Postdoctorate

The Munich School of Politics and Public Policy (HfP), with its affiliation to the Technical University of Munich (TUM), deals with the multifaceted interactions between politics, society, business and technology in research, teaching and practice. It was established by the Bavarian State Parliament based on a separate law.

The Professorship “Algorithmic Governance and Public Policy” focuses on the policy, ethical, and societal implications of algorithmic decision-making across public and private domains. Our team combines cutting-edge computational techniques with traditional social science methods and we are equally interested in methodological innovation and in the broader consequences of automation for democratic institutions. Prof. Gritsenko is a political scientist who has carried out qualitative, quantitative, and experimental research on topics of policy and governance, including energy, environment, and digital transformation.

This position is part of an ERC Starting Grant awarded to Associate Professor Daria Gritsenko (Principal Investigator) for a project examining how perceptions of legitimacy are shaped and changed in the minds of individuals in the context of algorithmic governance. The AGAPP project integrates methods from cognitive science with focus groups and survey experiments to explore how people evaluate the legitimacy of algorithmic governance in the context of migration policy. The project team collects quantitative and qualitative data to study how people use heuristics to judge legitimacy of algorithmic systems of rule, with the view to building theory of legitimacy for the digital age.

Responsibilities

How do individuals evaluate legitimacy of algorithmic governance? The main task of the appointed researcher is to contribute to answering this research question by designing, coordinating and conducting empirical research on the use of heuristics in cognition of algorithmic legitimacy. Working closely with the Principal Investigator, the post-doctoral fellow will play a pivotal role in project implementation individually and jointly with other team members. The appointee will help to develop in-depth understanding of cognitive processes in the context of legitimacy and translate it into concepts that can be operationalised in empirical, especially experimental, studies, and by using focus groups, interviews and think-aloud methods. Other main tasks include writing up joint peer-reviewed publications on methodological and comparative aspects of the project, working on individual peer-reviewed articles, and actively participating in online and onsite research activities of the group. The appointed researcher will also contribute up to 10% of their annual working time to teaching and administrative tasks at the Professorship “Algorithmic Governance and Public Policy”. It is possible to complete the teaching and administrative tasks in English.

Qualifications

An appointee to the position must hold a doctoral degree in social or behavioral sciences (incl. human-computer interactions with relevant experience). Applicants must demonstrate experience in experimental work with human participants; possess versatile methodological skills (ideally both quantitative and qualitative); have the ability to work independently and collaboratively in research teams; and have an excellent command of written and spoken English.

The default assumption is that the doctoral degree requirement must be met by the beginning of the employment. The chosen applicant is expected to reside in Germany while employed by the TUM.