Research

RESEARCH INTERESTS

My research interests lie in the field of comparative politics. More specifically, my research focuses on minority cabinets, political parties, institutions, coalition governments, parliaments.

MINORITY GOVERNMENTS

How to govern without controlling a legislative majority? How can cabinet and non-cabinet parties influence policy outcomes? What are the effects of different types of minority cabinets on legislative control and cabinet stability? Though a third of all governments in established parliamentary democracies is formed by minority governments, there has been little comparative research after Kaare Strøm’s seminal work in 1990. For my dissertation project, I collected rich data on minority cabinet attributes, support party attributes, and support agreements. In my thesis and various articles with co-authors, I shed light on minority governments in comparative perspective.

Manuscripts:
– PhD Thesis: Policy-making under minority cabinets: How non-cabinet parties influence public policies (at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin)
– Small but powerful? The legislative performance of minority cabinets, 2022, in Legislative Studies Quarterly, Vol. 47 (1), pp. 193-224
– Stability of minority governments and the role of support agreements, 2022, in West European Politics, Vol. 45 (4), pp. 767-792 (with Svenja Krauss)
– Under the Influence: Pay-Offs of Legislative Support Parties under Minority Governments, 2021, in Government and Opposition, Vol. 56 (1),  pp. 121-140 (with Veronica Anghel)
Work in progress:
– Policy-making under minority cabinets: How non-cabinet parties influence public policies (book manuscript)

COALITION GOVERNMENTS (& POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS)

Coalition governments shape the political life in most established parliamentary democracies. To understand the circumstances that affect which type of cabinet forms and the partisan dynamics which impact the stability of governments is therefore of highest interest. In my research, I also look at the interplay of political institutions and coalition governments. Which influence do institutions have on government formation? And how do coalitions make use of legislative institutions such as committee chairs?

Manuscripts:
– Institutional constraints on cabinet formation: Veto points and party system dynamics, in European Journal of Political Research, Vol. 60 (2), pp. 295-316 (with Johan Hellström & Holger Döring)
– Extra-coalitional policy bargaining: investigating the power of committee chairs, in The Journal of Legislative Studies, Vol. 27 (1), pp. 93-111 (with Svenja Krauss & Katrin Praprotnik)
Work in progress:
– Exit Options and Cabinet Stability with (Jochen Rehmert & Mingyi Zhang)
– Cabinet formation on the state level. Evidence from Germany and Austria (Katrin Praprotnik & Svenja Krauss)

POLITICAL PARTIES & SUPPORT PARTIES

What effect does government participation and government support have on the electoral performance of political parties? How do voters perceive parties based on their government status? And which effect does this have for party competition?

Work in progress:
– The electoral implications of minority cabinets (with Heike Klüver)
– Coalition heuristics in multi-level systems (with Ida Hjermitslev and Svenja Krauss)
– In for a penny, in for a pound? Do perceptions of support parties shift with governing coalition partners (with Matthew Bergman and Svenja Krauss)