Martin Gross

Rwanda accepts top Sudan clubs into domestic soccer league due to ongoing civil war Al Hilal and Al Merrikh played the 2024-25 season in Mauritania, north west Africa, due to the unstable political situation in Sudan.

The Rwanda Football Federation (FERWAFA) has accepted three top clubs from Sudan, where there is an ongoing civil war, into its domestic league for the 2025-26 season.

More from @colinmillar.bsky.social ⤵️

www.nytimes.com/athletic/674...

And he is unapologetic. "Of course I think it was right [to partner] with the FPÖ. We did a lot of good things for the country, starting with labour law, the budget under control, migration controls. It was a very successful coalition that people especially at first supported and liked."

But doesn't bringing far-right politicians into power risk legitimising them? He has a ready response. "Well, first of all you can only see it this way if you think their views don't have the same rights to exist. If you see it this way, it is pretty much clear that a left idea is better than a right idea. Number two, it's proven it's the opposite. Politics is in waves, and in democratic systems there is change at some point. Keeping the far right out, the cordon sanitaire, it doesn't work."

The "good things" they did for the country, such as the ÖVP-FPÖ's labour law, which reintroduced a 12-hour workday.

And yes, the cordon sanitaire does actually work, as studies show.

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"If you meet centre-right politicians across Europe, they have very strong opinions pretty much on the right side. But you hear them speak in the media, they sound more left. That gives a lot of room to the far right."

If you already insist on having lunch with and giving a politically irrelevant ex-chancellor of a small EU country a platform, then at least do everyone a favour and consult political scientists to comment on and fact-check some of his outlandish poli-sci claims.

💫💫💫 Great News: We are over the moon that our paper "Election Pledges in Multiparty Governments: When do Voters Accept Non-Fulfillment?" is now published in BJPS @bjpols.bsky.social 🍾 🤗

👉🏻 doi.org/10.1017/S000...

w/ Juha Ylisalo, Katrin Praprotnik & @laurenzennser.bsky.social

🧵1/5

Now published as part of Issue 31, Vol. 6 in Party Politics.

Still very proud of this paper with @svenjakrauss.bsky.social and Katrin Praprotnik on 🇦🇹 & 🇩🇪 parties’ attention towards specific issues at the subnational level! 😊

doi.org/10.1177/1354...

..sollte sich ernsthaft mit den Möglichkeiten flexibler Mehrheiten beschäftigen. Sie lindern das Demokratieproblem der Brandmauer und die Demokratiegefahr durch die AfD. Mehr dazu im Frühjahr 2026 in meinem Buch.

Ich habe mit der Magdeburger Volksstimme über eine doppelte Gefahr für die CDU nach der Landtagswahl gesprochen: "Mord" in blau-schwarzer Koalition oder "Selbstmord" in einer überdehnten Anti-AfD-Koalition mit Einigungszwang. Etwas Empirie im thread...

Happy to serve as the editor-in-chief of the Politische Vierteljahresschrift/German Political Science Quarterly (PVS/GPSQ) link.springer.com/journal/11615 @dvpw.bsky.social from January 2026 onwards. Thanks to Eric Linhart for his great work in the last six years! 1/3

@ckreudersonnen.bsky.social and I are happy to announce two open research positions in our joint DFG-funded project VARICRIS (👉 bit.ly/varicris).
We are recruiting a #PostDoc and a #PhD candidate 🧵:

#PoliSky #PoliSkyJobs #polsci 🌐

Die AfD ist plötzlich Wahlverlierer. Ein Kommentar von @juliusgeiler.bsky.social buff.ly/gO2dyR3

Possibly not seen in international media - despite high expectations and high polling, the AfD did not win a any mayors in Brandenburg this autumn.

And now finally with proper page numbers as part of Volume 47, Issue, pp. 108-1105 in the Journal of European Integration. 😍

doi.org/10.1080/0703...

