Find your thesis supervisor(s) and examiner
This page helps students who study Political Science (incl. Cultural Studies, PPE, CPEL, Global Studies, and the Dual Degree MA) or LUMACSS find a suitable match for thesis supervision as well as oral and written final exams. We kindly ask students to follow the steps indicated below, check the list of potential supervisors and examiners in the relevant section, and learn about their availability, topical interests, methodological specialisations, and specific requirements.
Please note
- Regular external lecturers can also act as thesis supervisors and, in some cases, as examiners. You can find them in the lists under your study program below.
- More details on how the procedure for the thesis and examinations (Abschlussverfahren) works at the KSF can be found here.
First steps
- Check in their profile below whether the person mentions a topic of interest and methodological specialization that overlaps with your interests.
- Check whether the potential supervisor/examiner is still available for supervision or exams by consulting THIS GOOGLE SHEET. Note that, currently, only external lecturers indicate their availability as we are testing this system.
Next steps for thesis supervision
- Contact a potential supervisor who is available and overlaps with your interests by sending them the specific materials they request, which are indicated in their profile below.
- For the Master thesis, limit your first contact to the first supervisor and then discuss with that supervisor who would be a suitable second supervisor.
Next steps for oral and written exams
- Contact a potential examiner who is available and overlaps with your interests by sending them the specific materials they request, which are indicated in their profile below.
What to do if cannot find anyone
- Please contact the study advisor of your degree programme.
- Do this as early as possible, as we cannot guarantee that we can help find a match when dealing with last-minute requests before the registration deadline.
Prof. Dr. Joachim Blatter
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: democratic theory, practice, and innovation; migration and integration; transnationalism, European Integration; populism, rural resentment, East-West-Conflict, authoritarianism
- Methodological specialisations: case studies; all kinds of text analysis; normative discussions, concept- and index-building
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: tentative research design of an idea of interest (one page maximum)
ORAL EXAMS
- Freedom of choice: maximum freedom within my expertise (see above)
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: declaration of topics of interest and justification of overlap with my research interests and methodological specialisations (see above)
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Prof. Dr. Lena Schaffer
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: International and comparative climate politics, international political economy, public opinion; more specifically, globalisation and trade policy, climate and energy policy, parties and climate change
- Methodological specialisations: quantitative methods, causal inference
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: concrete ideas for research question as well as first checks on data availability and suitability of method
- Other comments: ideally, you should have visited a course with me or with external examiners in the field of International Relations and/or International Political Economy
ORAL EXAMS
- Freedom of choice: oral examination is based on the topics and literature covered in my seminars and lectures; an example of topics from earlier oral examinations (updated regularly) is available upon request
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: you should be interested in International Relations or International Political Economy and send a list of relevant courses taken in these areas with me or with external lecturers
- Other comments: ideally, you have visited a course with me or with external examiners in the field of International Relations or International Political Economy
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Prof. Dr. Alexander Trechsel
PLEASE NOTE
As Professor Trechsel also serves as Vice President of Research, he has limited capacity to serve as supervisor and examiner. When reaching out to him, please always put his senior assistant Dr. Álvaro Canalejo-Molero in cc (alvaro.canalejo@unilu.ch).
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: comparative politics, political communication, political behaviour, politics and the internet, Voting Advice Applications (VAAs), digitalisation and party politics, affective polarisation, European integration, direct democracy, politics of Switzerland
- Methodological specialisations: quantitative methods
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: concrete ideas for research questions and initial checks on data availability; please put alvaro.canalejo@unilu.ch in cc
- Other comments: ideally, you should have attended a lecture of mine
ORAL EXAMS
- Freedom of choice: examinations are based on the topics and literature covered in my lectures with a focus on those also covered in own research
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: List of topics with preliminary literature lists; please put alvaro.canalejo@unilu.ch in cc
- Other comments: ideally, you should have attended a lecture of mine
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Dr. Stefan Rieder
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: policy analysis, policy evaluation, environmental and energy politics and policies
- Methodological specialisations: qualitative methods
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: tentative research design of an idea of interest (one page maximum); up to three ideas / research designs in total
ORAL EXAMS
- Freedom of choice: maximum freedom within my expertise (see above)
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: declaration of topics of interest and justification of overlap with my areas of expertise (see above)
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German
Dr. Álvaro Canalejo-Molero
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: political behaviour, elections and party politics, democratic attitudes and backsliding, affective polarisation, identity politics, digitalisation and politics
- Methodological specialisations: quantitative methods, regression analysis, experiments, causal inference, quantitative text analysis
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: tentative research design of an idea of interest (one page maximum); up to three ideas / research designs in total
ORAL EXAMS
- Freedom of choice: maximum freedom within my expertise (see above)
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: declaration of topics of interest and justification of overlap with my areas of expertise (see above)
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- English
Dr. Johannes Schulz
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: political emotions (especially resentment/ressentiment), politics of memory, social (in)equality, the political/social theory of right-wing populism/authoritarianism, feminist political theory, neo-liberalism, democratic theory, history of ideas: Hobbes, Rousseau, Kant, Adam Smith, Marx, Nietzsche, Scheler, Adorno, Foucault, Habermas, Rawls
- Methodological specialisations: normative political theory, social theory, social philosophy
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: tentative one-page proposal/research design with a developed research question, outline of the structure and relevant literature
- Other comments: I do not supervise empirical or partly empirical work or work that obviously lends itself to an empirical methodological approach and will ignore e-mails that contain (partially) empirical proposals.
