, A. Braga and L. Budd (2021). What can city leaders do for climate change? Insights from the C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group network. Regional Studies. DOI: 10.1080/00343404.2021.2005244.
(Winner of Policy Paper of the Year, 2021, Regional Studies)
Worthy, B., Bennister, M. and M. W. Stafford (2019). Rebels Leading London? The Mayoralties of Ken Livingstone and Boris Johnson Compared. British Politics, 14(1), 23-43.
Stafford, M. W. (2014). Women’s political participation and their legislative representation. Alfred, 5(1), 50-57.
Books
I am currently in discussions with Bloomsbury, regarding the following books:
1. (2024) - Strong Mayors' Leadership Capital: New York, London, and Amsterdam (2000-2016)
2. A book on my current project regarding the role, influence and significance of the Downing Street Chief-of-Staff (1997-present)
Conferences
I have given c.20 conference papers on a range of topics related to my research interests (full listing on ORCID).
Book Reviews
I have published several book reviews for Party Politics and Political Studies Review (full listing on ORCID).
You can update the information for this section in Pure (opens in a new tab).
Research groups
Any research groups you belong to will automatically appear on your profile. Speak to your line manager if these are incorrect. Please do not raise a ticket in Ask HR.
Research interests
Add up to 5 research interests. The first 3 will appear in your staff profile next to your name. The full list will appear on your research page. Keep these brief and focus on the keywords people may use when searching for your work. Use a different line for each one.
In Pure (opens in a new tab), select ‘Edit profile’. Under the heading 'Curriculum and research description', select 'Add profile information'. In the dropdown menu, select 'Research interests: use separate lines'.
Current research
Update this in Pure (opens in a new tab). Select ‘Edit profile’ and then ‘Curriculum and research description - Current research’.
Describe your current research in 100 to 200 words. Write in the third person. Include broad key terms to help people discover your work, for example, “sustainability” or “fashion textiles”.
Research projects
Research Council funded projects will automatically appear here. The active project name is taken from the finance system.
Publications
Public outputs that list you as an author will appear here, once they’re validated by the ePrints Team. If you’re missing any outputs that you’ve added to Pure, they may be waiting for validation.
Supervision
A list of your current and past PhD students.
This section will only display on your public profile if content has been added.
Contact your Faculty Operating Service team to update PhD students you supervise and any you’ve previously supervised. Making this information available will help potential PhD applicants to find you.
Teaching
I have broad-ranging teaching interests, covering:
- political leadership
- British and American politics
- public administration
- research methods
In 2023/24, I will be teaching on the following courses:
PAIR1002 Political Systems
PAIR1007 Crises of the 21st Century
PAIR2004 Qualitative Research Methods
PAIR6043 Comparative Public Administration
PAIR6068 Professional Skills for the 21st Century
PAIR6071 Issues in Contemporary Public Administration
You can update your teaching description in Pure (opens in a new tab). Select ‘Edit profile’. Under the heading and then ‘Curriculum and research description’ , select ‘Add profile information’. In the dropdown menu, select – ‘Teaching Interests’. Describe your teaching interests and your current responsibilities. Aim for 200 words maximum.
Courses and modules
Contact the Curriculum and Quality Assurance (CQA) team for your faculty to update this section.
External roles and responsibilities
These are the public-facing activities you’d like people to know about.
This section will only display on your public profile if you’ve added content.
You can update your external roles and responsibilities in Pure (opens in a new tab). Select ‘+ Add content’ and then ‘Activity’, your ‘Personal’ tab and then ‘Activities’. Choose which activities you want to show on your public profile.
You can hide activities from your public profile. Set the visibility as 'Backend' to only show this information within Pure, or 'Confidential' to make it visible only to you.
Biography
Max Stafford is a political leadership studies specialist. He has taught at a number of universities (UK, America and Europe), delivering innovative content for students from First Year undergraduate to doctoral levels.
At Southampton, Max delivers courses in British Politics, Public Administration, Qualitative Research, skills development, and dissertations.
Max welcomes opportunities for research, consultancy, and public engagement work in relation to any of his research specialisms.
Max welcomes applications for PhD supervision.
You can update your biography section in Pure (opens in a new tab). Select your ‘Personal’ tab then ‘Edit profile’. Under the heading, and ‘Curriculum and research description’, select ‘Add profile information’. In the dropdown menu, select - ‘Biography’. Aim for no more than 400 words.
This section will only appear if you enter the information into Pure (opens in a new tab).
Prizes
You can update this section in Pure (opens in a new tab). Select ‘+Add content’ and then ‘Prize’. using the ‘Prizes’ section.
You can choose to hide prizes from your public profile. Set the visibility as ‘Backend’ to only show this information within Pure, or ‘Confidential’ to make it visible only to you.