Summary:

Jointly with Profs. David Dorn (director), Nir Jaimovich and Matthias Mahlmann, I co-direct the UZH Research Priority Program “Equality of Opportunities”. The URPP Equality of Opportunity aims to investigate the economic and societal changes that give rise to inequality. The researchers involved in the program will also analyze legal frameworks and political measures that help to increase equal opportunities for all members of a society. At IPZ, we conduct a sub-project that studies the politicization of economic inequalities and their political implications via survey experiments and focus groups. The project team consists of Tarik Abou-Chadi, Stefanie Walter, Tabea Palmtag, Delia Zollinger and myself. Also at IPZ, we support a range of excellent projects on political science inequality research through the IPZ Inequality Research Fund.

Contributors:

• Silja Häusermann

Sources of Funding:

• UZH

Contacts:

Internal:

Silja Häusermann
Stefanie Walter
Tabea Palmtag

Transversal Research Priorities:

• Politik und Ungleichheit

Summary:

Joint project by myself, Simon Bornschier, Delia Zollinger, Lukas Haffert and Marco Steenbergen (all UZH) Read our article in the Comparative Political Studies. Electoral politics in advanced democracies have undergone major upheaval in recent decades. The last fifty years have seen the rise of culturally connoted identity politics and the relative decline of political conflict over economic state intervention. Party politics in many countries have changed beyond recognition. Strands of social cleavage theory constitute comprehensive attempts to make sense of these developments. They posit that socio-structural divisions are translated into politics through the mobilization of shared collective identities. However, many studies of social cleavages operate with outdated notions of socio-structural categories and mobilization patterns. Our project integrates theories and concepts of social identity theory, political psychology and social cleavage theory to study the formation of group identities, their mobilization and the formation of new cleavages structuring electoral politics in the 21st century through public opinion surveys in Germany, the UK, Switzerland and France.

Contributors:

• Silja Häusermann

Sources of Funding:

• UZH

Contacts:

Internal:

Delia Zollinger
Lukas Haffert
Marco Steenbergen
Simon Bornschier
Silja Häusermann

Transversal Research Priorities:

• Politik und Ungleichheit