Dr Mette Wiggen is a lecturer in the School of Politics and International Studies (POLIS) at the University of Leeds. She teaches on the Extreme Right in Europe, and politics for the Introduction to Social Sciences foundation course aimed at Widening Participation- and international social science students at Leeds.  Mette is the Widening Participation Officer for the University’s Social Science Cluster where she engages with non traditional students who are exploring and entering higher education.

Mette has a background in politics and campaigning in Norway and the UK where for many years she volunteered in the refugee sector and for local schools.

Mette has more than 20 years of teaching experience for students at all ages from primary school to adult education. She has taught languages and politics, in Norway and the UK, with guest lectures and conference papers in Egypt, Spain, Portugal, The Netherlands, Norway, UK and USA.  Mette has also given papers at teaching and learning conferences in the UK on intercultural communication, on student lead discussion groups and on how to engage with students and teach the undergraduate dissertation. Mette has acted as a supervisor for UG thesis at the university in Konstanz, where she supervised work written in German.

Mette has researched in the field of retrenchment of the welfare state, the impact of neo liberalism on the poor and linked that to support of the radical right.

In recent years Mette has presented conference papers on inequality, the welfare state and the radical right, in Sweden, USA and the UK.  Mette has been interviewed about Scandinavian Politics several times on Radio Leeds and in newspapers in Norway.

Mette has published in New Political Science, The Conversation, CIPP Bulletin and co-authored in Economic Performance in Europe (Edward Elgar 1995).

Specialist research areas:

Increase in inequality and support to the radical right in Scandinavia. She looks at Islamophobia and welfare chauvinism and how the mainstream left as well as the right have co-opted a radical right, and increasingly racist, language and strategies in dealing with immigration in general and refugees in particular. In the name of freedom of speech increasingly radical groups are demonstrating and taking part in mainstream events as in the case of the Nordic Resistance Movement.

Available for consultation in the following areas:

The radical right in Scandinavia; widening participation; and how to engage young people in politics and society.