Accountability and Participation

Accountability and Participation

The Accountability and Participation Research Programme undertakes comparative analyses of political processes that may foster or undermine the quality of democratic institutions and spread authoritarian politics and practices in the Global South and across the globe.


  • Since the beginning of the century, processes of democratic erosion and backsliding have started to affect societies across continents while citizens and civil society mobilise to turn the tide. The Accountability and Participation Research Programme investigates political processes, institutional change, and socio-political developments taking place in the Global South, with a focus on state-society and intra-state political dynamics in different political regimes. We also evaluate repercussions of these dynamics for state-society relations in Europe and Germany.

    We pay attention to how civil society organises itself, and how it mobilises to assert its demands under conditions of high levels of inequality in an age of disinformation and increasing repression. Likewise, we analyse the leadership’s responsiveness towards citizens’ demands and the empowerment of executives above other actors and institutions. We are interested in the role of individual attitudes and political institutions, like courts and the military which shape the link between citizens and political elites. In addition, the study of authoritarian political practices, including the legitimation of repression, alerts us on the emergence and spread of authoritarian dominance at different (sub-)national levels. Our researchers develop context-sensitive approaches in the field of comparative politics and related disciplines. They actively engage in scholarly exchange with researchers in the regions and provide civil society organisations and decision-makers with research-grounded expertise on the Global South’s most relevant socio-political dynamics, and its repercussions to Europe.

    GIGA Focus Latin America | 6/2023

    Crisis in the Andes: The Rise (and Fall?) of Two Women Leaders

    Women, often seen as political outsiders, bring renewal during crises but face added challenges. Examining Jeanine Añez and Dina Boluarte in Bolivia and Peru respectively reveals these dynamics, shedding light on the potential implications for future female political leaders.

    Audio Medienbeitrag Andreas Ufen Deutschlandfunk Kultur Indonesien
    Audio Medienbeitrag Andreas Ufen Deutschlandfunk Kultur Indonesien

    Infographic | 09/2025

    Demographic (Dis)Continuities in Peace Concepts Within and Across Six Countries

    Explore how answers differ within and across countries. Heatmaps display the distribution of top ranked concepts by region, sex, age, and socioeconomic status. The tool supports side by side comparison, helping identify consistent divides and bridges across groups.

    Infographic | 09/2025

    Ranked Concepts of Peace Across Six Countries

    See how respondents ranked fourteen concepts related to peace, from safety to rights and change. Interactive bar charts and rank distributions highlight national profiles and common ground, inviting comparison across the six countries.

    Research Project | 01/09/2025 - 31/08/2028

    Militaries and Democratic Backsliding Since the End of the Cold War

    Since the Cold War's end, militaries have played varied roles in democratic backsliding - from leading coups to supporting or resisting autocratic moves. This project systematically explores how armed forces shape the erosion, collapse, or defense of democracy worldwide.
    DFG, 2025-2028

    Research Project | 01/08/2025 - 31/12/2026

    The Political Consequences of Religious Institutions and Practices

    This project examines the dynamic interactions between religious institutions and practices on the one hand and political outcomes on the other - in other words, how religion both shapes and is shaped by politics. While primarily adopting quantitative approaches, analyzing various survey data and location data of various religious institutions, it also draws insights from qualitative evidence and case studies. The project focuses on Indonesia as the initial case and will add more cases as appropriate.
    AvH, 2025-2026

    Research Project | 01/06/2025 - 31/12/2027

    Digital Authoritarianism through Lawfare: Mapping and Strengthening Civil Society Responses in Asia

    This project investigates the most potent weapon of digital authoritarianism - lawfare in the digital realm - in South and Southeast Asia. Building on previous research, it creates the first database in the world on the range of laws used for digital repression of civil society by autocratic/autocratising states, its impact on democracies and civil liberties, and countermeasures for democratic resistance and resilience.
    2025-2027

    Research Project | 01/03/2025 - 28/02/2027

    Leftist Politics in Democratising Indonesia

    My project addresses the question of why the leftist element of civil society in Indonesia remains marginalised despite over two decades of democratisation that have ostensibly created a more open political landscape. It investigates the factors that hinder their consolidation, both related to organisational capacity and the socio-political structures. Specifically, it analyses the extent to which Indonesia’s recent democratic decline correlates with the continued absence of an organised left.
    AvH, 2025-2027

    Research Project | 01/02/2024 - 31/12/2025

    Digital Transformation Lab (DigiTraL), Phase II: Digitalisation as Chance for Cooperation with Global Partners