Why do rustbelts vote radical right? Studying the German Ruhr area, @nilsblossey.bsky.social, @lstoetze.bsky.social and I show: it’s not just about deindustrialization, but also about the original industrialization. Where coal is buried deeper and mining started later, the AfD is stronger today 1/12

Job Alert! We are hiring two post-docs (full time, 4+ years) in our project SCEPTIC - Social, Computational and Ethical Premises of Trust and Informational Cohesion with @annanosthoff.bsky.social @guzoch.bsky.social and Prof. Andreas Peters (uol.de/informatik/s...)

Valundersøkinga viser at unge kvinner blir raudare I skuggen til høgrebølga blant gutane har «ein stille revolusjon» gått under radaren: Unge kvinner blir raudare og raudare.

"Relatively small movements among young men have received a lot of attention, while the big changes among young women have gone more under the radar."

Great article on the "Linksruck" (left-wing trend) of young women in Norway. 👏

Migrant Electoral Rights Dataset (1960-2020)

📊 Link to dataset: hdl.handle.net/1814/93661

📕 Link to codebook: cadmus.eui.eu/server/api/c...

💼 Link to 400 page documentation: cadmus.eui.eu/server/api/c...

Kommunalwahl in Bayern: Macht die JU der CSU Konkurrenz? Die Junge Union tritt bei der Kommunalwahl 2026 vielerorts in Bayern mit eigenen Listen an – als Jugendorganisation der CSU. Wie ist das rechtlich möglich? Was bedeutet das für die CSU? Die wichtigste...

Zur Frage, inwieweit die Junge Union eine Konkurrenz für die CSU bei den Kommunalwahlen in Bayern 2026 darstellen könnte, durfte ich beim @brkommunikation.bsky.social etwas beitragen.

www.br.de/nachrichten/...

Neu: Wir haben modelliert, wie groß der Einfluss von Tiktok auf die Bundestagswahl war. Demnach haben Linke und AfD stark profitiert, Grüne und Union verloren. Es geht jeweils um hunderttausende Stimmen. @zeit.de
www.zeit.de/politik/deut...

Brandmauer: Tauber und zu Guttenberg fordern Normalisierung im Umgang mit der AfD Der frühere CDU-Generalsekretär wünscht sich "neue rote Linien" für den Umgang mit der AfD. "Entzauberung gelingt nicht durch Boykott", sagt der Ex-Verteidigungsminister.

Was haben Politikwissenschaft und Klimaforschung gemeinsam?
Es hört ihnen einfach niemand zu.
Und schon gar nicht in der Union.

Alles, was Peter Tauber, zu Guttenberg, Andreas Rödder und ihm seine Denkfabrik sagen, ist wissenschaftlich widerlegt.

www.zeit.de/politik/deut...

AfD hetzt gegen Hochschulen: Angriff auf die Freiheit der Wissenschaft Die AfD Sachsen-Anhalt fragt gezielt nach Listen postkolonialer Seminare und Lehrstühle. Wie die Universitäten beginnen, sich gegen die Angriffe zu wappnen.

Die AfD Sachsen-Anhalt fragt gezielt nach Listen postkolonialer Seminare und Lehrstühle. Wie die Universitäten beginnen, sich gegen die Angriffe zu wappnen.

Abstract of the article "How populist citizens see the people and their place in representative democracy" by Rosa Kindt, Robert A. Huber and Kristof Jacobs. Published online first in West European Politics.

Figure 2, displaying the comparison of high and low populists' marginal means on whether politicians belong to the people.

Figure 3, displaying the comparison of marginal means per attribute on the economical dimension in relation to 'belonging to the people'.

Figure 4, displaying the comparison of marginal means per attribute on the cultural dimension in relation to 'belonging to the people'.

💥Online first:

"How populist citizens see the people and their place in representative democracy"

by Rosa Kindt @robert-a-huber.bsky.social & @kristofjacobs1.bsky.social

doi.org/10.1080/0140...

Zum 1. Februar 2027 ist an der Universität Jena eine W2 Professur für Politische Theorie und Ideengeschichte zu besetzen. Erwartet wird ein exzellentes Forschungsprofil im Bereich der politischen Theorie und Ideengeschichte mit einem Schwerpunkt auf... https://www.theorieblog.de/?p=30062

A game of tariffs: is there demand for tariffs in Europe? In April 2025, the United States introduced sweeping tariffs on imports from the European Union and the United Kingdom, raising transatlantic tensions and prompting debate over Europe’s response. T...

