MEDem

MEDem welcomes the European Democracy Shield - Monitoring Electoral Democracy MEDem welcomes the European Democracy Shield The European Commission’s newly presented European Democracy Shield sets a clear agenda for strengthening democratic resilience across the EU. Its emphasis...

The #EuropeanDemocracyShield is an important step toward coordinated, evidence-driven democratic resilience in the EU.
Its focus on a protected information space, free and fair elections, and evidence-based policymaking aligns closely with MEDem’s mission.

We fully support this initiative.

📢 New Thematic dataset: 𝐋𝐚𝐰𝐬 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐋𝐢𝐛𝐞𝐫𝐭𝐢𝐞𝐬
The #Demscore v6 update comes with a new thematic dataset on Laws and Liberties.
Available for free at the Demscore website: www.demscore.se/data/themati...

More info in 🧵1(3)

#SocialScienceData #Polisky #PolDataSky #PoliSciSky #PoliticalScienceData

📢 Don’t miss the next #CNES Seminar, a deep dive into #migrant #electionstudies!

Methods School: 16 – 27 February 2026 Get priority access and book 48 hours early!

📣 Our Methods School winter programme is now LIVE #ecprms

📆 16 – 27 Feb 2026
💻 Online

🔓 Join the priority booking list by Wed 29 Oct buff.ly/gMBSzZ8
✅ First pick of courses
🎓 Expert-led training on #quantitative, #qualitative, creative & mixed research methods

Just 2 weeks to go until our ODISSEI Annual Conference 2025!

🗓️ 4 November 2025 | 📍 Jaarbeurs, Utrecht | 🆓 FREE REGISTRATION

Register 👉 odissei-data.nl/event/odisse...

🎓 Interested in #PoliticalBehavior, #SurveyData & #ComparativeResearch?

@forsresearch.bsky.social & the University of Lausanne 🇨🇭 are hiring a PhD researcher in comparative political behavior — join a great team and contribute to #MEDem’s Service Center for Survey Data!

🗓️ Apply by 9 Nov!
👉

From Data to Impact: MEDem Conference 2025 - Monitoring Electoral Democracy From Data to Impact: MEDEM CONFERENCE 2025 The 3rd MEDem Conference took place at GESIS – Leibniz Institute for the Social Sciences in Cologne. Over the course of two days, researchers, policymakers, ...

✨ From Data to Impact: The #MEDemConference recap is now online!

Two days of exchange, reflection, and collaboration with inspiring voices from media, policy, and academia, innovative tools, & plenty of photo highlights showing the #MEDemCommunity in action 📸

👉 Read the full #MEDemBlog post here:

Do you have a degree in social sciences or a related field? And are you interested in becoming part of Europe's largest social science panel study?
Then apply for the position of Survey Specialist as part of the German country team: share-eric.eu/news-events/...

A group of MEDem team members standing outside in Cologne, gathered around a bright orange statue of the Mouse from the German children’s TV show Die Sendung mit der Maus.

A group photo of MEDem team members in front of a screen displaying the MEDem (Monitoring Electoral Democracy) logo.

✨ Two inspiring days at the #MEDemConference wrapped up with our #MEDemBoD meeting!

A big thank you to @gesis.org for hosting us in Cologne — and for the chance to meet one of the city’s most famous residents: Die Maus, star of the legendary German TV show "Die Sendung mit der Maus". 🐭🎉

Twelve years ago, I used AmCAT for the first time. Today it’s exciting to see it finding its place in @medem.bsky.social 🗳️📊 – and wow, so much hard work has gone into it since then… 😱

Sofia Gil-Clavel stands at a podium presenting AmCAT at the 3rd MEDem Conference. Behind her, a slide shows the AmCAT team (Kasper Welbers, Wouter van Atteveldt, Johannes Gruber, Sofia Gil-Clavel) with the tagline: “Developed by researchers for researchers, society, and data savvy users.” Logos of MEDem, VU Amsterdam, and the Societal Analytics Lab are displayed at the top.

Sebastian Ziaja stands at a podium presenting HarDIS (Harmony in the Democratic Ideological Space) at the 3rd MEDem Conference. A slide behind him shows the HarDIS team (Lea Kaftan, Paul Bederke, Selçuk Timur Uluer) with the logos of MEDem, GESIS Leibniz Institute for the Social Sciences, and OSCARS (the funding initiative).

Day 2 of the #MEDemConference at @gesis.org starts with powerful tool demos:
🔍 AmCAT @sof14g1l.bsky.social on enabling large-scale text analysis of media & political debates.
🌐 HarDIS @sziaja.bsky.social on harmonizing and sustaining cross-national democracy data (surveys, parties, experts).