    GIGA‘s Digital Transformation Lab (DigiTraL), funded by the German Federal Foreign Office, analyses the political drivers and real-world consequences of the digital transformation taking place around the world. The Global South in particular is an important actor in and shaper of this transformation.
    FFO, 2024-2025

    Research Project | 01/01/2024 - 31/12/2025

    Climate Obstruction and Foreign Policy in Comparative Perspective

    The fight against climate change continues to be hindered by campaigns of corporate and other actors who seek to prevent global and/or national action on climate change. This research group is set up to a joint and comparative research agenda on climate obstruction in and across key Global South countries. The lead institutions are the GIGA and the Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (UERJ).
    DAAD/CAPES, 2024-2026

    Research Project | 01/04/2023 - 31/03/2027

    Context Matters – Country-Specific Politico-Economic Analyses, Conflict and Crisis Potentials, as well as Global and Regional Trends / Phase III

    The achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals and the strategic capability of German development cooperation in the context of the BMZ 2030 reform concept are based on in-depth knowledge of country-specific, regional and global developments. The GIGA provides annual information on actors and governance structures as well as on conflict potentials in countries of the Global South. Additionally, important regional and global trends are analysed with a comparative area perspective.
    BMZ, 2023-2027

    Research Project | 01/04/2023 - 31/03/2029

    Merian Center for Advanced Studies in the Maghreb (MECAM): Imagining Futures - Dealing with Disparity, Phase II

    The Merian Centre for Advanced Studies in the Maghreb (MECAM) based in Tunis is the first and only Institute for Advanced Studies in North Africa. MECAM’s ambition is to become an intellectual hub that contributes to the emergence of cutting-edge, internationally relevant and visible research in the humanities and social sciences on, from and in the Maghreb and in particular with scholars from the Maghreb. The GIGA coordinates MECAM's publications as well as outreach and transfer activities.
    BMBF, 2023-2029

    Team


    Associated



    Working Groups


    Working Group 1: Democratic Institutions

    The Working Group looks into the functioning of formal and informal political institutions, the ways in which citizens seek and/or fail to hold power-holders accountable, the policy-making process, and processes of democratic erosion in the democratic and semi-democratic regimes of the Global South. The group’s current research concentrates on three areas.

    Executive politics in unconsolidated democracies is usually characterised by powerful presidents that seek to control formal institutions and decision processes. We examine the behavioural and institutional dimensions of executive leadership by analysing which interests drive their political decisions. We focus also on the institutional and political dynamics of powerful executives, such as the personalisation of power, populist discourses, and institutional engineering.

    Powerful executives frequently face relatively weak control institutions, such as courts and legislatures which may imperil democracy. We study how institutions of horizontal accountability are challenged but also the strategies that these institutions apply to bolster their legitimacy and independence.

    Citizens can hold their governments accountable through elections, civic engagement, and protest. The group analyses the quality of elections as well as the influence of clientelism and ethnic politics on electoral processes. Moreover, we look at how civil society organises itself around topics of democracy, identity, and sustainability, and we identify the factors influencing the success of mobilisation.

    Our work is primarily empirical and is based on extensive original data collection. We use a range of empirical methods, including qualitative approaches, such as process tracing and comparative case studies, as well as statistical analysis and field experiments.


    Working Group 2: Authoritarian Politics

    The Working Group studies authoritarian political practices in states all over the world. We analyse authoritarian regime characteristics, strategies, internal dynamics, and interaction with citizens, societal groups, and the political opposition. We study transformation processes such as the emergence, persistence, and demise of authoritarian regimes. Since authoritarian practices are not limited to autocracies, we also investigate their role in democracies.

    Our research often centres on actors and their behaviour within certain institutional and discursive contexts. Relevant actors include political elites, security services, the political opposition and protest movements, and diaspora populations. We study civil-military relations, shrinking spaces for civil society, and regime responses to popular protests, including both concessions and repression. Discourses to justify coercion tie in with general strategies of legitimation and co-optation that matter in authoritarian contexts.

    Our analyses are not limited to the nation-state level, as we also investigate authoritarian politics on the sub-national, the regional, and global levels, taking into account international cooperation, diffusion and learning processes that spread authoritarian practices across the globe. Our research builds on theories from comparative politics and integrates insights from sociology, international relations, foreign policy analysis, and political communication. We employ and welcome a broad variety of methodological approaches and types of data.

    President (ad interim)

    Prof. Dr. Sabine Kurtenbach is President (ad interim) of the GIGA.

    Prof. Dr. Sabine Kurtenbach

    Regional Institutes

    Africa|Asia|Latin America|Middle East

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