Hugo Drochon is a political theorist and historian of modern political thought, with interests in continental political philosophy, democratic theory, liberalism and political realism. His book Nietzsche's Great Politics came out with Princeton University Press in 2016 (paperback 2018). It was reviewed in the TLS, New Statesman, Times Higher Education, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews, Dissent and the LARB, and featured in interviews with Vox and the Irish Times. It was selected as one of CHOICE's Outstanding Academic Titles for 2017, and longlisted for the Bronislaw Geremek First Academic Book Prize.

His current research is on elite theories of democracy - Mosca, Pareto, Michels and Ostrogorski - and the impact their thinking had on the development of democratic theory in the US and Europe after WWII, notably on figures such as Schumpeter, Dahl, Wright Mills, Aron, Manin, Rosanvallon and Bobbio. He has a book entitled 'Elites and Democracy' under contract with Princeton University Press.