Professor Dr. Mathias Poertner

Biography

Mathias Poertner is an Associate Professor of Political Science at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE). His research focuses on the intersection of political behavior, democratic representation, political parties and movements, and political methodology, with a regional focus on Latin America and Europe. Poertner employs a variety of methods including field, survey, and natural experiments, as well as intensive qualitative techniques, to investigate how political participation and representation shape social identities, partisanship, ethnicity, and gender. His research addresses the dynamics of electoral support for new parties, influenced by emerging types of civil society organizations. Moreover, he examines the role of social identities in the context of immigrant integration. Poertner is the author of award-winning books, including "Creating Partisans: Organizational Roots of New Parties in Latin America" (2024, Cambridge University Press) and "Native Bias: Overcoming Discrimination Against Immigrants" (2022, Princeton University Press). His work has been published in leading journals and has received multiple awards, including the Gregory Luebbert Prize and the Leon Epstein Outstanding Book Award. Before joining LSE, he held a faculty position at Texas A&M University and was part of the Evidence Governance Politics (EGAP) network.

Research Interests

Experience

Courses