Congrats 🥳 #PhDone

These were just a few examples, many others in the seminar did equally impressive work. I learned a lot reading them and left genuinely inspired. Let's talk more about what students can do, not just what AI might take away.

Most research on voting advice applications (VAAs) focuses only on the top match. @belad.bsky.social looks at effects across the whole party system and finds that VAA use does shift party preferences, but not in ways that consistently increase or decrease political polarization.

Does social media spread lone-actor terrorism? Fabian Feilmeier's analysis of 16 democracies (2013–2020) finds the opposite: higher social media penetration is actually associated with slightly lower attack rates. Individual radicalization pathways don't simply scale up to the national level.

Why are young women and young men increasingly voting differently? Benedikt Unkel digs into the 2025 German federal election and finds that feeling "left behind" and differing attitudes toward gender issues both help explain the growing gender gap in support for the populist radical right.

Not all civil war endings are equal. @benjaminhofer.bsky.social analyzes 414 terminated intrastate conflict episodes worldwide and shows that conflicts fizzling out through "low activity" (rather than peace agreements or military victory) much more likely to recur within five years.

Social isolation and populism are both on the rise, but are they connected? Using ESS data from EU member states, Veronika Wimmer finds that higher social isolation predicts voting for right-wing populist parties, but not for left-wing ones.

Do people who feel politically powerless see immigration as more threatening? Anna Treutlein, using ESS data from Germany and creating an immigration threat index, finds that lower internal political efficacy is linked to higher immigration threat perceptions, but political attitudes matter too.

Quick note before we dive in: these are seminar papers: not peer-reviewed, not published. I'm sharing them as examples of impressive work, with each student's consent, not as reliable research results. This thread was drafted with the help of AI (Claude) and edited by me. Now, on to the papers. 👇

In the age of AI, there's a lot of talk about students not doing real work anymore. As a teacher, I catch myself focusing on the struggles rather than the wins. Time to fix that. A thread highlighting standout papers from my quantitative methods seminar last term @univie.ac.at. 🧵

Kann sich die Sozialdemokratie noch retten? In Deutschland geht es rapide bergab, auch anderenorts, etwa in Österreich, läuft es schlecht. Gibt es einen Ausweg?

"Kann sich die Sozialdemokratie noch retten?" 🥀
fragt @markuswagner.bsky.social im Kommentar der Anderen im @derstandard.bsky.social

Neben den Gründen für den Wählerverlust der Sozialdemokraten zeigt Prof. Wagner außerdem mögliche Wege aus der Krise auf:

www.derstandard.at/story/300000...

I’d especially like to encourage women to apply. We’re a fantastic department with excellent scholars, in beautiful Vienna. Data shows that women are less likely to apply for positions than equally qualified men (Muriel Niederle & Lise Vesterlund 2011), so if you’re considering it, please go for it!

Job vacancy announcement for a postdoctoral position at the University of Vienna Department of Government, starting August/September 2026. Research focus includes political representation, party competition, political institutions, political economy, political behavior, or related fields. Application deadline: 29 April 2026. Full details are also available through the shared link.

🚨 Job Alert 🚨

We have an opening for a 𝗣𝗼𝘀𝘁𝗱𝗼𝗰 𝗣𝗼𝘀𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 @stawi-univie.bsky.social starting Aug/Sep 2026!

Focus: political representation, party competition, political institutions, political economy, political behavior, or related fields

📅Apply by 29 April 2026

jobs.univie.ac.at/job/Universi...

Screenshot of the AUSSDA (Austrian Social Science Data Archive) webpage for the “AUTNES Online Panel Study 2017–2024 (SUF edition).” The page shows the dataset title, version 2.0, authors, citation information with DOI link, and a description noting it is a multi-wave panel survey covering Austrian national elections (2017, 2019, 2024). On the right, there is a blue “Access Dataset” button and a metric indicating 8,594 downloads. Keywords and licensing information are listed below.

🎉 New release!

An updated version of the #AUTNES Online Panel Study 2017–2024 (SUF edition) is now available via @aussda.bsky.social.

