Arndt Leininger

I am Professor of political science, especially methods at University of Hamburg, where I lead an Emmy Noether Research Group on “Polarization through and in referendums: mapping polarization within and beyond the party system.” I am also the recipient of an ERC Starting Grant for my project “Residential mobility and the realignment of electoral politics in established democracies (RESPOL).”

Previously, I was an assistant professor for political science research methods at Chemnitz University of Technology. I hold a PhD in Governance from the Hertie School of Governance, Berlin, an MSc in Political Science and Political Economy from the London School of Economics and Political Science and a BA in Political Science from Freie Universität Berlin.

My areas of research are in political behavior and applied quantitative methods. I am interested in rightwing populism, polarization, direct democracy, turnout, youths in politics, election forecasting, economic voting, and electoral studies more broadly. My work has been published in the American Political Science Review, Journal of Politics, Political Science Research and Methods, Politische Vierteljahresschrift, and West European Politics among others.

I am also a founding member and former board member of CorrelAid, a data science non-profit. From 2012 to 2013 I worked as parliamentary aide in the German Bundestag. I occasionally post about political science, politics, data analysis and sometimes football using the handle @aleininger.