New parliament offers new opportunities for impact

Navigating and collaborating with parliament poses challenges for academics, but also offers rewards, says Marc Geddes.

The UK general election threw up a range of surprises for academics in the social sciences. But something that has not changed is researchers’ relative neglect of parliament as a route by which their work can influence policy.

In part, this may be down to perceptions that parliament has few powers to have a meaningful impact on legislation. Instead, academics have tended to focus on government and the civil service, especially in light of government initiatives on evidence-based policymaking. Studies of interactions between researchers and policymakers have similarly focused on these relationships.