B European Political Systems and their Integration
The development of democracy in Europe is at the core of research in Department B. Coherence of the research activities in Department B results from both the common interest in European democratic governance and the methodological emphasis on theory-guided comparative empirical research in this area.
The projects in this Department approach the issue of democracy in Europe, giving particular attention to the conditions and contextual factors of democratic governance. However, they do so from different perspectives and, accordingly, are organised in three research areas. These three research areas investigate complementary yet interrelated aspects of democratic politics in European countries and in the European multilevel system of governance. Projects in Research Area B1 give special attention to the conditions of democratic governance in terms of the behaviour and orientations of citizens; projects in Research Area B2 concentrate on the institutional contexts of democratic governance; projects in Research Area B3 focus on political behaviour and political decision-making in regions that are influenced by European states or the European Union. Several projects are closely involved in international research networks and many aim to generate data sets as public goods for the scientific community.