Jan Berz

Do interpersonal relations affect coalition bargaining? @hannaeback.bsky.social, @michaelimre.bsky.social and I argue that when the Prime Minister is replaced, the incumbency advantage of a coalition will be weakened because of reduced familiarity and trust journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/... 1/2

In the coming months, I'll be recruiting two PhD students to work with me as part of the Voting & Democracy research group at @kuleuvenuniversity.bsky.social. So watch this space if you want to join the team and work on this lovely campus!

I'm very proud of Lucas, who just published his second single-authored paper! A great track-record since the start of his PhD in 2021.

As speakers of the @dvpw.bsky.social's working group Elections and Public Opinion, we invite proposals for a special issue on the 2025 German federal election (to be submitted to Electoral Studies).

See: www.dvpw.de/gliederung/a...

Also see the previous SI: www.sciencedirect.com/special-issu...

As @cpsjournal.bsky.social editor I read about 100 peer-reviews per month. A 🧵 on what makes a great review:

1.) Succinct summary of the contribution (puzzle, argument, data, evidence)

2.) State clearly in your first paragraph whether the evidence supports the argument.

Very happy to share our new article in JoP @thejop.bsky.social, where we explore how parties forge links with social groups (here: social classes) through different appeals and how citizens respond to such appeals.
www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/epdf/10....

Voting for Disabled Candidates | The Journal of Politics Despite important advances in the rights of disabled people, stigma and prejudice remain widespread. Meanwhile, disabled political representatives are few and far between. This raises the question: do...

My article on voter support for disabled candidates is now published at doi.org/10.1086/732994.

I find that left-wing voters in UK+US favour disabled candidates, while right-wing voters prefer non-disabled candidates - but only because voters assume disabled candidates to be more left-wing. [1/2]

As Germany heads to the polls on Sunday, here are some articles we have published on German elections that can guide you through what to expect… 🗳️ 📊

Letzte Woche haben @corinnakroeber.bsky.social und ich basierend auf den Kandidierendenlisten & der Wahlrechtsreform geteilt, dass der neue Bundestag deutlich weniger weibliche Abgeordnete beinhalten wird. Unsere Überlegungen dazu könnt ihr bei @lseeuroppblog.bsky.social nachlesen. 📚🕵️‍♀️

Do citizens stereotype Muslims as inherently homophobic?

In a new @bjpols.bsky.social paper w/ @bertous.bsky.social & @michaelhunklinger.bsky.social we answer this question using a double-list experiment across 🇬🇧 🇺🇸 🇩🇪 🇳🇱

doi.org/10.1017/S000...

Spoiler: Yes. 🧵

🚨 Postdoc Fellow at LSE in Political Behaviour 🚨

We're hiring a 2-3 year postdoc fellow at the LSE to join our great department (with some teaching in political behaviour and comparative European or EU politics)

Please spread the word and reach out with questions!
jobs.lse.ac.uk/Vacancies/W/...

Thank you so much Or and Roni for a fantastic workshop and outstanding hospitality! It was great to be at the MZES.

Left to right: Or Tuttnauer, Jan Berz, Amanda Bittner, Maya Mark, Javier Martinez Canto, Roni Lehrer, Justin Spruit, Michelangelo Vercesi, Lucas Da Silva. Also attended: Ferdinand Müller-Rommel, Florian Grotz, Christoffer Green-Pedersen

Had a great time talking all things prime ministers with @janberz.bsky.social, @javiermcanto.bsky.social, @bittner.bsky.social, and many others in the 2-day workshop Roni Lehrer and I organised @MZES Mannheim. Inspiring stuff.

Got my first one today too 👇👇

‼️ New paper out in EJPR!

With @mauritsmeijers.bsky.social, we use a new survey item that we fielded in surveys in five countries to examine who accepts party policy change. Check out the 🧵 by Maurits below for an overview of our findings!

EPSA rejection: to all early career people who face this today, I want to say that I had two of them in the past, one of them was published in AJPS in the end, the other has not been submitted yet. Today, my third EPSA rejection. If you have it, too: hear me it means nothing! Enjoy your weekend 😇

Bei Homosexuellen belegt die AfD den ersten Platz - mit haushohem Vorsprung Diese Umfrage dürfte viele überraschen. Ein Datingportal für Homosexuelle hat rund 60.000 Nutzern die Frage gestellt, wen sie bei der kommenden Bundestagswahl wählen würden. Das Ergebnis ist verblüffe...

Die "Umfrage" ist nicht repräsentativ. Sie hat die Qualität einer Videotextumfrage. Sie ist manipulierbar. Es gibt die Möglichkeit, mehrfach abzustimmen. Es widerspricht allen Kenntnisständen, die wir zum Wahlverhalten der Gruppe haben. Teilt diesen Unsinn nicht. #AfD

www.focus.de/politik/bei-...

Delighted to see this coming out in @thejop.bsky.social. Some basic science that for data reasons was never done before. www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1...

Empathy During Crises: Investigating Attitudes, Tolerance, and Ingroup-Outgroup Dynamics in Response to Refugee Movements

🚨 New Open Access Publiation! Under the lead of @ronjademel.bsky.social , David Schieferdecker, @hannaschwander.bsky.social , Swen Hutter, Jule Specht and I investigated the role of empathy on attitudes towards refugees and ingroup-outgroup dynamics

Our book lays a foundation for understanding PM performance & raises new questions: 🤔 Do capable PMs strengthen democracy? 🤔 Does poor PM performance affect elections or democratic trust? We hope this sparks more research on the causes & consequences of PM performance—in CEE & beyond.

Last but not least, we investigate: What drives prime-ministerial performance? Our analyses highlight:

How do PMs’ careers & contexts shape their success? We analyzed of 131 cabinets across 11 CEE countries (1990–2021) to find:
✔ PMs are more experienced than assumed
✔ Contexts are stabilizing (e.g., fewer oversized cabinets).
Take away: CEE PMs & their challenges are far from uniform!

Is the idea of weak CEE PMs a myth? Our dataset reveals wide variability in PM performance, challenging assumptions of uniform weakness. PMs with strong parliamentary & party backing excelled at conflict resolution & policy influence. CEE PMs are far more dynamic than stereotypes suggest.

Our paper on how plant disease pandemic destroying olive groves in 🇮🇹 fuelled far right support by activating local community narrative of state neglect forthcoming @apsrjournal.bsky.social

🧵 below ⬇️

For nerds: also presents research design for combing causal inference with ethnographic research

Thank you very much, Gizem.

📢 Our new paper in Political Analysis explains how to use LLMs like GPT-4o, Llama or Mistral to estimate the ideological and policy position of political texts. Our approach is fast, reliable, cost-effective and reproducible and works with texts written in different languages 1/7 cup.org/4axBEXo

My book “The Normalization of the Radical Right” has recently come out in the US.

If you're interested, in this thread I’ll link different ways of learning about the book and its argument (I’ll keep adding if more come out).

First, here is the link to the book: academic.oup.com/book/57946

Anti-racist protests reduced AfD vote shares in both the 2021 German Election and the 2024 European Election.

While the Greens gained in 2021, *they didn’t in 2024*—likely due to their shift towards anti-immigration policies in government.

Important implications for progressive parties. More: 👇

The tool is versatile, requiring minor adjustments for global application. For instance, relevant countries or organizations may vary across regions. We encourage others to apply it beyond CEE, broadening our understanding of PM performance globally.

We validated the questionnaires’ reliability and validity & found:
✅ Performance ≠ duration. Many short-term PMs outperformed expectations, while some long-serving PMs underperformed.