Matt worked as a cereers adviser and teacher in the 1990s and a community worker and youth justice worker in the 2000s.  He has since worked at a number of universities publishing in journals such as Race & Class, Social Justice, Critical Criminology and the European Journal of Criminology.  Subjects covered include the history of riots and anti-racism, knife crime, Social movements from populism to black lives matter, state crimes and labelling processes.

Matt is a critical criminologist, a sociologist of deviance.  Some of his influences include Marxism and the sociology of Norbert Elias - and within Criminology the ideas of David Matza, Angela Davis, Stan Cohen and Stuart Hall.