Maria Chiara Franceschelli is a PhD candidate in Political Science and Sociology at the Scuola Normale Superiore, and a member of the Center on Social Movement Studies (COSMOS). She holds a BA in Intercultural and Linguistic Mediation from the University of Bologna and a MSc in Comparative Politics from the Higher School of Economics in Saint Petersburg, where she researched the strategies of non-contentious environmental participation in contemporary Russia.

Her research interests lie in the field of political sociology and social movements in post-Soviet Eastern Europe. She is currently researching the strategies and the motivations of non-contentious environmental participation in authoritarian regimes from a comparative perspective, with a focus on the relationships between social movements organisations, public institutions and the private sector; and the reciprocal influence that these actors have on each other. Specifically, her PhD project aims to explore the innovation processes induced by social mobilisation and grassroots participation outside the field of democratic practices and processes, shifting the focus to dynamics pertaining to the private sector and the local governance.

Research interests: social movements, environmental participation, Eastern Europe, post-Soviet space, authoritarian regimes, comparative political sociology.