My research centers on challenger parties: how they break into established electoral competition and how the contexts into which they emerge shape the strategies they adopt. Across projects, I ask how challenger parties appeal to social groups, position themselves vis-a-vis the political regime, and navigate the organizational landscapes they inherit. My cases span Western Europe from the mass party era to the present; my methods combine historical comparison with computational analysis of textual data.
Challenger parties gain electoral footing by appealing to group identities, but they can do so in strikingly different ways. While some focus on rallying support for an ingroup, other primarily mobilize in opposition to outgroups. This book distinguishes these strategies as contrasting styles of identity politics and explains the structural and political conditions which favour either approach. Through mixed-methods analysis of socialist, fascist, ethno-regionalist, green, and far right parties across Germany, Great Britain, and the Netherlands, I show how identity politics emerges during periods of party system transformation. Revising for submission end of August 2026.
The dissertation on which this project is based received the Honorable Mention for APSA's Ernst B. Haas Best Dissertation Award.
My other recent and ongoing work examines the organizational foundations of the emerging educational divide, and examines how parties use group-based appeals in political competition.
The educational divide reshaping European politics lacks the deep organizational roots that characterized past cleavages. I map cross-national variation in how parties and civil society actors embed (or fail to embed) this divide, and explore the consequences for representation and political stability.
"Cleavage theory meets civil society: A framework and research agenda" (with Endre Borbáth and Swen Hutter). Published in West European Politics.
"Die Schweiz ist überall? Cleavage theory and the new far right." Revising; stay tuned.
"Can civil society still anchor cleavages? Mapping social closure in associational life" (with Alexander Pries and Swen Hutter). Working paper will be available in June.
How and why do parties differ in how they invoke social groups? I examine variation in group-based appeals between challengers and mainstream parties, identifying key differences and asking whether they stem from organizational structure, strategic considerations, or a combination of both. Using computational text analysis of manifestos, speeches, and historical campaign materials, I trace the bases of parties' representational choices.
"A group by any other name: Conceptualizing and measuring group-based appeals" (with Ronja Sczepanski). Data expansion in progress; previous working paper available upon request.
"How party-building shapes group-based appeals: Evidence from the British Labour Party." New data collection in progress; previous working paper available upon request.
"Regional inequality and electoral strategy in Interwar Britain: Evidence from a new corpus of candidate speeches" (with Pau Grau-Vilalta). Working paper will be available in June.