ORAL EXAMS
- Freedom of choice: maximum freedom within my expertise (see above); topics that do not meet the criteria in the next point will not be considered
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: list of at least four possible topics with justification of overlap with my topics of interest (see above) and/or a clear overlap with the materials listed in a syllabus of a course I have taught at the University of Lucerne (syllabi are available on request)
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Dr. Maurits Heumann
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: authoritarianism and right-wing populism, political emotions (e.g. rural resentment), urban–rural divides, and epistemic divides
- Methodological specialisations: qualitative research methodology, including participant observation, qualitative interviews, focus groups, qualitative content analysis, and thematic analysis
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: a short research design sketch outlining the research question, preliminary ideas, and the intended methodological approach (1-2 pages)
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Dr. Lynn Roth
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: utopian and dystopian thought; evil in political and moral contexts; critical theory and social critique; emotions and affect in political thought; theories of populism
- Methodological specialisations: political theory (interpretive, conceptual, and normative approaches)
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: Short description of the topic and motivation (max. half a page); preliminary research question(s) or problem statement (max. half a page); initial thoughts on methodology and research design (max. half a page)
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Prof. Dr. Joachim Blatter
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: democratic theory, practice, and innovation; migration and integration; transnationalism, European Integration; populism, rural resentment, East-West-Conflict, authoritarianism
- Methodological specialisations: case studies; all kinds of text analysis; normative discussions, concept- and index-building
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: tentative research design of an idea of interest (one page maximum)
ORAL EXAMS
- Freedom of choice: maximum freedom within my expertise (see above)
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: declaration of topics of interest and justification of overlap with my research interests and methodological specialisations (see above)
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Prof. Dr. Lena Schaffer
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: International and comparative climate politics, international political economy, public opinion; more specifically, globalisation and trade policy, climate and energy policy, parties and climate change
- Methodological specialisations: quantitative methods, causal inference
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: concrete ideas for research question as well as first checks on data availability and suitability of method
- Other comments: ideally, you should have visited a course with me or with external examiners in the field of International Relations and/or International Political Economy
ORAL EXAMS
- Freedom of choice: oral examination is based on the topics and literature covered in my seminars and lectures; an example of topics from earlier oral examinations (updated regularly) is available upon request
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: you should be interested in International Relations or International Political Economy and send a list of relevant courses taken in these areas with me or with external lecturers
- Other comments: ideally, you have visited a course with me or with external examiners in the field of International Relations or International Political Economy
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Prof. Dr. Alexander Trechsel
PLEASE NOTE
As Professor Trechsel also serves as Vice President of Research, he has limited capacity to serve as supervisor and examiner. When reaching out to him, please always put his senior assistant Dr. Álvaro Canalejo-Molero in cc (alvaro.canalejo@unilu.ch).
