📣CfA for a Postdoctoral Fellow Position in political science (3-4 years) as part of the ERC project “Waging of War” (WOW) - PI Scott Gates. The application deadline is March 16th, 2026. www.jobbnorge.no/en/available...

We have a vacant position as Associate Professor in Political Science (International Relations). Deadline April 29. Please apply or distribute. www.jobbnorge.no/en/available...

Open Access: -110 initially nondemocratic countries of the third wave from 1970 to 2024 - 105 episodes of autocratization followed in 75=60 (55 %) of these 110 countries are democracies by 2024, but 50 never became democracies or have reverted back to autocracy. www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Altruistic motivations aside, looking at purely self-interested motives of donors, is there still a rationale for supporting democracy abroad? YES, says a new #PolicyBrief from V-Dem Institute: Democracy Aid: What’s in it for Donor Countries? v-dem.net/media/public... 👇 1(3) #Polisky #SocialScience

My latest - some interesting insights from new survey data from 🇰🇿

Digital sovereignty is a strategically flexible concept, and if you are interested in its development and evolution, check our new article in @govjournal.bsky.social: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/... 1/8

🥉“Conceptual and Measurement Issues in Assessing Democratic Backsliding”. Working Paper 140 from 2023 is the third most viewed (4,080 times). v-dem.net/media/public... @chknutsen.bsky.social @kailmarkvart.bsky.social @silindberg.bsky.social ‪@medzihorsky.bsky.social @danpemstein.com 4(6)

Last week in Minnesota, I watched ordinary people risk their lives to protect their neighbors. In the process, they not only won a significant—though not final—victory against authoritarianism, they proved virtually every MAGA social theory wrong. (gift link) www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/0...

@schumer.senate.gov & @hakeem-jeffries.bsky.social would fail a basic org sociology course, which is a problem for all of us, not to mention the country. Here's the deal: 1. ICE has a known organizational culture 2. That culture centers on violence, racism, personalistic loyalty, & impunity 1/

Amid everything else, a brief note to announce the CFP for the 2026 Summer Workshop in the Economic History and Historical Political Economy of Eurasia. If you are an economist, historian, or political scientist working on Imperial Russia or the USSR, please consider applying. July 17–18, Paris.

I wrote about what political science research suggests about democracy building in Venezuela after the way Nicolás Maduro was removed: blogs.lse.ac.uk/usappblog/20... We'll see what comes of María Corina Machado's meeting today with Trump-

[2/3] In this paper I use a model to explain why propaganda can be obviously false and still work - even a clearly false claim can be effective not because it persuades, but because it undermines trust in all news.

📣 New article 👥 @allansikk.bsky.social @sonagolder.bsky.social @ibenskasr.bsky.social @paulinasl.bsky.social 👉 Does switching pay off? The impact of parliamentary party instability on individual electoral performance 📗 Open access in Electoral Studies 🔗 doi.org/10.1016/j.el...

I don't think we should over index Trump's "Donroe Doctrine" comments & infer that he favors a great-power-spheres-of-influence world. He's not that consistent. A few months ago he claimed to have brokered an Armenia-Azerbaijan deal, cutting out Russia. 1/2

With Maduro gone, Venezuela must decide on the status of his absence. According to the Venezuelan constitution the National Assembly can declare the presidency abandoned, but if it does new presidential elections must be held within thirty days (art 233). Don’t expect such a declaration anytime soon

Putin did full scale invasion and presented as special military operation, Trump has done special military operation and presented as if it was full scale invasion. Both seem deluded.

Upward and onward to 2026.

Resistance in Altai, environmental protests in Bashkortostan and the shadowy influence of an occult healer espousing reptilian conspiracy theories. In the final Regions Calling newsletter of 2025, we wrap up the year in Russia's regions:

Christmas came early to the Russia scholars with Santa declassifying the Bush-Putin meeting transcripts. That's 2001. Ukraine is Russian land, simply given away for no reason, as if USSR had not collapsed and there was no Ukraine independence referendum. And, long before the 2008 Bucharest Summit

Why do citizens who say they support democracy tolerate leaders who dismantle it? Delighted to share my paper “Framing Democracy: How Elite Discourse Shapes Citizens' Understandings of Democracy and Enables Backsliding” is forthcoming in World Politics...(1/5, link at the end)

For those interested in the effects of direct public funding of political parties on various dimensions of political activity, a brief review. www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Come work with us. A two-year postdoctoral fellowship in Ukrainian Studies and another for an open position at the Harriman Institute. Deadline January 5. harriman.columbia.edu/postdoctoral...

🧵Here's a research-backed answer: No. 1/ www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

And just in time for the holidays! The perfect present for all your criminal and kleptocrat loved ones living abroad. www.washingtonpost.com/politics/202...