Somewhat ironically, we have come together to #MakeDemocracyResearchGreatAgain. Always a pleasure – and quite humbling – to see the #MEDemCommunity gather to discuss where @medem.bsky.social should be headed in the coming years. #ResearchInfrastructures ⚙️

I really enjoyed the inspiring keynote speeches by @sldelange.bsky.social and @simonsaysnothin.bsky.social at the 3rd #MEDemConference at @gesis.org in Cologne! ⭐

Integrate ○ Researchers get lost in building fragmented data infrastructures (case in point: me). ○ specialized collection is fine, but fragmented dissemination hinders use. ○ Lack of integration blocks comparative research. Whot I'd like MEDem to build towards ○ Incentivization of shared infrastructures ○ Toolkits to standardize data collection (measurement and interoperability)

@simonsaysnothin.bsky.social at #MEDem Conf: we need to integrate our efforts instead of researchers all building their own datasets and infrastructure. Couldn't agree more!

Lorenzo De Sio presents at the 3rd MEDem Conference 2025, standing beside a projection of the MEDem Service Gateway Hub. The slide shows tools including MEDem ATLAS, METEOR, AmCAT, and HarDIS, which support comparative democracy research.

Next at the #MEDemConference – @LorenzoDeSio presents his vision for the #MEDemServiceGatewayHub 🌐 – featuring #ATLAS, our living encyclopedia designed to make democracy data findable, comparable, reusable, and linkable. Discover more about our #MEDemTools 👉 link in bio!

Sarah de Lange presents at the 3rd MEDem Conference 2025. Behind her, a slide shows the book “The Normalization of the Radical Right” and a quote on how radical-right behavior grows when previously hidden views become socially acceptable.

Simon Munzert speaks at the 3rd MEDem Conference 2025 on the past, present, and future of democracy research.

🚀 Kicking off day 1 of the 3rd #MEDemConference at @gesis.org! From @sldelange.bsky.social discussing radical-right normalization 🗳️ to calls to consolidate democracy data by @simonsaysnothin.bsky.social 📊 — keynotes spotlight why #MEDem matters for democracy.

Open science in democracy research: the research infrastructure “Monitoring Electoral Democracy” (MEDem) - European Political Science Ensuring universal access to scientific research and upholding the principles of keeping data findable, accessible, interoperable, and reusable is of paramount importance to the democratization of science. However, upholding these principles becomes increasingly complex with the increasing scope of data collection, the more different types of data we collect (e.g., survey, text, or institutional and country-level macro data), and the more research teams are involved in data collection. In the domain of democracy research, scientists across Europe are therefore joining forces to launch the research infrastructure monitoring electoral democracy (MEDem), which aims to establish itself as an open platform where the fragmented crowd of researchers in the various research fields can coordinate and develop common standards for data collection both retrospectively as well as prospectively to make their data interoperable, and (comparative) democracy research more productive. Moreover, MEDem will help make democracy research data and findings accessible to the general public (e.g., citizens, journalists, and policymakers).

Find the full open access piece here: doi.org/10.1057/s413...
Authored by @hajoboo.bsky.social, @alexiakatsanidou.bsky.social, S. Kritzinger, G. Lutz, J. Willmann & @jamoeberl.bsky.social – just in time for the upcoming #MEDemConference.

Screenshot of the article “Open science in democracy research: the research infrastructure ‘Monitoring Electoral Democracy’ (MEDem)” published in European Political Science. The header shows the journal name, DOI link, and the label “DEBATE.” Below, the title is followed by the author list: Hajo Boomgaarden, Alexia Katsanidou, Sylvia Kritzinger, Georg Lutz, Johanna Willmann, and Jakob-Moritz Eberl. The abstract explains the aims of MEDem as a European research infrastructure to make democracy research data FAIR (findable, accessible, interoperable, reusable). Keywords listed include open science, FAIR data, ESFRI roadmap, research infrastructure, democracy research, data harmonization, data linking, and data set search. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/s41304-025-00534-8

They say: once there’s a paper 📝, it’s real…
🎉 #MEDem in #EPS @ecpr.bsky.social

The paper outlines how MEDem will strengthen #OpenScience by making data #FAIR in #DemocracyResearch – and how scholars across Europe are joining forces to build a truly open #ResearchInfrastructure ⚙️

Coming Up: The 2025 MEDem Conference & Workshop! - Monitoring Electoral Democracy Coming Up: the 2025 medem Conference! We are thrilled for the upcoming 3rd MEDem Conference, scheduled to take place from September 29-30 at GESIS in Cologne!The 3rd MEDem conference will bring togeth...

