Post-doctoral Research Associate

Faculty/Department
- Geography and Earth Sciences
- Salary Scale
- £39,905.97- £46,048.78 per annum
- Salary
- SP 31-36
- Contract Type
- Fixed Term
- Duration
- 01.10.2025 - 31.12.2028
- Full-time / Part-time
- Full-Time
- Weekly Hours
- 36.5 hrs
- Employment Visa
- Sponsorable
- Posted Date
- 22/09/2025
- Closing Date
- 28/09/2025
- Ref No
- 5874

The Role
What you’ll do
Who you are - Qualifications, Experience, Knowledge and Skills required
How to apply

**Benefits**:
Employment Visa

The Role

We are seeking to appoint two Post-Doctoral Research Associates to work on the ‘Rural Discontent, Spatial Justice and Disruptive Politics in the 21st Century’ (Rural-Spatial-Justice) research project, led by Professor Michael Woods. The project, selected as a European Research Council Advanced Grant and funded by the UKRI Frontier Research Guarantee, examines patterns and dynamics of rural support for disruptive political movements (such as populism) in liberal democracies, explores connections to sentiments of rural discontent and perceptions of spatial injustice, and investigate responses that address polarisation and promote social and spatial justice. The post-holders will contribute to the research through the collection and analysis of qualitative data, including library, online and field research, involving interviews, ethnography, textual analysis and participatory methods. The post will be based in Aberystwyth but will involve domestic and international travel, including extended periods of field research potentially in the UK, USA, France, Austria, Poland and/or Romania. The responsibilities of the post-holder will additionally include contributions to the intellectual and methodological design and development of the research, routine project management, and dissemination of results, including writing scientific outputs, social media and online content, and presentations.

Appointments are normally made within 4 - 8 weeks of the closing date.

The anticipated start date is 1 October 2025.

What you’ll do

As a Post-Doctoral Research Associate (PDRA) you will contribute to the delivery of the ‘Rural Discontent, Spatial Justice and Disruptive Politics in the 21st Century’ (Rural-Spatial-Justice) project, specialising in the collection and analysis of qualitative data. Rural-Spatial-Justice is a five-year project, from 1 January 2024 to 3 December 2028, which was selected by the European Research Council as an Advanced Grant and is funded by the UKRI Frontier Research Guarantee.

You will work as part of a project team at Aberystwyth University led by Professor Michael Woods alongside Dr Emanuele Amo (Qualitative PDRA), Conor Judge (Quantitative/GIS PDRA) and Dr Rachel Vaughan (Project Administrator), as well as three US-based co-investigators/advisors: Professor Loka Ashwood (University of Wisconsin Madison), Professor Leland Glenna (Penn State University) and Professor Ryan Weichelt (University of Wisconsin Eau Claire).

Rural-Spatial-Justice responds to the apparent significance of rural voters in disruptive political movements such as the Brexit referendum in Britain, election of Donald Trump in the USA, rising support for populist and/or far-right parties in Europe and South America, and backing for separatism in Scotland and Catalonia. Rural-Spatial-Justice examines the patterns and dynamics of rural support for disruptive politics and test posited explanations. It develops a novel analytical framework employing the concept of spatial justice to explore connections between disruptive politics and rural discontent, including inequalities in economic trajectories and resource distribution and perceptions of injustice in political decision-making and the neglect of rural cultures and their interests. The project also considers the implications of populist or exclusionary discourses for the rights of individuals and communities in rural areas and investigate alternative inclusive approaches for addressing discontent and promoting spatial justice.

Rural-Spatial-Justice involves a mixed methods strategy, combining qualitative, quantitative and participatory data, and international comparative research in a progressive scalar framework that moves from an initial global survey to national-scale analysis to local-scale case studies. The research focuses in particular on the UK, USA and Italy, plus at least two further European countries. The selection of the additional countries will be determined in part by the language competences of the appointed researchers. Potential countries under consideration include France, the Netherlands, Austria, Poland and Romania.

Rural-Spatial-Justice is organised into six work packages:
**_ WP1: Dynamics and Discourses of Rural Disruptive Politics_** is currently underway and involves scoping patterns, timelines and effects of disruptive politics in liberal democracies since 2000 and examining connections made to rural discontent or marginalization in political materials, me