Laurenz Ennser-Jedenastik

© Laurenz Ennser-Jedenastik

In the coming five years, the political scientist Laurenz Ennser-Jedenastik studies how political careers in Europe have changed since 1945 and which consequences arise for legislation and behaviour in elections. Traditionally, political parties were the recruitment channels for the political elite. Today, however, more and more lateral entrants without a long political career manage to hold a high political office. Ennser-Jedenastik and his team study how this shapes politics. They record the career paths of about 10,000 European ministers since 1945 in great depth. With methods of sequence analysis (similar to DNA analysis) they make these career paths quantifiable. These data are used in the project to gain insights into the effects of changing political biographies on political outputs (legislation) and inputs (behaviour in elections).