Institute Research Forum
Building on earlier sporadic research seminars, the Institute took a major step forward at its retreat in Eger in September 2025 with the formal establishment of dedicated research groups. These groups were launched around key thematic areas like Power, Policy and Practice (PPP), Political Economy, Identity Politics, Economics of Mental Health, and Global Mobility, etc. Their mission is to provide a structured and collaborative environment where members meet regularly to present and discuss papers, exchange ideas, and initiate joint research projects. By fostering a culture of intellectual exchange and inviting contributions from international experts, the groups aim to strengthen the Institute’s academic community, broaden its global reach, and generate impactful research outcomes.
Power, Policy and Practice Research Group
Purpose: The goal is to provide a forum for ISPS colleagues to exchange ideas and advance scholarship at the intersection of politics, policy, and administration. We welcome contributions across departments on a broad range of topics, including politico-administrative relations, anti-corruption, and all phases of the policy process, including design, implementation and compliance. At this initial stage, the emphasis is on getting to know each other’s work, providing constructive feedback, and creating a supportive, inclusive, and developmental space. We hope this will lead, over time, to joint publications, larger collaborative projects, and external grant applications.
Contact: Sabina Schnell at sabina.schnell@uni-corvinus.hu
September 29 Research Seminar
Jacob Thomas presented his paper “What Ties Individuals to a Society? How (Im)mobility Capital Stratifies International Legal Mobility and Migration” to be submitted to a Q1 journal, and examines how US consular officers assess visa applicants’ (im)mobility capital, revealing counterintuitive findings about immigration intentions and approval rates.
Political Economy Research Group
The Research Group is dealing with national and international political economy, involving Faculty colleagues, colleagues from other Institutes and Students of the Politics, Philosophy and Economy BA Program.
Contact: Federico Pachetti at pachetti.federico@uni-corvinus.hu
4 November Research Seminar
Invited Speaker: Joseph Torigian (American University). Title: The Party’s Interests Come First: The Life of Xi Zhongxun, Father of Xi Jinping
About the speaker:
Joseph Torigian’s main research area includes authoritarian politics and leadership transitions in China and Russia. His first book Prestige, Manipulation, and Coercion: Elite Power Struggles in the Soviet Union and China after Stalin and Mao was published by Yale University Press in 2022. His latest work, The Party’s Interests Come First: The Life of Xi Zhongxun, Father of Xi Jinping, released in June 2025, investigates the life of Xi Zhongxun and the inner workings of the Chinese Communist Party.
Identity Politics Research Group
“Our research group works together to explore the notion of identity politics in a multifaceted way, connecting discursive and institutional approaches to this matter. We aim to bring together research reflecting on the narratives fuelling identity politics (what?), the actors producing these (who?), and the mechanisms creating, shaping, and reinforcing these (how?). This is an inclusive forum considering methodological and substantive approaches, ranging from historical and sociological inquires to more actor-centric, legal and institutional analyses exploring the instrumentalization of narratives on political identities. With a particular emphasis on post-autocratic and post-conflict societies, this forum is particularly open to scholars in the fields of nationalism, conflict resolution, democratization and democratic resilience.”
Contact: András Gál andras.gal@uni-corvinus.hu
October 6 Research Seminar
Invited Speaker: Daniele Stracquadanio (University or Trento, CEU)
Presented paper: ‘From ice to water: A quantitative analysis of peaceful thawings in non-international frozen conflicts’.
Beyond the insightful discussion on the research project, the event also served as the launching event for the research group “Identity Politics: Actors and Institutions“.
Public Opinion on Competing Economic Interest Research Group
As economies develop and mature a variety of theories predict conflicting interests. Some predict a conflict between those in export industries and investment (Baccaro and Pontusson, 2016), others between those in full-time positions versus part-time or fixed-term employment (Thelen 2012), and more classically a conflict between those in public-sector and the private-sector (Esping-Andersen 2019). Yet these theories are often about elite-level of conflict or party behaviour. What about the opinion of those employed in the predicted sectors: Are they really at odds with one another? This project will seek to examine the aforementioned competing claims through survey and (randomized experimental) focus groups. It aims to examine a variety of economies as well as within country regional aspects. Countries could include Hungary, Latvia, Italy, and Germany.
Contact: Matthew Bergman, matthewedward.bergman@uni-corvinus.hu
1 December Research Seminar
Invited speaker: Professor Chloe Thurston, Northwestern University
Global Mobility Research Group
The Global Mobility Research Group explores the international mobility of students, academics, researchers, and other highly skilled professionals. It focuses on how opportunities for mobility—and the barriers to them—are shaped by structural inequalities linked to class, ethnicity, gender, and other social divisions. By examining the transnational circulation of talent, the group seeks to uncover both the privileges and exclusions embedded in global mobility. Our aim is to foster interdisciplinary dialogue, support early-career scholars, and contribute to debates on equity and access in higher education and professional trajectories worldwide.
Contact: Adél Pásztor at adel.pasztor@uni-corvinus.hu
3 November Research Seminar
Invited Speaker: Kamil Luczaj, CIAS Visiting Fellow.
Title: From Biographies to Policy: Using Autobiographical Narrative Interviews in Higher Education Research
The presentation draws on two recent studies examining the biographies of migrant academic professors from Poland and Hungary – at the intersection of biographical sociology, higher education studies, and migration research. Its main objective is methodological: by focusing on the autobiographical narrative interview method (Fritz Schütze), I demonstrate how this time-intensive qualitative approach can be valuable not only for fundamental academic inquiry but also for policy-oriented research in higher education. The presentation is structured in three parts: the first outlines the key methodological assumptions, the second presents selected case studies, and the final part offers an analytical discussion of the main advantages and limitations of this approach within the context of policy-oriented sociology.
BIO: Kamil Luczaj is a sociologist specializing in migration and higher education. He is an Associate Professor at the University of Łódź, Poland, where he earned his habilitation after completing a PhD at the Jagiellonian University in Kraków. He has held visiting positions at the University of New Mexico, the Slovak Academy of Sciences, the University of Cambridge, and the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. His research focuses on academic migration, the academic profession, and qualitative methodologies—particularly narrative interviewing and ethnography. His work has been published in leading journals, including Studies in Higher Education, Geoforum, and Higher Education Policy. He is currently a Senior Fellow at the Corvinus Institute for Advanced Studies.
Economics of Mental Health Research Group
Contact: Sándor Csengődi, sandor.csengodi@uni-corvinus.hu
Journalistic Autonomy Research Group
The Research Group compare how journalists make sense of, negotiate, and claim journalistic autonomy in both pro-government and pro-opposition media. The research will focus on coverage of a selection of domestic and foreign policy crises and test the challenges to journalistic autonomy faced by the profession in Hungary.
Contact: Zoltán Dujisin at zoltan.dujisin@uni-corvinus.hu
Central and Eastern European Studies Research Center
The aim is to build cross-Institute collaboration and partnerships with external scholars.
Center for Gender and Culture
The Center was founded in 2001 by Miklós Hadas and Beata Nagy. Over the past 25 years, it has organised several conferences, workshops and lectures about gender relations and inequalities.
Research Group aims to revive academic discussions of the Center for Gender and Culture, by
– connecting Corvinus scholars interested in gender-related topics (incl. PhD students)
– reading and discussing manuscripts written by colleagues on gender-related topics, – fatherhood, women in local politics, and parenting.
– organising documentary film screenings
Contact: Beáta Nagy, beata.nagy@uni-corvinus.hu