📊 Now includes the post–coalition formation wave (March 2025).

🔗 Download & explore: doi.org/10.11587/HNU...

#openscience #elections #PoliSky

BLOG: Who gets emotional about politics? Fear of migrants, national pride, and anger at elites are just some examples of the ways in which emotions play an important part in today’s political culture. It is a long standing assumption that em...

New blog post ✒️

Who gets emotional about politics and what impact do knowledge, interest, and confidence-in-knowledge have?

Find out more about the sophistication-emotion link in our latest blogpost:

I've been asked over the last few days/weeks what I think will happen on April 12th in Orbán's 🇭🇺 (and the aftermath), so here's my assessment, looking at everything as it stands now 🧵

tldr: It's complicated, and no one really knows (and those who say they do are either lying or overly confident) 1/

Are you a policymaker, teacher, practitioner, academic in political science, psychology, education or related field? We’re inviting experts to complete a short survey on youth political participation: tinyurl.com/ywnseae3

For every completion, we’ll donate €1.20 to UNICEF. Please share!

It was an immense honor to contribute to the 30th anniversary issue of Party Politics. Richard Katz and I advocate for the continued relevance of studying party organization, both to understand how politics in democracies actually works and to articulate how it should work.

doi.org/10.1177/1354...

Disentangling the Sophistication-Emotion Link: Political Interest and Confidence-in-Knowledge, but not Knowledge, Drive Emotional Responses - Political Behavior Why do some people feel stronger emotions about politics than others? Past work suggests that political sophistication, consisting of knowledge and interest, is related to feeling strong emotions abou...

🎉 New paper out in Political Behavior (with @gijsschumacher.bsky.social & @mrooduijn.bsky.social)

Why do some people feel stronger emotions about politics than others?
💡Not political knowledge, but interest and confidence-in-knowledge drive emotional engagement.
link.springer.com/article/10.1...
🧵

This was one of the classes I wished I was a student again to join! 👇👇

The outside of the Austrian parliament building with a tall flagpole in the front and a blue sky in the background. ©Jerome Dufek

The 2024 Austrian parliamentary elections made history: the far-right FPÖ became the strongest party for the first time, and Austria saw its longest-ever government formation, ending in the first three-party coalition since 1947. 📜

Curious? Find out more in our blog: tinyurl.com/2k5dptuc

👇 Let me know if you have any questions on the position, Department or city!

🚨📣Very excited to announce our Online INCONEX Kick-Off Workshop on December 12 from 13:45 to 17:45 (CET)!

We have a great line-up of paper presentations and a fantastic roundtable. Everyone is welcome!

👉 Sign up here: bit.ly/inconex_workshop

@erc.europa.eu #PoliticalScience #Representation

At the recent Zweitstimme.org Workshop on Elections, Public Opinion & Elite Behaviour at the Hertie School, researchers from across Europe shared new insights on elites, participation and polling, highlighting how data, methodology and communication are reshaping the study of democratic politics.

Wow!!! Congratulations 🥳

📢📢 Happy to announce a new update to the PPEG database!

The data now covers

- > 3.000 parties
- 1.100 parliamentary elections
- 402 presidential elections
- 2.044 cabinets

across 73 countries (1945 - 2025, Oct 31).

All info: ppeg.wzb.eu

We hope that data is helpful to the community!

🎉 Kicking off the Zweitstimme.org Workshop!

We’re looking forward to two days discussing new work on Elections, Public Opinion & Elite Behaviour.

Today’s sessions:
👉 Panel I – Elites
👉 Panel II – Participation
👉 Panel III – Party Strategies

Huge thanks to @hertieschool.bsky.social for hosting us!

📢 New paper out! How do partnership constellations relate to poverty in Germany?

Together with @emstruffolino.bsky.social, we examine different-sex partnerships and how low education and non-employment cluster, distinguishing non-migrants, descendants of migrants, and EU vs. non-EU migrants.

Yes, see descriptively here bsky.app/profile/chri...