Tariffs might be the word of 2025.

Given the state of *looks around* we asked: is there demand for tariffs in Europe?

@grahn.bsky.social @katharinalawall.bsky.social @sophiemainz.bsky.social Maria Nordbrandt & I show the answer is a resolute no
@jeppjournal.bsky.social

doi.org/10.1080/1350...

Title: Incongruent Suffrage Authors: Klaudia Wegschaider, Rainer Bauböck, Sebastián Umpierrez de Reguero Abstract: Candidacy rights and voting rights are not always congruent. Although voting rights are extensively studied, historical and contemporary incongruencies in suffrage have been widely overlooked. We propose a typology of suffrage incongruency that we apply to the enfranchisement of non-citizen residents and non-resident citizens—two categories recently at the center of enfranchisement scholarship and reform efforts. Using an original dataset that covers 165 countries and 61 years (1960-2020), we identify past and present voting-only incongruencies and candidacy-only incongruencies. Existing theories of suffrage extension focus on the voteshare maximizing logic of incumbents. However, these explanations cannot account for why only one part of suffrage is extended. With two exploratory case studies of Switzerland and the United Kingdom, we inductively arrive at potential explanations for why voting-only and candidacy-only incongruencies arise and resolve in democracies. We conclude with a research agenda on the causes and consequences of suffrage incongruencies.

🚨 New Working Paper with R.Bauböck + @sumpierrez.bsky.social

We introduce the concept of incongruent suffrage.

This describes when there are voting rights but no candidacy rights for a group. Or vice versa.

The paper includes descriptive data & exploratory case studies.

doi.org/10.33774/aps...

Wieder ein schlechter Tag für die AfD im Osten.
Deklassiert in der OB-Stichwahl in Frankfurt (Oder) und sogar in Eisenhüttenstadt - wo sie sich echte Hoffnung machte - deutlich verloren.

Wenn ihr euch für die Lage in den USA interessiert, hört heute Nachmittag um 17:05 Uhr mal Deutschlandfunk -- da sprechen Eric Frey (Der Standard) und ich mit Christiane Florin darüber, wie weit die Autokratisierung in den Vereinigten Staaten bereits fortgeschritten ist.

Over the moon to see this paper out in the @ejprjournal.bsky.social David Willumsen and I look at coalition agreements in the Netherlands. We show that the greater the share of negotiating parties that agree on a policy the more likely it ends up in the agreement www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

ABSTRACT This article examines how political messengers, and not the message, influence attitudes toward renewable energy infrastructure amid an increasingly polarized climate change debate. Focusing on wind power, a highly politicized issue, and solar energy, less contentious, we conducted an experimental survey in Germany. We assess how either a far-right or an environmentalist critic affect acceptance of renewables. Importantly, our analysis examines support for renewables in forest areas, focusing on a conflict between climate action and local environmental protection. Our findings reveal that the messenger impacts attitudes regarding wind energy. Criticism of wind turbine expansion by an environmentalist actor leads to greater rejection, while a similar critique by a far-right actor results in increased acceptance, i.e. a backlash effect. No such influence was found for solar energy. We explain these diverging findings by differences in politicization. Our findings have important consequences for understanding key dynamics of the public debate and political conflict over climate action.

New article!

Climate action versus environmental protection? How far-right and environmentalist messengers shape public attitudes towards renewable energy infrastructure in forests, by @manesweisskircher.bsky.social and Matthias Diermeier.

doi.org/10.1080/0964...

In der @lagedernation.org ist man jetzt von politikwissenschaftliche Forschung ist „nicht seriös“ bei sie ist „zu politikwissenschaftlich“ angekommen. Dazu die gleichen abgedroschenen talking points („den Leuten wird ihre Haltung ja nicht eingeredet“, „man kann das Thema ja nicht verschweigen“) 1/

There are many parallels between publishing papers and putting a baby asleep. An endless 🧵

1. it takes longer than you think.
2. there are strategies, but it‘s essentially trial + error.
3. don‘t let them out of your hands too early, it‘ll fail
4. you usually hear back from them sooner than hoped