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Publication of the Student Research Papers of the “Interfaces for Democratic Participation” Research Training Course at Goethe University, Frankfurt

06 Oct 2026

We are delighted to announce the publication of student research papers from the “Interfaces for Democratic Participation” Research Training Course at Goethe University. Between April 2025 and March 2026, this course provided ten students from the Political Science and Comparative Democracy master’s programmes with insights into the INTERFACED project. Under the supervision of Claudius Wagemann and Anna L. Geyer, the students developed individual research projects, exploring patterns of political participation during and after the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic.

The course included conceptual, theoretical, and methodological phases, as well as regular sessions for presenting research progress and receiving peer feedback. At the end of the course, the students submitted their research papers (14 ECTS), six of which we are pleased to publish:

• Johanna Steinwandel and Julius Groß compare scientific evidence on citizen participation with local participatory guidelines in municipalities across Germany in their paper “Citizen participation in research and practice”.
• Mohammad Zabi Rahmanzai explores the link between institutional configurations and third-country nationals’ political participation, comparing Germany and Sweden in his research paper, “Pathways To Representation: Institutional Configurations and Third-Country Nationals Political Participation”.
• Maximilian Waldmann examines pandemic-related mobilisation, democratic scepticism, and party communication in Germany and Austria in his research paper, “From Protest to Party? Pandemic-Related Mobilization, Democratic Skepticism, and Party Communication in Germany and Austria”.
• Frederike Sporleder investigates queer political participation in contemporary Germany under the title “We Are Only Fighting Against Something”.
• Marco Warmt provides quantitative insights into how mistrust in political parties influences protest participation among climate-conscious citizens in post-pandemic Europe in his paper “A Matter of Mistrust in Political Parties? Protest Participation by Climate-Conscious Citizens in Post-Pandemic Europe.”
• Johanna Birkler compares how young adults from urban and rural contexts in Germany perceive and use social media as interfaces of political participation in her research paper, “Digital Political Participation in Urban and Rural Contexts. How Young Adults from Germany Perceive and Use Social Media as Interfaces for Political Participation”.

Read the full papers to learn more about these timely and impactful studies.

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