Research
Research
In its research and teaching, the Department of Government primarily focuses on comparative and Austrian politics. Its research is concerned with political behaviour, political actors, such as political parties and politicians, political institutions, the processes governed by these institutions, as well as their outcomes. It includes work on political participation, voting behaviour, parties and party competition, coalition politics and Austrian politics in general and is mostly based on rationalist and behavioural approaches.
Our goal is to conduct high-level, internationally competitive research in the area of Comparative Politics with the collaboration of international project partners and research networks. At the Faculty of Social Sciences the department is mainly engaged in the key research area ''Political Competition and Communication: Democratic Representation in Changing Societies'.
The department’s approach places it in the discipline’s empirical-analytical core and is mostly based on quantitative social science methods. To map empirical phenomena accurately, researcher in the department focus on the continuous development of survey design, as well as on the analysis of empirical data by applying the best suited statistical model. The department aims to achieve the best work on Austrian politics and to make important contributions to the international academic literature on Comparative Government and Politics.
An overview of current publications and activities at the department can be found below and on the personal websites of our team.
Publications
Coalitions in the news
- Author(s)
- Jakob-Moritz Eberl, Carolina Plescia
- Abstract
Past research has shown that media coverage during election campaigns influences citizen preferences and expectations about parties and political candidates. Very little is known, however, about the effect of media coverage on post-electoral coalition preferences and expectations. This is surprising, given that speculations about post-electoral coalition building are an essential part of election campaigns in all multiparty systems. This paper investigates the consequences that coalitions' media saliency and tone have on voter preferences and expectations about these potential coalitions. Using media and panel data from the 2013 German and Austrian election campaigns, we find that media coverage has substantial effects on voter perceptions although the effects differ in strength between the two countries. These findings have important implications for our understanding of media effects, voter expectations and campaign strategies.
- Organisation(s)
- Department of Communication, Department of Government
- Journal
- Electoral Studies
- Volume
- 55
- Pages
- 30-39
- No. of pages
- 10
- ISSN
- 0261-3794
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1016/j.electstud.2018.07.004
- Publication date
- 10-2018
- Peer reviewed
- Yes
- Austrian Fields of Science 2012
- 506012 Political systems, 508012 Media impact studies
- Keywords
- ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Political Science and International Relations
- Portal url
- https://ucrisportal.univie.ac.at/en/publications/ae88268b-631a-4bf7-8c88-39ea6202df67