Current News

In a report by Perspective Daily, Prof. Dr. Gerald Schneider comments on 5 questions in the Middle East conflict that are asked far too rarely. He discusses the failure of past peace plans and what we can learn from them. He explains the mediation role of the EU, the USA and the Arab states and points out common interests between Israelis and Palestinians. The full report in German is available here.

Leslie Fischer, graduate of the M.A. in Politics and Puiblic Administration, receives the Christiane Rajewsky Prize of the Association for Peace and Conflict Research for her outstanding Master's thesis. Ms Fischer receives the prize for her thesis "Victimised societies and voter turnout: A natural experiment assessing the price of indifference to conflict-related sexual violence", in which she uses a natural experiment to investigate the long-term political effects of conflict-related sexual…

Since the beginning of 2024, protests against right-wing extremism have been very popular across Germany. But is it really a "silent majority" that is standing up for democracy? Marco Bitschnau and Sebastian Koos found that the participants mostly feel they belong to the upper middle class, are politically left of centre and have above-average educational qualifications. Many have no experience of protesting and are concerned about the rise of the AfD, but are more nuanced when it comes to…

During the coronavirus pandemic, working from home was the norm for many people. No more inconvenient commuting, more space for a good work-life balance. Company buildings were sold off and office space reduced. But that all seems to be over. More and more bosses are calling their employees back to the office. This is causing a lot of resentment and unrest in the workforce. Why this recall campaign? What are the business motives behind it? And: How will we work in the future? Doris Maull…

In recent years, state intervention in digital communication has increased. However, in order for governments to gain and maintain control over digital data flows, they must secure access to the network infrastructure at the ISP level. Eda Keremoglu et al. have analysed how the network topology of the internet is changing in different political environments. They show that in autocratic countries, state (and not private) providers have a significantly higher degree of control over transit…

In an interview with Deutschlandfunk radio, Prof. Dr. Florian Kunze explains the reasons for the trend towards the introduction of compulsory attendance, which is due to the lack of development of new work cultures in Germany. He points out that the introduction of mandatory attendance can lead to employee demotivation and make it more difficult to attract suitable employees. He also points out that managers fear a subjective loss of control due to home office regulations, but that home office…

Prof. Dr. Breunig talks about his playlist for the Comparative Politics course. Thereby he plays a soundtrack before each session to encourage students to apply course concepts in a different context. You can find the article and the playlist here.

Prof. Dr. Marius Busemeyer argues that the subjective perception of inequality is growing. In the Cicero Podcast Wissenschaft, he discusses the impact it has on citizens' voting behavior. In his studies, Prof. Dr. Marius Busemeyer shows that the subjectivity of perception is particularly important when it comes to political (electoral) decisions. And that today's pessimistic assessments of the development of inequality tend to go hand in hand with higher support for right-wing populist parties.…

Prof. Dr. David Garcia and his colleagues have published a report on disinformation on the internet for the Spanish Parliament. This report examines the causes and effects of the phenomenon of disinformation and the mechanisms that can help to combat it.

The Internet and digital development have brought numerous economic and social advances and benefits. However, this development has created a new social and informational context that favours an unprecedented spread of disinformation and acts…