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: comparative politics, political communication, political behaviour, politics and the internet, Voting Advice Applications (VAAs), digitalisation and party politics, affective polarisation, European integration, direct democracy, politics of Switzerland
- Methodological specialisations: quantitative methods
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: concrete ideas for research questions and initial checks on data availability; please put alvaro.canalejo@unilu.ch in cc
- Other comments: ideally, you should have attended a lecture of mine
ORAL EXAMS
- Freedom of choice: examinations are based on the topics and literature covered in my lectures with a focus on those also covered in own research
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: List of topics with preliminary literature lists; please put alvaro.canalejo@unilu.ch in cc
- Other comments: ideally, you should have attended a lecture of mine
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Dr. Stefan Rieder
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: policy analysis, policy evaluation, environmental and energy politics and policies
- Methodological specialisations: qualitative methods
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: tentative research design of an idea of interest (one page maximum); up to three ideas / research designs in total
ORAL EXAMS
- Freedom of choice: maximum freedom within my expertise (see above)
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: declaration of topics of interest and justification of overlap with my areas of expertise (see above)
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
German
Dr. Álvaro Canalejo-Molero
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: political behaviour, elections and party politics, democratic attitudes and backsliding, affective polarisation, identity politics, digitalisation and politics
- Methodological specialisations: quantitative methods, regression analysis, experiments, causal inference, quantitative text analysis
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: tentative research design of an idea of interest (one page maximum); up to three ideas / research designs in total
ORAL EXAMS
- Freedom of choice: maximum freedom within my expertise (see above)
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: declaration of topics of interest and justification of overlap with my areas of expertise (see above)
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- English
Dr. Johannes Schulz
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: political emotions (especially resentment/ressentiment), politics of memory, social (in)equality, the political/social theory of right-wing populism/authoritarianism, feminist political theory, neo-liberalism, democratic theory, history of ideas: Hobbes, Rousseau, Kant, Adam Smith, Marx, Nietzsche, Scheler, Adorno, Foucault, Habermas, Rawls
- Methodological specialisations: normative political theory, social theory, social philosophy
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: tentative one-page proposal/research design with a developed research question, outline of the structure and relevant literature
- Other comments: I do not supervise empirical or partly empirical work or work that obviously lends itself to an empirical methodological approach and will ignore e-mails that contain (partially) empirical proposals.
ORAL EXAMS
- Freedom of choice: maximum freedom within my expertise (see above); topics that do not meet the criteria in the next point will not be considered
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: list of at least four possible topics with justification of overlap with my topics of interest (see above) and/or a clear overlap with the materials listed in a syllabus of a course I have taught at the University of Lucerne (syllabi are available on request)
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Dr. Maurits Heumann
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: authoritarianism and right-wing populism, political emotions (e.g. rural resentment), urban–rural divides, and epistemic divides
- Methodological specialisations: qualitative research methodology, including participant observation, qualitative interviews, focus groups, qualitative content analysis, and thematic analysis
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: a short research design sketch outlining the research question, preliminary ideas, and the intended methodological approach (1-2 pages)
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Dr. Lynn Roth
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: utopian and dystopian thought; evil in political and moral contexts; critical theory and social critique; emotions and affect in political thought; theories of populism
- Methodological specialisations: political theory (interpretive, conceptual, and normative approaches)
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: Short description of the topic and motivation (max. half a page); preliminary research question(s) or problem statement (max. half a page); initial thoughts on methodology and research design (max. half a page)
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Prof. Dr. Joachim Blatter
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: democratic theory, practice, and innovation; migration and integration; transnationalism, European Integration; populism, rural resentment, East-West-Conflict, authoritarianism
- Methodological specialisations: case studies; all kinds of text analysis; normative discussions, concept- and index-building
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: tentative research design of an idea of interest (one page maximum)
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Prof. Dr. Lena Schaffer
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: International and comparative climate politics, international political economy, public opinion; more specifically, globalisation and trade policy, climate and energy policy, parties and climate change
- Methodological specialisations: quantitative methods, causal inference
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: concrete ideas for research question as well as first checks on data availability and suitability of method
- Other comments: ideally, you should have visited a course with me or with external examiners in the field of International Relations and/or International Political Economy
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Prof. Dr. Alexander Trechsel
PLEASE NOTE
As Professor Trechsel also serves as Vice President of Research, he has limited capacity to serve as supervisor and examiner. When reaching out to him, please always put his senior assistant Dr. Álvaro Canalejo-Molero in cc (alvaro.canalejo@unilu.ch).