Coming up on Monday the @medem.bsky.social conference at @gesis.org in Cologne. Stay tuned for the future of democracy research infrastructures www.medem.eu/coming-up-th... Keynotes from @simonsaysnothin.bsky.social and @sldelange.bsky.social

Wide view of Jakob-Moritz Eberl presenting on stage at the Congress of the Polish Communication Association in Katowice. A large projected slide titled “Why research infrastructures?” is visible, listing features such as data provision, method development, networking, and training.

Jakob-Moritz Eberl standing at a black lectern, giving a presentation at the Congress of the Polish Communication Association in Katowice. Behind him a slide about MEDem services is projected, including text on harmonization and linking services.

This week, I joined the #PolishCommunicationAssociation in #Katowice 🇵🇱.
I presented @medem.bsky.social – where we stand as #EuropeanResearchInfrastructure ⚙️ & what lies ahead.
Many thanks to the MEDem teams at #UniversityOfSilesia, #JagiellonianUniversity, & #UniwersytetSWPS for the warm welcome.

👉 read more about the event at our #MEDemBlog: medem.eu/news

#MEDem’s added value for the #EuropeanResearchCommunity was front and center in #Katowice 🇵🇱: connecting dispersed datasets, advancing shared standards, and improving access to high-quality, comparable data for democracy researchers all across Europe. Thank you @jamoeberl.bsky.social for presenting!

I might have had a hand in this 💪 After a long journey, my lobbying for democracy research has made its way to the German Federal Ministry of Research, Technology & Space — and the timing couldn’t be more perfect.🚀

„Wir fördern gezielt den Ausbau der Datenkompetenzen und Infrastrukturen in den Geistes- und Sozialwissenschaften, damit vorhandene Datenressourcen für neue Forschungsfragen genutzt werden können. Dazu zählt ab 2026 der Aufbau einer Dateninfrastruktur zur Extremismusbekämpfung, ab 2027 die Einrichtung eines Akademienzentrums Digitale Lexikographie und der Aufbau einer europäischen Forschungsdateninfrastruktur zur vergleichenden Demokratieforschung (MEDem).“ English (translation): “We specifically support the expansion of data skills and infrastructures in the humanities and social sciences, so that existing data resources can be used for new research questions. This includes, starting in 2026, the development of a data infrastructure for combating extremism, in 2027 the establishment of an Academy Center for Digital Lexicography, and the creation of a European research data infrastructure for comparative democracy research (MEDem).”

We are delighted that the new “Hightech Agenda Deutschland” by the #BMFTR recognizes the importance of strengthening data infrastructures in the social sciences and humanities – and explicitly mentions #MEDem. ⚙️📊

Full source here: www.bmftr.bund.de/SharedDocs/P...

w/ @janabernhard.bsky.social, @hajoboo.bsky.social, @marikenvelden.bsky.social, @rensvliegenthart.bsky.social, @claesdevreese.bsky.social, and @vanatteveldt.com

A small boat covered with a dark tarp is moored along a sunny canal in Amsterdam, with typical narrow Dutch houses and parked cars lining the waterway under green trees.

A wide sunset view over the cityscape of Amsterdam, seen from a high vantage point, with buildings and tree-lined streets stretching toward the horizon under a soft pastel sky.

Sunny & productive days in Amsterdam! ☀️ The MEDem Infrastructure’s Service Center for Text & Multimedia Data 📚📺📱gathered for a 2-day workshop to discuss services & put plans into action. Important steps forward - one step at a time! ⚙️📊 #MEDem #DemocracyResearch #EuropeanInfrastructure #DataScience

The MEDem Service Center for Interoperability at University of Gothenburg #UGOT is hiring a #DataBaseManager! ✴️ Apply now 👇🏻 w/ @polhosc.bsky.social

Super excited to be speaking at the #MEDemConference2025

🎉 We are excited to announce the #MEDemConference2025 keynote speakers:

@sldelange.bsky.social & @simonsaysnothin.bsky.social — leading experts in European #DemocracyResearch!

Looking forward to their insights & fruitful discussions!

📅 29–30 Sept 2025
📍 GESIS, Cologne

🔗⚙️ Excited to announce a new #MoU between #MEDem & @icpsr.bsky.social! Partnering to tackle #ICT -related challenges & support data-driven #DemocracyResearch worldwide. 🌐📊 Read more on the MEDemBlog: www.medem.eu/mou-icpsr/