I am a Professor of International Management & Political Economy at Loughborough University London. I joined LU LND in August 2017 from King’s College London where I worked from 2009 as Lecturer, Senior Lecturer, and then Reader in Comparative Management. Before that I was a Research Fellow at the Centre for Business Research (CBR), University of Cambridge (2007 – 2009) and the Centre for International Studies, and Diplomacy (CISD), SOAS, University of London (January – August 2009).

I hold a PhD in political science from the University of Lausanne, Switzerland (2008), an MA ("DEA") in political science from the Universities of Lausanne and Geneva (2003) and a BA ("licence") in political science from the University of Lausanne (2001).

My research is situated at the intersection of Comparative Management, Comparative Political Economy, and Comparative Politics. I am interested in the ways in which formal and informal institutions shape economic behaviour and economic structures in different countries. My approach is hence an institutionalist approach drawing notably on Historical Institutionalism, New Institutionalism in Organisation Theory, and on New Institutional Economics.

As part of my research I am particularly looking at the role that the law plays in shaping economic activities and outcomes. I therefore also venture into the area of socio-legal studies, legal theory and Law and Economics. My current research focuses indeed on the question whether law matters for change of firms' corporate governance practices, or whether the latter evolve quite independently.

The type of institutions I have looked at include not just law, however, but also 'soft' and informal institutions, such as interlocking directorate and ownership networks among companies. The research questions I am interested in revolve around the drivers and consequences of institutional change and the interaction between institutions and actors' behaviours.

Studying institutional change in the advanced and emerging capitalist economies in the 20th and 21st centuries is hardly possible without thinking about the process of liberalisation and the spread of market mechanisms to areas of human society where they were previously absent. As a result, I have increasingly become interested in theories of economic and political liberalism and the role that liberal ideas play in economic and societal change.