Matthew Hepplewhite

I am a doctoral student at Merton College. I am researching the kind of people (in terms of sociodemographic characteristics, with a particular focus on education, former occupation, and class) who act as politicians in modern Britain, testing whether they are the kind of people whom Britons want to act as their representatives (at the experimental and electoral levels), and exploring what British politicians publicise - and don't publicise - about themselves with regard to the sociodemographic characteristics listed above.

Qualifications

• BA Social and Political Sciences (Double First) (University of Cambridge)

• MSc Politics Research (University of Oxford)

• DPhil Politics candidate (University of Oxford)

Awards

•  Elected to Senior Scholarship (Peterhouse, University of Cambridge)

•  Duke of Grafton Scholar in Social and Political Sciences (University of Cambridge)

• College Prize: Social and Political Sciences Tripos Part IIA (Peterhouse, University of Cambridge)

• College Prize: Social and Political Sciences Tripos Part IIB (Peterhouse, University of Cambridge)

Teaching

•  Comparative Government (paper 201), Department of Politics and International Relations, University of Oxford

•  Political Sociology (paper 220), Department of Politics and International Relations, University of Oxford

•  Modern British Politics and Government (paper 204), Department of Politics and International Relations, University of Oxford

 Publications

• Geoffrey Evans and Matthew Hepplewhite ‘Class and Educational Inequality in Electoral Participation: From Resources to Representation’ in Maria Grasso and Marco Giugni (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Political Participation. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Working papers

• ‘The British political elite, 1945-2022’, with Erzsébet Bukodi (University of Oxford), Geoffrey Evans (University of Oxford), and John Goldthorpe (University of Oxford)

• ‘A meating of the minds? An experimental study into Britons’ views towards vegan and vegetarian candidates’ with Rainbow Murray (Queen Mary University of London)

• ‘The leader’s new clothes: How Jeremy Corbyn presented himself sartorially on social media’ with Niamh Cashell (University of Manchester)

• ‘Brother, can you spare a grand? A qualitative exploration of British political donors’ with Rong Wei (University of Birmingham) 

• ‘Boy jobs and girl jobs? Gendered occupations and political candidates’ 

• ‘British candidate choice experiments: A review’ 

• ‘An MP who looks like me? A study of level of identification and vote choice using conjoint experiments’ with Sanne van Oosten (University of Amsterdam) 
   

Administrative positions

• DPhil representative, Postgraduate Student Representative Board, Social Sciences Division, University of Oxford

• DPhil representative, Graduate Studies Committee, Department of Politics and International Relations, University of Oxford

• DPhil representative, Social Science Library Committee, University of Oxford