Dr Laura Cashman

I have extensive teaching experience in Higher Education. In 2019 I won the ‘Expect Respect’ CCCU Golden Apple Teaching Award and I became a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy in 2020. I currently teach global politics at undergraduate and postgraduate levels. I also supervise PhD students and mentor colleagues. As Course Director, I am responsible for the smooth running of our degrees. I manage processes that enable my colleagues and our students to have the best possible learning and teaching experience.

Before joining CCCU in 2009, I taught Politics and International Relations at the University of Glasgow and at the University of St Andrews. I graduated from Trinity College Dublin with a BA in European Studies and subsequently continued my postgraduate studies in Central and East European Studies at the University of Glasgow. My PhD, funded by the ESRC and a Europe Asia Studies scholarship, was awarded in 2007. My thesis examined the implementation of Romani integration policies in the Czech Republic and my research continues to explore themes linked to racism and discrimination.

I have designed and taught modules and courses at foundation, undergraduate and postgraduate level and I have supervised and examined PhD students. My teaching approach emphasises challenging discrimination based on gender, ethnicity, class or ability, to allow all students to achieve their full potential.

Student awards and module evaluations demonstrate that students rate my approach to teaching very highly. I won the Expect Respect Golden Apple Award in 2019 and was runner up for the Community, Diversity, and Inclusion Golden Apple Award in 2023.

I have been external examiner for politics degrees at the University of Brighton and London Metropolitan University and have used insights from these experiences to inform curriculum development at CCCU.

In 2024-25 I am leading the following modules:

• Level 4: Power, Politics and the State
• Level 6: Dissertations
• Level 7: Advanced Principles in Politics and IR

The main focus of my research concerns racism and discrimination. I have published articles and book chapters examining specific challenges facing Roma communities in local contexts, focusing particularly on the segregation of Romani children in so-called ‘special’ schools. My research agenda has now broadened to look at wider concerns of the growth of anti-Gypsyism in Europe to understand the persistent failure of state policies to address the social exclusion of Roma. I founded the Roma, Gypsies and Travellers (GRT) Research Network at CCCU to build a learning community of staff and students with an interest in themes related to exclusion of GRT communities.

I have also developed a parallel interest in questions of diplomacy and racism which developed out of my teaching experience and discussions with students. I am particularly interested in questions around decolonising how we research and study questions about foreign policy and international relations. These interests have allowed me to collaborate on joint research projects with colleagues. I have written about space diplomacy with Dr Sarah Lieberman and am currently working on a project analysing the Nigerian Space programme and its international partnerships through a postcolonial lens.

I am an experienced PhD supervisor and welcome applications on topics close to my areas of specialist research interest. Please get in touch if you have an idea for an interesting project.

I regularly provide peer reviews for academic journals and I have experience as a consultant for EU reports, and as a commentator in the UK media. My expertise has also been called upon as an independent expert in cases related to asylum claims.

• Interviewed and quoted in Forbes Magazine article about the International Space Station and the current state of space diplomacy: Crashing Space Station In 2027 Will Trigger Backlash Across ISS Allies (February 2025) 
• Ethics Advisory Board member LEGITIMULT Legitimate Crisis Governance in Multilevel Systems (Horizon Europe project (Oct 2022 – Sept 2025)
•  Steering Group Member KCC Gypsy Roma Travellers Health Needs Assessment (Feb 2022 – June 2023)
• Invited Speaker: Wales Institute of Social and Economic Research and Data’s (WISERD) Bangor University, Roundtable: “Roma civil society organisations in Europe: Navigating uncertainty in times of Brexit and Covid-19” (July 2021). 
• Invited Speaker: Loughborough University, London, Roundtable: “Roma Diplomacy and Voice in International Politics” (November 2021). 
• BBC Radio Kent ‘Drivetime’ Brexit debate (16 July 2018)
• Chair and participant in round table discussing “Britishness and National Identity” in response to Octopus at the Marlowe Theatre, Canterbury (19 June 2018)
• Keynote speaker: ‘Inspiring Kent Labour Women Event’ (10 March 2018)
• Independent Expert Opinion provided supporting Asylum application of Romani man at the Miami Immigration Court, USA (November 2017) 
• Interviewed and quoted in Financial Times article about EU Roma policy ‘Roma: Moving target’ (25 February 2014)
• Consultancy for European Parliament Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs (January 2011) 
• Invited Speaker: Disputed Rights: The free movement of Roma as EU citizens, Rosa Luxemburg Foundation Specialist Seminar, Bucharest, Romania (December 2010). 
• BBC Expert Adviser on stereotypes depicting Roma ‘Silent Witness’, (February 2010). 

I regularly peer review articles and have worked with the following academic journals: Ethnic and Racial Studies, Ethnopolitics, Europe-Asia Studies, European Journal of Social Work, European Review of International Studies, European Societies, International Affairs, International Journal of Human Rights, Journal of Communist Studies and Transition Politics, Journal of Contemporary European Research, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, Journal of International and Intercultural Communication, Journal of International Migration and Integration, Nationalities Papers, Patterns of Prejudice, Social Inclusion.