News from the CEU Democracy Institute

The tenth issue of the Democracy Bulletin, the quarterly newsletter of the CEU Democracy Institute (DI), focuses on our most important achievements and publications in the previous months. If you don’t want to miss any of our news items, events, publications, podcasts, or videos, then please follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

HIGHLIGHTS

Renata Uitz Appointed Professor at Royal Holloway

Renata Uitz, former Co-director of the CEU Democracy Institute, has been appointed as a Professor of Law and Government at Royal Holloway, University of London. She will also serve as a Senior Research Fellow at the DI, focusing on research projects related to illiberal democracy, constitutionalism, and the rule of law. Our Director Laszlo Bruszt praised her contributions to the DI's research agenda and expressed anticipation for collaborative projects on the future of democracy. "Leading the DI alongside Laszlo has been a unique and rewarding professional opportunity. I would like to thank the DI's vibrant community for its trust, support, and inspiration. The pursuit of new ideas and a resilient spirit make the DI a true hub of advanced learning,” Renata Uitz said.

New Project for Research Incubation and Education on “Democracy and Development”

We are thrilled to announce the launch of a three-year project, funded by the Open Society University Network. The project aims to promote collaboration between scholars from the Global South and North on Democracy and Development. It involves multiple OSUN institutions and creates global research hubs addressing challenges related to democracy revival, and will establish and support four region- and theme-specific research incubation hubs. Our Director Laszlo Bruszt leads the initiative with OSUN Post-doctoral Fellow David Karas serving as academic coordinator.

Roma Civil Monitor at Council of Europe and OSCE

Our Roma Civil Monitor Project (RCM) was invited to present at three significant international events at the Council of Europe and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE). Roland Ferkovics, Co-Manager and Project Officer of RCM advocated for equality and empowerment of Roma women at the Council of Europe, emphasizing the alignment of national strategies with EU frameworks and the involvement of Roma civil societies. At the OSCE meetings, he highlighted civil society's crucial role in strategy development and addressed issues like anti-gypsyism and hate crimes and discussed advancements in National Roma Strategic Frameworks and their role in combating exclusion and fostering political representation.

Zsolt Enyedi and Balazs Trencsenyi Awarded by CEU

The Central European University awarded our Senior Research Fellow Zsolt Enyedi with the CEU Research Excellence Award, and Balazs Trencsenyi, lead researcher of our Democracy in History Workgroup, with the CEU Community Service Excellence Award. Zsolt Enyedi's book, "Party System Closure," co-authored with Fernando Casal Bertoa, received recognition and awards for its scholarly contributions. Additionally, Zsolt's leadership led to CEU winning a Horizon Europe grant in 2022. Meanwhile, Balazs Trencsenyi's dedication to the Invisible University for Ukraine (IUFU) program highlights his commitment to addressing pressing issues and mobilizing resources effectively.

What Is Illiberalism? Discussion with Cas Mudde

In June members of the AUTHLIB consortium gathered for a hybrid workshop in Budapest. The workshop, featuring Professor Cas Mudde, focused on both conceptual and empirical aspects of illiberalism. Participants engaged in discussions about defining illiberalism, its analytical utility, and methods for operationalization and measurement.

Two Post-doctoral Fellows Join the International Polarization Observatory

The DI is joining forces with Sciences Po Paris and the London School of Economics to study the manifold dimensions and expressions of both socio-economic and political polarization. The three institutions are forming the International Polarization Observatory, a collaborative network open to the participation of other universities and research centers conducting research on polarization. As one of the first steps, the DI welcomed two Post-doctoral Fellows in Budapest within the framework of the project: Carlos Melendez and Giorgos Venizelos.

THE DI IN VIENNA

From a Multiethnic Empire to a World of Nation States

Together with our journal, the Review of Democracy, the Research Center for the History of Transformations (RECET), the Institute of Culture Studies and Theatre History at the Austrian Academy of Sciences (ÖAW/IKT) and the Department of European, International and Comparative Law at the Faculty of Law at the University of Vienna we organized a book discussion that explored Central Europe's role as a laboratory shaping the contemporary world order.

OPPORTUNITIES

Joint Budapest Fellowship

The Institute for Advanced Study (IAS CEU), CEU Democracy Institute (DI), and the Vera and Donald Blinken Open Society Archives (OSA) announced a call for applications for their joint fellowship program for the academic year 2024/25, focusing on the theme of "Falsifying the Future." See more details here.

Post-doctoral Fellowship

We also invite applications for a Post-doctoral Fellow position within the project “Overcoming the Aggressor.” This three-year interdisciplinary project examines the formation of national enemy images shaped by aggressors in Europe. See details here.

RESEARCH

DE- AND RE-DEMOCRATIZATION

Rethinking Political Polarization

“When played among ‘democratic enemies,’ democracy stops being ‘the only game in town,’” Andreas Schedler, the workgroup’s lead researcher writes in his article in Political Science Quarterly, in which he seeks to “circumscribe the use and reconstruct the core of political polarization as an instance of extraordinary democratic conflict.”

Incorporating Carbon Compensation

Committed to ecological sustainability, the workgroup has started to incorporate carbon compensation into the budget, assuming at least some measure of responsibility for the environmental impact caused by travel. It is estimated that DRD emitted 12 tons of carbon dioxide in the Academic Year 2022-23, and it compensated for these carbon emissions by contributing 300 EUR to the Community Projects fund of the renowned UK environmental company Carbon Footprint.