🇭🇳 🗳️ Wondering what's going on with Honduras' election chaos? Me too! In any case, I've tried to make sense of how the country arrived at the current moment and what might be in store in this essay for @jodemocracy.bsky.social 👇

Faroe Islands, late September 2025

Turkey, 26.10-06.11.25

Vancouver Island, September 2025

Atyrau, 06.25

Happy to announce that I have received an @erc.europa.eu Consolidator grant for the project "Authoritarian Threats to Scientific Knowledge". AutoKnow will study how authoritarian regimes and politics affect scientific progress, contents and topics in different fields. www.sv.uio.no/isv/english/...

everyone time I wade into the autism literature a little John Ruskin pops up inside my head to say this

Atyrau, 06.25

Great to see this issue is finally online. We're getting a lot of excellent research so we tried to cram as many articles as we could into the last issue before the holidays. Check it out: online.ucpress.edu/cpcs/issue/5...

The December edition of the V-Dem Institute Newsletter is out! 📬 To find out about new publications, research and more, you can access the newsletter here: mailchi.mp/v-dem/newsle... Not subscribed yet? Here is the subscription link: v-dem.us8.list-manage.com/subscribe?u=... #Polisky #PolDataSky

If we pitch "credible" research as necessarily using complicated designs, clever falsification tests, and technically challenging estimators, we risk losing the message. *Credible* research has just 4 things: 1. A well-posed Q 2. A plausible theory 3. Appropriate data 4. Appropriate analysis

New paper! @william-dinneen.bsky.social @guygrossman.bsky.social Yiqing Xu and I use GPT to code 91k articles from 174 polisci journals (2003–2023)and track research designs, transparency practices, and citations. How has the credibility revolution reshaped the discipline? doi.org/10.31235/osf... 🧵

Kjære alle, USN lyser nå ut en 100 % fast stilling som førsteamanuensis. Spre gjerne utlysningen til alle dere tenker kan være aktuelle. Dersom dere har spørsmål om stillingen eller om USN, er det bare å ta kontakt med meg.

this is just gutter racism

Save the Date: #DEMSCORE Conference 2026 The fourth DEMSCORE Conference will take place in Gothenburg on June 8–9, 2026. More information: www.demscore.se/events/demsc... @ucdp.bsky.social @qoginstitute.bsky.social @vdeminstitute.bsky.social @viewsforecasting.org ‬‬ @repdem-org.bsky.social 1(3)

Good news—Dr. Abedini has been released!!! Thanks to everyone who shared and mobilized 🙏🏼🙏🏼🙏🏼

My colleague, Dr. Vahid Abedini, was illegally detained by ICE on Saturday. He is currently being held without a court date in sight, despite being in the country legally. Please spread the word! We must ensure his due process rights are upheld. www.oudaily.com/news/ou-prof...

Vancouver Island, September 2025

Looking at this photo of the US-Ukraine Geneva meeting, I wondered who was in the delegation. ABC has the list: abcnews.go.com/Internationa... No Russia or Ukraine experts (although US Ambassador to Ukraine Davis & SACEUR Grynkewich were there). Who is the guy with the notebook? Andy Baker. 1/2

My @nytimes.com op-ed: The Boomers Are Protesting Trump. Where Is Gen Z? www.nytimes.com/2025/11/24/o... (gift link) The key point: "The absence of young people from conventional protests is both a problem and a warning."

Trump's "peace' plan for Ukraine is not only morally unacceptable but myopic and no basis for a lasting peace. goodauthority.org/news/ukraini...

A few experts going right now: "hear me out, Budapest Memorandum, keeping Ukraine out of NATO, telling it to accept loss of Crimea, and pretending the Minsk Accords meant to save Ukraine's sovereignty were all mistakes, but if we now combine all this idiocy into a 28-point plan, it might work!"

🎓New Research Projects on Democratic Resilience! Today we congratulate the V-Dem researchers involved in two new research projects that will tackle the issue of democratic resilience, in different ways. Read more : v-dem.net/news/new-res... #Polisky #PoliticalScience #DemocraticResilience 🧵1(4)

Yes. But also, Orbán was in power for 14 years until finally a successful challenger emerged and Orbán's popularity drastically declined. So the interesting question to ask is: Why now? And why was Magyar so much more successful in his anti-corruption messaging than others before him?

New article out today in @iojournal.bsky.social that tackles a pressing question: As the US retreats from democracy promotion, will autocracies abandon liberal norms and return to overt repression? Our @danieladonno.bsky.social Jon Pevehouse and @cjschneider.bsky.social answer: not so fast.🧵1/

Student journalists getting the job done!