Kenny joined the
Australian National University in 2013: from July 2013 to December 2017, he was a research fellow in
Indian Political and Social Change, then from August 2019 to July 2020, he was an associate professor. Kenny's research on populism, corruption, and political institutions has been published in many international peer-reviewed journals, including the
International Studies Review, the
Journal of Refugee Studies,
British Journal of Political Science,
Government and Opposition,
The Journal of Politics,
Political Research Quarterly, the
Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, and the
Journal of East Asian Studies. In 2017, Kenny explored the micro-foundations of populism in his book
Populism and Patronage: Why Populists Win Elections in India, Asia, and Beyond with
Oxford University Press, which won the 2018
Robert A. Dahl Award. He wrote two books with
Cambridge University Press (
Populism in Southeast Asia in 2018 and
Why Populism? Political Strategy from Ancient Greece to the Present in 2023), exploring his belief that populism is best understood "less as a political ideology than as a cost-effective political strategy." Since July 2020, Kenny has held the post of Professor of Political Science at the
Australian Catholic University. He is head of the Department of Political & Social Change. In May 2023, Kenny moderated
Mapping Global Populism — Panel 2: Populism, Macho-Fascism and Varieties of Illiberalism in The Philippines, a European Center for Populism Studies panel, with speakers Adele Webb,
Mark R. Thompson, Jean S. Encinas-Franco, Jefferson Lyndon D. Ragragio. ==Selected works==