“Don’t know where we’re going, but there’s no sense being late”
Digital media and AI are changing politics and society. The question now is how to make them work for democracy.
That takes digital capacity: the ability to understand these technologies, to use them well, and to govern them. With my research and teaching, I help policymakers, journalists, students, and the public to shape the digital transformation instead of being shaped by it.
- Professor of Political Science, esp. Digital Transformation
- University of Bamberg
- Member of the Board of Directors
- Bavarian Research Institute for Digital Transformation (bidt)
- Associate Editor
- Political Communication
Advice and evidence for the European Commission, the Federal Constitutional Court, and OSCE/ODIHR.
Quoted in The New York Times, DIE ZEIT, Der Spiegel, and FAZ.
Publications
127published since 2009
Selected journals
- Political Communication
- Political Behavior
- Journal of European Public Policy
- Government Information Quarterly
- Journal of Communication
- Communication Theory
- New Media & Society
- The International Journal of Press/Politics
The politics of AI
AI has become both a subject of politics and a tool in it. People contest what resources are spent on AI and how it should be regulated. Politicians, campaigns, and governments use it. This shifts power and raises the question of who gains and who loses. Societies have to settle which uses are legitimate, in government, the military, the police, and political persuasion.
I study how actors use AI, what that changes, what people think of it, and the attempts to govern and regulate AI and its applications.
- Artificial Intelligence and Democracy
Today’s AI is narrow, not general. Judged by what it actually does, its effects on democracy are specific: on self-rule, on equality, on elections, and on the contest between democracies and autocracies.
- Artificial Intelligence in Election Campaigns
American voters dislike AI in campaigns and judge deception hardest. Yet parties that deceive with AI lose no favor, not even with opponents; what rises instead is support for strict regulation, up to a ban on AI development.
- Artificial Intelligence in Deliberation
Told that AI rather than people will run a public deliberation, respondents are less willing to take part and expect worse results. The gap follows attitudes to AI, not education: a new deliberative divide.
- Public Opinion on the Politics of AI Alignment
Which rules should AI systems follow? People in Germany and the United States want accuracy and safety above all; fairness and promoting social ideals get more cautious support, especially in Germany.
What’s aheadFour preprints: a general theory of how AI shapes social change, disclosing a chatbot’s persuasive intent reduces its persuasion, the hidden costs of AI-mediated political outreach, and public support for military AI in nine countries.
Generative AI in Elections: Uses, Preferences, and Trust
Authoritarian AI: How Large Language Models Align with Russia’s Propaganda
AI for Deliberation: Institutionalised, Multimodal, Gamified, Mass Democratic Deliberations
Digitale Identität: Staatliche Gestaltung und öffentliche Akzeptanz
AI News Search and Opinion Formation in Germany: What People Ask, What Systems Return, and What Users Take Away
Four research areas
I examine how digital technology changes the spaces where politics is negotiated, how it changes the ways parties and campaigns compete, how societies try to govern the digital transformation, and how researchers can study all this with digital trace data, computational methods, and AI.
The public arena
Public sphere · Platforms · News media
Platforms, search engines, and AI-enabled services now shape what topics become visible and who gets heard. I map how this changes the relationships between people, news media, and politicians, and how they adapt.
For journalists and policymakers: why outsiders break through, why legacy media lose reach, and who gains and loses power.
Political competition
Parties · Campaigns · Elections
Parties and campaigns use digital tools to organize their work, raise resources, reach voters, and signal competence. I examine new practices, innovation processes, and how organizations learn. I also study how challengers use digital media to bypass established parties and legacy media.
For parties, campaigners, and election observers: what digital tools really change in a campaign.
Governance
Regulation · Platforms · AI
New technology brings calls for new rules. Societies struggle to decide how platform companies should govern political speech, visibility, and information flows. AI companies pose new challenges, such as resource expenditure and alignment. I ask what the evidence supports and what people expect, so that rules address real risks without creating new ones.
For regulators and policymakers: how to weigh the risks of digital media and AI against the risks of regulating them.
Methods
Measurement · Digital trace data · Computational social science
Online data look like a window on society, but mostly they measure attention, not opinions or political support. Since the first Twitter election forecasts I have shown where these data mislead and how to use them with their limitations and data-generating process in mind. Today I bring the same questions to AI-enabled methods for persuasion, search, and simulation.
For anyone reading election forecasts or the public mood off social media or AI: what these numbers can and cannot show.
Advice and evidence
With my research, I help build digital capacity in the institutions that decide how digital media and AI are governed and regulated.
- European Commission, Joint Research Centre
- Federal Constitutional Court
- Bavarian Authority for New Media
Also for the Federal Foreign Office, OSCE/ODIHR, and the German Bundestag.
Writing for the public
Much of my writing appears in German, for readers outside the university: in publications of the Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung and the Landeszentralen für politische Bildung, and in newspapers.
In the media
The New York TimesThe Wall Street JournalDIE ZEITDer SpiegelFAZZDF heute journal
„Früher hätte man eine Karikatur gezeichnet“
„Ich glaube, dass künstliche Intelligenz politische Kampagnen zwar verändert, aber noch keine große Gefahr für sie darstellt.“
On AI before the 2025 German federal election: it changes campaigns, but is not yet a major danger to them.
Will A.I. Be a Creator or a Destroyer of Worlds?
“A.I. has begun to touch the very idea and practice of democracy.”
Thomas B. Edsall quotes Artificial Intelligence and Democracy (2023) and discusses its argument that AI may help autocracies overcome their information disadvantage.
Tech Companies Are Taking Action on AI Election Misinformation. Will It Matter?
“I would argue that this is an attempt by these companies to avoid negative coverage.”
On watermarking by AI companies. Studies consistently find, he told Time, that misinformation has not measurably changed the outcomes of previous US elections.
For journalistsI comment in English and German on the politics of AI, disinformation, platforms, and campaigns. Press photos, short bio, and contact · All media appearances
Teaching
My teaching builds digital capacity in two focus areas: digital politics, and computational approaches to political science and economics.
The lectures lead from an introduction to digital politics in the BA to current research in the MA. The seminars cover AI and democracy, the digital transformation of politics, disinformation, and technology governance. In the research courses, students run their own empirical research projects. In interdisciplinary courses, students from the social sciences and computer science work together in mixed teams. I teach in English and German and supervise BA and MA theses.