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: comparative politics, political communication, political behaviour, politics and the internet, Voting Advice Applications (VAAs), digitalisation and party politics, affective polarisation, European integration, direct democracy, politics of Switzerland
- Methodological specialisations: quantitative methods
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: concrete ideas for research questions and initial checks on data availability; please put alvaro.canalejo@unilu.ch in cc
- Other comments: ideally, you should have attended a lecture of mine
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Dr. Stefan Rieder
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: policy analysis, policy evaluation, environmental and energy politics and policies
- Methodological specialisations: qualitative methods
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: tentative research design of an idea of interest (one page maximum); up to three ideas / research designs in total
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German
Dr. Álvaro Canalejo-Molero
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: political behaviour, elections and party politics, democratic attitudes and backsliding, affective polarisation, identity politics, digitalisation and politics
- Methodological specialisations: quantitative methods, regression analysis, experiments, causal inference, quantitative text analysis
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: tentative research design of an idea of interest (one page maximum); up to three ideas / research designs in total
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- English
Dr. Johannes Schulz
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: political emotions (especially resentment/ressentiment), politics of memory, social (in)equality, the political/social theory of right-wing populism/authoritarianism, feminist political theory, neo-liberalism, democratic theory, history of ideas: Hobbes, Rousseau, Kant, Adam Smith, Marx, Nietzsche, Scheler, Adorno, Foucault, Habermas, Rawls
- Methodological specialisations: normative political theory, social theory, social philosophy
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: tentative one-page proposal/research design with a developed research question, outline of the structure and relevant literature
- Other comments: I do not supervise empirical or partly empirical work or work that obviously lends itself to an empirical methodological approach and will ignore e-mails that contain (partially) empirical proposals.
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Dr. Maurits Heumann
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: authoritarianism and right-wing populism, political emotions (e.g. rural resentment), urban–rural divides, and epistemic divides
- Methodological specialisations: qualitative research methodology, including participant observation, qualitative interviews, focus groups, qualitative content analysis, and thematic analysis
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: a short research design sketch outlining the research question, preliminary ideas, and the intended methodological approach (1-2 pages)
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Dr. Lynn Roth
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: utopian and dystopian thought; evil in political and moral contexts; critical theory and social critique; emotions and affect in political thought; theories of populism
- Methodological specialisations: political theory (interpretive, conceptual, and normative approaches)
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: Short description of the topic and motivation (max. half a page); preliminary research question(s) or problem statement (max. half a page); initial thoughts on methodology and research design (max. half a page)
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Prof. Dr. Joachim Blatter
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: democratic theory, practice, and innovation; migration and integration; transnationalism, European Integration; populism, rural resentment, East-West-Conflict, authoritarianism
- Methodological specialisations: case studies; all kinds of text analysis; normative discussions, concept- and index-building
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: tentative research design of an idea of interest (one page maximum)
ORAL OR WRITTEN EXAMS
- Freedom of choice: maximum freedom within my expertise (see above)
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: declaration of topics of interest and justification of overlap with my research interests and methodological specialisations (see above)
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Prof. Dr. Lena Schaffer
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: International and comparative climate politics, international political economy, public opinion; more specifically, globalisation and trade policy, climate and energy policy, parties and climate change
- Methodological specialisations: quantitative methods, causal inference
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: concrete ideas for research question as well as first checks on data availability and suitability of method
- Other comments: ideally, you should have visited a course with me or with external examiners in the field of International Relations and/or International Political Economy
ORAL OR WRITTEN EXAMS
- Freedom of choice: oral examination is based on the topics and literature covered in my seminars and lectures; an example of topics from earlier oral examinations (updated regularly) is available upon request
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: you should be interested in International Relations or International Political Economy and send a list of relevant courses taken in these areas with me or with external lecturers
- Other comments: ideally, you have visited a course with me or with external examiners in the field of International Relations or International Political Economy
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Prof. Dr. Alexander Trechsel
PLEASE NOTE
As Professor Trechsel also serves as Vice President of Research, he has limited capacity to serve as supervisor and examiner. When reaching out to him, please always put his senior assistant Dr. Álvaro Canalejo-Molero in cc (alvaro.canalejo@unilu.ch).
