SPIN is pleased to share an event recording from our recent Research Methods Masterclass: Navigating the Challenges of Freedom of Information Access (FOIA). This event was aimed at PhD and early career researchers with an interest in accessing and using government files for research purposes. The recording consists of three presentations by each of our experts in regulating, using, and studying FOI/A (or Access to Information) for research across different national contexts, followed by a discussion and Q&A session.
Speakers
Speaker Bios
Dr. Aiden Clarkson is a Senior Upstream Regulation Officer in Freedom of Information and Transparency at the Information Commissioner’s Office. He works on developing resources to help public authorities comply with FOI/EIR, and on assisting the public to make workable and effective requests. Aiden has also worked in the ICO’s own Information Access team, handling complex FOI requests along with SARs and other individual rights requests, and on the ICO’s helpline and livechat services, giving detailed information rights guidance to private companies, public organisations, and individuals.
Prof. Kevin Walby is Professor of Criminal Justice, University of Winnipeg. He is co-author of Police Funding, Dark Money, and the Greedy Institution (Routledge, 2022) and co-editor of Changing of the Guards: Private Influences, Privatization, and Criminal Justice in Canada (UBC Press, 2022). He is the Director of the Centre for Access to Information and Justice (CAIJ) and co-editor of the Journal of Prisoners on Prisons.
Dr. Hannah Richards is a Research Associate at the University of Bristol and holds a PhD in Politics and International Relations from Cardiff University. She is currently working on the ERC/UKRI funded project ‘Powerful Perpetrators’, a five-year project looking at sexual misconduct and abuse perpetrated by professionals, and the regulatory and administrative justice mechanisms used to investigate and sanction their behaviour. Hannah is a co-convenor of the BISA Critical Military Studies working group and has had her work published in Critical Military Studies, Critical Studies on Security, and Review of International Studies.