DEMOCRACY IN HISTORY

Academics Facing Autocracy Continued

The workgroup launched the second round of its Academics Facing Autocracy program. One track assesses European support structures set up for refugee scholars displaced by authoritarianism and war, while the other one is aimed at developing course curricula to enable students of threatened universities to identify authoritarian threats and to map sources of alternative education.

Article in Urban History

The collective rights of (privileged) city dwellers in medieval and early modern European cities and the historicity of urban governance are important research topics for DI's medievalists. Research Affiliate Katalin Szende published an article on this topic in the journal Urban History, entitled The Birth of Oppida: Small Towns in Hungary in the Angevin Period.

ENVIRONMENT AND DEMOCRACY

Sonya Ziaja’s Article Awarded

The article of our Research Affiliate Sonya Ziaja entitled How Algorithm-Assisted Decision Making is Influencing Environmental Law and Climate Adaptation, won recognition by the Environmental Law and Policy Annual Review as one of the year’s best academic articles that present legal and policy solutions to pressing environmental problems.

Seminar on Policy Responses to the Pandemic

Our Research Affiliate Alexios Antypas examined and analyzed the literature on the impacts on democracy of policy responses to the Covid-19 pandemic in a seminar. He also laid out possible lessons that can be learned from pandemic-related policy that could help mitigate negative impacts on democracy from climate change policies.

INEQUALITIES

Interview Features Our Project

Media platform Partizan profiled the research project History of Our Movements, run in cooperation between the Inequalities and Democracy workgroup and Kozelet Iskolaja (School of Public Life). The project is aimed at providing an insight into the history of Hungarian social movements and shaping the representation of Hungarian civil society and helping process the rich social movement history.

On Governance of Violence Against Women

In their chapter in the Handbook of Feminist Governance, entitled “Feminist Governance in the Field of Violence Against Women: The Case of the Istanbul Convention,” the workgroup’s lead researcher Andrea Krizsan and Conny Roggeband discuss the governance of violence against women in three parts.

MEDIA AND TECHNOLOGY

Contribution to Digital News Report

This year’s Reuters Institute Digital News Report provides evidence that news audiences are becoming more dependent on digital and social platforms. Our researchers, Judit Szakacs and Eva Bognar wrote the chapter on Hungary, where 2022 was a turbulent year in the media market, and trust in news has decreased to just 25%.

Article in Nature Scientific Reports

The article of our Senior Research Fellow Balazs Vedres and Post-doctoral Fellow Orsolya Vasarhelyi, entitled Inclusion Unlocks the Creative Potential of Gender Diversity in Teams, was published by Nature Scientific Reports. The authors analyzed teams in more than 4000 video game projects, and the results show that adding diversity first, and developing inclusion later can lead to higher diversity and inclusion.

RULE OF LAW

Article on Naturalization in EU Jurisdictions

The Oxford Compas working paper by the workgroup’s lead researcher, Dimitry Kochenov and Martijn van den Brink, entitled Legal Residence and Physical Presence: The Law and Practice of Naturalization in EU Jurisdictions, explores the relationship between two of the most common legal concepts in European migration and nationality laws: legal residence and physical presence.

Article on Nationality-Based Bans from the Schengen Zone

The Yale Journal of International Law article by our Research Affiliate Sarah Ganty, Dimitry Kochenov, the workgroup’s lead researcher and Suryapratim Roy, entitled Unlawful Nationality-Based Bans from the Schengen Zone: Poland, Finland, and the Baltic States against Russian Citizens and EU Law, argues that there is no legal way under current European Union law to adopt a citizenship-based ban on entering the Schengen zone.

PODCASTS

The Mistaken Path of Cold War Liberals

In this conversation Yale Professor Samuel Moyn discusses his newly published book Liberalism Against Itself. Cold War Intellectuals and the Making of Our Times with Ferenc Laczo.

The War in Ukraine and Transition

Despite or perhaps due to the war in Ukraine there have been positive developments in combating corruption and other issues in anticipation of EU membership. Teodora Miljojkovic discusses these issues with Maria Popova.

How the Orban Regime Was Made

Stefano Bottoni discusses with Ferenc Laczo how the current political system has been built up in Hungary; reflects on the Orban regime’s sources of legitimacy and internal contradictions; and explores the changing relationship of the country to the EU and to Putin’s Russia.

REVIEW OF DEMOCRACY

Our journal, the Review of Democracy (RevDem) is an open platform to discuss, analyze, reflect on, and develop possible solutions to the challenges to democracy across the globe today. Read its most important publications from recent weeks:

The Man Who Split the Atom and his Soul

Nuclear policy scholar Adérito Vicente reviews one of the two blockbusters of this summer: “Oppenheimer” by Christopher Nolan.

In Need of a Spiritual Renewal of Europe

What is the link between the European counterrevolutionaries of the 17th and 18th centuries and today’s self-declared illiberals? Kasia Krzyzanowska talks to Matthijs Lok.

Models of Judicial Independence in Europe

Teodora Miljojkovic discusses the different models of judicial independence in Spain and beyond with Pablo Castillo Ortiz.

MEET THE DI

Learn more about our colleagues! Click on the image below to watch their videos, in which they introduce themselves, and talk about their work. Stay tuned, a new video is coming on Fridays.

Learn more about the CEU Democracy Institute