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: comparative politics, political communication, political behaviour, politics and the internet, Voting Advice Applications (VAAs), digitalisation and party politics, affective polarisation, European integration, direct democracy, politics of Switzerland
- Methodological specialisations: quantitative methods
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: concrete ideas for research questions and initial checks on data availability; please put alvaro.canalejo@unilu.ch in cc
- Other comments: ideally, you should have attended a lecture of mine
ORAL OR WRITTEN EXAMS
- Freedom of choice: examinations are based on the topics and literature covered in my lectures with a focus on those also covered in own research
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: List of topics with preliminary literature lists; please put alvaro.canalejo@unilu.ch in cc
- Other comments: ideally, you should have attended a lecture of mine
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Dr. Stefan Rieder
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: policy analysis, policy evaluation, environmental and energy politics and policies
- Methodological specialisations: qualitative methods
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: tentative research design of an idea of interest (one page maximum); up to three ideas / research designs in total
ORAL OR WRITTEN EXAMS
- Freedom of choice: maximum freedom within my expertise (see above)
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: declaration of topics of interest and justification of overlap with my areas of expertise (see above)
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German
Dr. Álvaro Canalejo-Molero
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: political behaviour, elections and party politics, democratic attitudes and backsliding, affective polarisation, identity politics, digitalisation and politics
- Methodological specialisations: quantitative methods, regression analysis, experiments, causal inference, quantitative text analysis
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: tentative research design of an idea of interest (one page maximum); up to three ideas / research designs in total
ORAL OR WRITTEN EXAMS
- Freedom of choice: maximum freedom within my expertise (see above)
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: declaration of topics of interest and justification of overlap with my areas of expertise (see above)
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- English
Dr. Johannes Schulz
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: political emotions (especially resentment/ressentiment), politics of memory, social (in)equality, the political/social theory of right-wing populism/authoritarianism, feminist political theory, neo-liberalism, democratic theory, history of ideas: Hobbes, Rousseau, Kant, Adam Smith, Marx, Nietzsche, Scheler, Adorno, Foucault, Habermas, Rawls
- Methodological specialisations: normative political theory, social theory, social philosophy
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: tentative one-page proposal/research design with a developed research question, outline of the structure and relevant literature
- Other comments: I do not supervise empirical or partly empirical work or work that obviously lends itself to an empirical methodological approach and will ignore e-mails that contain (partially) empirical proposals.
ORAL OR WRITTEN EXAMS
- Freedom of choice: maximum freedom within my expertise (see above); topics that do not meet the criteria in the next point will not be considered
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: list of at least four possible topics with justification of overlap with my topics of interest (see above) and/or a clear overlap with the materials listed in a syllabus of a course I have taught at the University of Lucerne (syllabi are available on request)
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Dr. Maurits Heumann
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: authoritarianism and right-wing populism, political emotions (e.g. rural resentment), urban–rural divides, and epistemic divides
- Methodological specialisations: qualitative research methodology, including participant observation, qualitative interviews, focus groups, qualitative content analysis, and thematic analysis
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: a short research design sketch outlining the research question, preliminary ideas, and the intended methodological approach (1-2 pages).
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Dr. Lynn Roth
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: utopian and dystopian thought; evil in political and moral contexts; critical theory and social critique; emotions and affect in political thought; theories of populism
- Methodological specialisations: political theory (interpretive, conceptual, and normative approaches)
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: Short description of the topic and motivation (max. half a page); preliminary research question(s) or problem statement (max. half a page); initial thoughts on methodology and research design (max. half a page)
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Prof. Dr. Lena Schaffer
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: International and comparative climate politics, international political economy, public opinion; more specifically, globalisation and trade policy, climate and energy policy, parties and climate change
- Methodological specialisations: quantitative methods, causal inference
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: concrete ideas for research question as well as first checks on data availability and suitability of method
- Other comments: ideally, you should have visited a course with me or with external examiners in the field of International Relations and/or International Political Economy
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Prof. Dr. Alexander Trechsel
PLEASE NOTE
As Professor Trechsel also serves as Vice President of Research, he has limited capacity to serve as supervisor and examiner. When reaching out to him, please always put his senior assistant Dr. Álvaro Canalejo-Molero in cc (alvaro.canalejo@unilu.ch).
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: comparative politics, political communication, political behaviour, politics and the internet, Voting Advice Applications (VAAs), digitalisation and party politics, affective polarisation, European integration, direct democracy, politics of Switzerland
- Methodological specialisations: quantitative methods
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: concrete ideas for research questions and initial checks on data availability; please put alvaro.canalejo@unilu.ch in cc
- Other comments: ideally, you should have attended a lecture of mine
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English
Dr. Stefan Rieder
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: policy analysis, policy evaluation, environmental and energy politics and policies
- Methodological specialisations: qualitative methods
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: tentative research design of an idea of interest (one page maximum); up to three ideas / research designs in total
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German
Dr. Álvaro Canalejo-Molero
AREAS OF EXPERTISE
- Topics of interest: political behaviour, elections and party politics, democratic attitudes and backsliding, affective polarisation, identity politics, digitalisation and politics
- Methodological specialisations: quantitative methods, regression analysis, experiments, causal inference, quantitative text analysis
THESIS SUPERVISION
- Necessary materials to be sent upon first contact: tentative research design of an idea of interest (one page maximum); up to three ideas / research designs in total
LANGUAGE OPTIONS
- German and English