I'm a Professor of Comparative Politics at the University of Salzburg. My work explores how institutions shape political representation and behavior, with a strong focus on gender and politics. I'm especially interested in why women remain underrepresented in political life and how attitudes about gender influence political preferences and democratic engagement.
Much of my research is grounded in cross-national surveys and quantitative methods. I’m one of the co-creators of the gender attitudes module in Round 11 of the European Social Survey, the first large-scale effort to collect comparative data on public views of gender roles across Europe.
At Salzburg, I teach courses on comparative politics, political behavior, political institutions, electoral rules, and quantitative methods. I enjoy helping students think critically about how different institutions shape political outcomes in different parts of the world.
I earned my Ph.D. from McGill University in 2008 and have held positions at institutions including the University of Mannheim and GESIS – Leibniz Institute for the Social Sciences.
Much of my research is grounded in cross-national surveys and quantitative methods. I’m one of the co-creators of the gender attitudes module in Round 11 of the European Social Survey, the first large-scale effort to collect comparative data on public views of gender roles across Europe.
At Salzburg, I teach courses on comparative politics, political behavior, political institutions, electoral rules, and quantitative methods. I enjoy helping students think critically about how different institutions shape political outcomes in different parts of the world.
I earned my Ph.D. from McGill University in 2008 and have held positions at institutions including the University of Mannheim and GESIS – Leibniz Institute for the Social Sciences.
**** Research news ****
May 2025
In this study, we (together with Christina Eder) examine how different forms of sexism — hostile, benevolent, and modern — shaped candidate evaluations and vote choice in the 2021 German federal election. Using panel data collected before and after the election, we show that sexism influenced not only support for the populist radical right, but also voting patterns for conservative and liberal parties, and reduced sympathy for women candidates — highlighting its broader impact on democratic representation.
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/2474736X.2025.2508382?scroll=top&needAccess=true
January 2025
In this post-election analysis for Politique européenne, we (together we Stefan Hee) examine the results of the 2024 European Parliament election in Germany. The vote marked a sharp defeat for the country’s progressive “traffic light” coalition government and confirmed pre-election expectations of a rightward shift. The piece situates the outcome in the broader context of German party politics and voter sentiment after years of political transformation following the Merkel era.
Read more about Germany and all the other country contribution open access in this special issue of Politique Européenne: https://shs.cairn.info/journal-politique-europeenne-2024-4-page-114?lang=en
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December 2024
Are EU institutions truly more gender-equal? This essay reviews decades of scholarship on women’s careers in EU politics, exploring whether elites' commitment to gender parity is unique—and how fragile gains might be.
Read more: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/14651165241299328
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April 2023:
New article on sexism and vote for radical right parties!
Read here: www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpos.2023.1038659/abstract
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November 2021:
New short commentary on the 2021 Bundestag election and the representation of women with Corinna Kröber.
Read here: www.bpb.de/apuz/343506/der-bundestag-ein-repraesentatives-parlament
May 2025
In this study, we (together with Christina Eder) examine how different forms of sexism — hostile, benevolent, and modern — shaped candidate evaluations and vote choice in the 2021 German federal election. Using panel data collected before and after the election, we show that sexism influenced not only support for the populist radical right, but also voting patterns for conservative and liberal parties, and reduced sympathy for women candidates — highlighting its broader impact on democratic representation.
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/2474736X.2025.2508382?scroll=top&needAccess=true
January 2025
In this post-election analysis for Politique européenne, we (together we Stefan Hee) examine the results of the 2024 European Parliament election in Germany. The vote marked a sharp defeat for the country’s progressive “traffic light” coalition government and confirmed pre-election expectations of a rightward shift. The piece situates the outcome in the broader context of German party politics and voter sentiment after years of political transformation following the Merkel era.
Read more about Germany and all the other country contribution open access in this special issue of Politique Européenne: https://shs.cairn.info/journal-politique-europeenne-2024-4-page-114?lang=en
****
December 2024
Are EU institutions truly more gender-equal? This essay reviews decades of scholarship on women’s careers in EU politics, exploring whether elites' commitment to gender parity is unique—and how fragile gains might be.
Read more: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/14651165241299328
****
April 2023:
New article on sexism and vote for radical right parties!
Read here: www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpos.2023.1038659/abstract
****
November 2021:
New short commentary on the 2021 Bundestag election and the representation of women with Corinna Kröber.
Read here: www.bpb.de/apuz/343506/der-bundestag-ein-repraesentatives-parlament
****
March 2021:
Book launch of Gabriele Abels, Andrea Krizsan, Heather MacRae, Anna van der Vleuten (eds.) Routledge Handbook of Gender and EU Politics. London: Routledge. See our contribution on political knowledge about Europe here!
https://www.routledge.com/The-Routledge-Handbook-of-Gender-and-EU-Politics/Abels-Krizsan-MacRae-Vleuten/p/book/9781138485259
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July 2020:
The European Social Survey (ESS) Wave 11 will include a rotating module entitled ‘Gender in Contemporary Europe: Rethinking Equality and the Backlash’ by Susan Banducci, Hilde Coffe, Jessica Fortin-Rittberger, Marta Fraile & Amy Alexander.
Historic moment: This will be the most comprehensive battery of items on gender ever fielded in a cross-national survey and the first ever all women team (it was about time)!
Read our position paper here!
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July 2020:
A few thoughts on the adoption of gender quotas in Germany. Seeking to dispel the urban legend that the adoption of quotas brings lower quality politicians.
https://www.sn.at/politik/weltpolitik/was-bringt-die-frauenquote-90176881
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June 2020:
New stuff out looking at how knowledge inequalities across gender, age, and education, are related to the content, format, and object of the survey items used to measure political knowledge. Using a pooled data set encompassing 106 post-election surveys in 47 countries from the CSES, we perform analyses by stacking the data at the question level. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/ssqu.12822
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April 2019:
New article looking at the stability of different measurements of political knowledge over time and across countries! Spoiler alert: it is even less pretty than you think. https://academic.oup.com/ijpor/advance-article-abstract/doi/10.1093/ijpor/edz005/5475494
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February 2019:
"Nur keine Angst vor der Quote" - in einem Gastbeitrag für Die Zeit.Online argumentiere ich mit Prof. Berthold Rittberger warum Frauenquoten in der Politik sinnvoll sind.
