Hello I’m Chris
A social scientist interested in the political sociology of migration, mobility, ethnicity and nationalism.
Hailing from Transylvania, trained in anthropology and sociology at Eötvös Loránd University of Budapest and Central European University, and with a PhD from Northumbria University, I currently work as a Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in Sociology at Newcastle University (UK).
I approach social research as a comparative, interdisciplinary and multimethodological endeavour. My work has combined ethnographic observation, document analysis, survey methods and statistical modelling.
I’m enthusiastic about transparency and reproducibility in the social sciences, and my pedagogical approach seeks to develop skills that facilitate open and credible research practices. My work as an Open Research Champion and my latest British Academy/Leverhulme Trust funded research project also contribute to this aim. Sometimes, I try my best to practice what I preach.
My latest …
This article explores the motivational factors behind preferences for medical care in the country of residence or the country of origin among EU nationals living in the UK. Undertaking a thematic analysis on a large-N qualitative data set, the article aims to establish a data-driven typology of motivations inductively. This provides an intermediary analysis between qualitative depth and quantitative operationalisability, contributing to the existing literature on healthcare location preferences among transnationally connected social groups. This article finds that preferences for medical care in the country of origin are driven overwhelmingly by quality considerations, while preferences for the UK have more to do with convenience and financing. These perceptions result from negative personal experiences, lack of trust, and often concealed cultural differences, and the analysis identifies various nuances and connections between attitudes that previous in-depth qualitative studies could not systematise.
The United Kingdom’s immigration and integration system is on the cusp of radical change. The complex patterns of mobility and settlement which had characterised the British migration system for over six decades had begun shifting at the turn of the millennium and within a decade the country’s migration landscape changed dramatically. This change was one of the principal factors contributing to the outcome of the 2016 Referendum on European Union membership, which has triggered an ongoing ‘Brexit’ transition period with yet unsettled legal and political outcomes, but which nevertheless is already affecting the UK’s demography and policy landscape. This article summarises the main changes undergone in the UK's migration system since the second half of the twentieth century.