Biography
Samuel Defacqz is an Assistant Professor in Political Science at UCLouvain, held jointly within the Faculty of Economic, Social and Political Sciences and Communication and the Institute for european Studies (UCLouvain Saint-Louis Bruxelles). He is also an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Political Science at Université Laval (Canada), where he previously served as an Assistant Professor between 2021 and 2024.
His primary research interests center on European Union governance, policies, and institutions, lobbying and interest groups, public administration (with a focus on digital transformation), administrative burden, and comparative politics.
Prior to his current appointment, Dr. Defacqz worked as a postdoctoral researcher on major European collaborative initiatives. He held research fellowships at the CNRS / Sciences Po Grenoble (UMR Pacte, France) and UCLouvain (ISPOLE, Belgium). During this period, he contributed to the EU Horizon 2020 TROPICO project, investigating digital transformation challenges in public administrations across ten countries. He also collaborated on the ERC-funded QUALIDEM project (led by Professors Virginie Van Ingelgom and Claire Dupuy at UCLouvain), which bridged citizens’ attitudes toward politics with public policy shifts.
Samuel Defacqz earned his Ph.D. in Political and Social Sciences from UCLouvain in 2018 as a Doctoral Research Fellow (Aspirant) of the F.R.S.-FNRS. His dissertation examined the interactions between national and European interest groups through a comparative qualitative lens. As part of his doctoral training, he was also a visiting researcher at the Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM).
Research
Dr. Defacqz’s research explores the intersection of European integration, public administration, and civil society. His primary research areas include:
- EU Governance & Institutions: European public policies, decision-making processes, and institutional dynamics.
- Lobbying & Interest Groups: Relations between national and European interest groups, qualitative and comparative approaches to interest representation.
- Public Administration & Digital Transformation: e-Government, digital transitions in public sector organizations, and administrative burden.
- Comparative Politics: Citizen-state relations, public policy analysis, and comparative democratic challenges.
Research Projects & Grants
- TROPICO (Transforming European Public Controls with the Public Sector) — Postdoctoral Researcher
EU Horizon 2020 funded project analyzing the drivers and barriers of digital transformation and collaboration in public administration across 10 European countries.
- QUALIDEM (Connecting Citizen-State Relations and Policy Dynamics) — Collaborating Researcher
ERC-funded project (led by Prof. Virginie Van Ingelgom and Prof. Claire Dupuy, UCLouvain) investigating how citizens’ perceptions of politics interact with public policy changes over time.
Publications
Teaching
- Political History of the EU
- EU Legal System & Political System
- Training and Master’s Thesis
