The New Zealand Election Study Team
Investigators
Jack Vowles
Professor of Comparative Politics — Victoria University of Wellington
Jack Vowles (Pākehā) is Professor of Comparative Politics at Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington. He has led the New Zealand Election Study since 1996, and was one of the principal investigators (with Peter Aimer) in 1990 and 1993.
Supported by the Marsden Fund, he is currently completing a study of electoral turnout in New Zealand, using a ‘big sample’ from the master rolls between 2014 and 2020. He was co-editor of A Populist Exception? The New Zealand General Election of 2017 (ANU Press, 2020) and co-author (with Tim Hellwig and Yesola Kwan) of Democracy Under Siege? Parties, Voters and Elections After the Great Recession (OUP, 2020).
Jennifer Curtin
Professor of Politics — University of Auckland
Jennifer Curtin (PhD, ANU) is Professor of Politics and Director of the Public Policy Institute at Waipapa Taumata Rau, the University of Auckland. She is an expert on gender politics and policy, as well as Australian and Aotearoa New Zealand politics and elections.
Jennifer has published eight books and more than 80 articles on these topics including two volumes drawing from New Zealand Election Study data – A Bark but no Bite: The 2014 New Zealand General Election (ANU Press, 2017), with Jack Vowles and Hilde Coffé, and A Populist Exception? The New Zealand General Election of 2017 (ANU Press, 2020), co-edited with Jack Vowles. Jennifer is involved in several externally funded projects related to the representation of women political leaders at the subnational level (SSHRC, Canada); the concept of the ‘Fair Go’ in Australia and New Zealand (ARC, Australia); and progressing gender inclusive policy making (HRC and MBIE).
Mona Krewel
Senior Lecturer in Comparative Politics — Victoria University of Wellington
Dr. Mona Krewel is a lecturer in Comparative Politics with a specialization in the study of elections, political parties, and public opinion at Victoria University of Wellington, as well as an External Fellow of the Mannheim Center for European Social Research (MZES) at the University of Mannheim. She is a member of the board of the German Society for Electoral Research (DGfW) and in this capacity part of the team which conducts the German Longitudinal Election Study (GLES). She is also the lead editor of the Journal of Elections, Public Opinion and Parties (JEPOP). Dr Krewel’s research focuses on the relation between media and politics and in particular on the role of the media in election campaigns.
Tom Jamieson
Lecturer in Political Communication — Te Herenga Waka, Victoria University of Wellington
Tom Jamieson is a Lecturer in Political Communication at Te Herenga Waka – Victoria University of Wellington. His work examines questions such as whether people can make informed decisions at the ballot box, and how to overcome myopia in political decision-making.
His book with Douglas A. Van Belle, That Could Be Us: News Media, Politics, and the Necessary Conditions for Disaster Risk Reduction, was published by the University of Michigan Press in 2022. His research has also been published in the American Review of Public Administration, Environmental Communication, International Journal of Communication, Journal of Experimental Political Science, Journal of Public Affairs Education, Political Research Quarterly, Political Science, Politics & Gender, Politics, Groups, and Identities, and PS: Political Science & Politics, among others.
Researchers
Luke Oldfield
Luke D. Oldfield is a lecturer of Politics at Te Herenga Waka–Victoria University of Wellington. He has a PhD in politics and international relations from the University of Auckland–Waipapa Taumata Rau. A Senior Research Assistant on the 2020 NZES, he also worked as a Research Assistant on Vote Compass in 2017 and various other election-related projects. Luke’s research interests are interdisciplinary, contributing to the fields of Political Science, Sociology, Critical Higher Education and Criminology.
Sam Bigwood
Sam Bigwood is a PhD candidate in Political Science at Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington. His thesis is looking at how the Covid-19 pandemic has affected attitudes towards the role of the state in Aotearoa New Zealand.
Sam Crawley
Sam Crawley is a political science researcher and teaching fellow at Te Herenga Waka / Victoria University of Wellington, specialising in the politics of climate change. He recently completed a Whitinga Postdoctoral Fellowship comparing different aspects of climate opinion in Aotearoa/New Zealand and Australia. Sam also works on broader aspects of public opinion, political behaviour, comparative and New Zealand politics.
Dominic O’Sullivan
Dominic O’Sullivan (Te Rarawa, Ngati Kanu) is a political theorist, public policy researcher, professor of political science at Charles Sturt University and adjunct professor at AUT University. Among his most recent publications is Sharing the Sovereign: Indigenous Peoples, Recognition, Treaties and the State. Singapore, Palgrave Macmillan, 2021. He has published over 50 refereed journal articles and book chapters and eight authored books. He is a regular political commentator on Australian and New Zealand politics.
Josh Van Veen
Josh Van Veen received an MA with first-class honours from the University of Auckland–Waipapa Taumata Rau. His thesis examined labourism and class dealignment in the United Kingdom and New Zealand. He has experience as a researcher, analyst, and writer, and is a Research Associate at the Public Policy Institute, University of Auckland.
Matthew Gibbons
Matthew Gibbons has a PhD in politics from the University of Waikato. His interests include quantitative analysis of parties’ policies, government expenditure and voting behaviour. He has also analysed social media data for the NZ Social Media Study at Victoria University of Wellington.