Dr Chantal Sullivan-Thomsett is a Lecturer in Politics at the University of Liverpool and a CAST Affiliate. Her research explores how political actors understand, communicate and respond to social and environmental change, with particular interests in climate politics, political communication, political parties and activism.
Between 2022 and 2026, she worked as a Senior Research Associate and Theme 2 Co-Lead within CAST and on the ERC-funded Deep Decarbonisation: The Democratic Challenge of Navigating Governance Traps project. Drawing on qualitative and interpretive approaches, her research examined how politicians in the UK and Germany understand public perceptions of climate change, how increasing politicisation shapes climate discourse and policy debates, and what this means for the implementation of climate action.
Her wider research interests include environmental politics, Green parties, political participation, social movements, and the relationship between institutional and extra-institutional forms of political action.