Presentation
Political Data Science is the study of political phenomena using data science tools. Most of the core theoretical concepts in political science, such as political preferences, ideology, level of democracy, and power are latent constructs that cannot be directly observed. What we do observe are manifestations of these constructs through actions and expressions. The fundamental challenge in political science is to turn these observed manifestations into systematic knowledge about the political world. Often, these actions and expressions are recorded as, or take the form of, text. Other times they are interpreted and reported as numerical values. Sometimes, they come in the form of pictures, videos, and sound.
Three recent developments lay the foundation for political data science. First, the digitalization of society, and with it, the digitalization of political debate, has resulted in access to an array of new rich data-sources, often in real-time. Second, the growth in compute recourses allows for the estimation of statistical models capable of combining these data-sources with the expert knowledge of the political data scientist. Third, new algorithms have allowed for explorations into political phenomena that until recently were unthinkable to study in a systematic, large-scale fashion. In this talk, Bj?rn H?yland presents examples of how all three of these developments have spurred research project at the Political Data Science research group (PODS) at the Department of Political Science.
Speaker
Bj?rn H?yland (PhD London School of Economics and Political Science, 2005) is Professor of Political Science at the University of Oslo and the Director of the PODS research group. He is a member of the dScience council. In his research, H?yland applies data science tools to test theories of legislative politics and to measure political phenomena, in particular within the context of the European Union. He has published in the fields of political science, economics, and computer science. He is the co-author (w/ Simon Hix) of the highly acclaimed textbook “The Political System of the European Union” (Bloomsbury, 2022, 4th edition), and is currently the PI on a Research Council of Norway project “The Strategy of Recorded Voting in the European Parliament (StREP)”.
Program
11:45 – Doors open and lunch is served
12:00 – "Political Data Science" by Bj?rn H?yland (Professor / Head of Studies, Department of Political Studies)
13:00 – Mingling (and goodbye)
To participate, please fill out the registration form. This way, we will not be short on food and drinks! (Registration is not binding and you are welcome to join us anyway!)
About the seminar series
Once a month, dScience will invite you to join us for lunch, soft drinks and professional talks at the Science Library. In addition to these, we will serve lunch to PhD candidates in our lounge in Kristine Bonnevies hus every Thursday. Due to limited space (40 people), this will be first come, first served. See how to find us here (download).
Our lounge can also be booked by PhDs and Postdocs on a regular basis, whether it is for a meeting or just to hang out – we have fresh coffee all day long! Read more about the series and the upcoming program here.