I studied political science at the University of Bremen and worked as a research associate at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz from 2016 to 2025, first in Comparative Politics and later in Political Theory and Public Policy.
My cumulative dissertation, Two-Dimensional Political Competition and the Party Politics of the Welfare State (2022), examined whether and under which conditions political parties continue to shape social policy under the transformed competitive dynamics of the 21st century. It shows that parties can—or choose to—make a difference only under specific circumstances, for instance when economic issues dominate political conflict. When they do not, the economic interests of lower-income citizens are less likely to be addressed.
My research focuses on the interplay between micro- and macro-level processes: how political attitudes and behavior—mediated through party competition—shape policy outputs and outcomes, and how these outcomes feed back into citizens’ perceptions and actions. A particular focus lies on citizens whose preferences are weakly represented or who do not find a party that aligns with their substantive interests, and on the implications this has for their views on democracy and their electoral behavior.
Within the Collaborative Research Centre 1472, I investigate the role of political opinion polls together with Philip Manow in Project C07. The project examines how the pervasive monitoring of politics through surveys shapes the popularity of parties and policies, and what consequences this has for political competition—such as party-system fragmentation or political polarization—as well as for democratic representation in contemporary democracies.