Research Projects

A record number of armed conflicts puts the lives of millions at stake. The majority of these conflicts have involved external interventions to foster peace and security, but they are heavily contested and often occur without long-term exit strategies. The project thus investigates the ending of external interventions into armed conflict. It focuses on sanctions, peacekeeping missions and military operations to study exit dilemmas and post-exit legacies related to these different types of intervention.
Leibniz Association, 2026-2031

The Cluster of Excellence “Climate, Climatic Change, and Society” (CLICCS), based at Universität Hamburg, is guided by the overarching question: "Which climate futures are possible and which are plausible?" This GIGA co-led project in the cluster's second phase aims to enhance the use of near-term climate predictions through the use of narratives, where effective narratives are not only founded in climate dynamics, but - through an iterative process - co-created with societal actors.
DFG, Excellence Strategy, 2026-2032

Italy is one of the few major European countries without a formal Indo-Pacific strategy. This policy-oriented project led by the Torino World Affairs Institute aims at assisting the Italian government in deciding on whether to adopt such a strategy and to identify lessons that can be learned from France and Germany's Indo-Pacific engagements.
Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Italy, 2026

The Cluster of Excellence “Climate, Climatic Change, and Society” (CLICCS), based at Universität Hamburg, is guided by the overarching question: "Which climate futures are possible and which are plausible?" This GIGA co-led project in the cluster's second phase investigates the socioeconomic and distributional impacts of renewable energy expansion and land-based carbon offsets in the Global South. It also scrutinises how these impacts lead to new or reinforce existing social conflicts.
DFG, Excellence Strategy, 2026-2032

This project investigates the evolution of anti-refugee discourse in Germany, focusing on Jewish and Muslim groups, through a comparative critical discourse analysis spanning from 1900 to 2024. It aims to understand the main arguments used by German governments to justify pro- and anti-refugee views, identify parallels and differences, and explore the boundaries of what is ‘sayable’ in political discourse. Gerda Henkel Foundation, 2025-2027

The Leibniz Research Network "China" consolidates existing China expertise within the Leibniz Association and makes it politically utilisable. In addition, experience-sharing between members supports them in conducting cooperation with Chinese partners while maintaining research security. The GIGA contributes to the network, inter alia, with its expertise on China’s foreign policy.
Leibniz Association, 2025-2028

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

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

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

ERA-AREAS establishes the Center for Multidisciplinary Area Studies (CenMAS) at the Faculty of Arts, Charles University (CUFA), marking a major step in institutional advancement. Led by ERA Chair Holder Prof. Mariana Llanos, the project drives organizational reform and introduces an innovative methodological shift by integrating social-scientific and linguistic-cultural approaches, strengthening research capacity, international networking, and CUFA’s global excellence.
EU, 2025-2030

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

As part of the overall MOTRA II project, the GIGA sub-project aims to gain generalisable insights into the influence of international events and developments on politically extremist attitudes among the population living in Germany and among party political elites, how these attitudes change over time, and how they interact with each other.
BMFTR, BMI, 2025-2028

This project will critically examine the societal discourse surrounding ethnic politics in mainland China, focusing on how intellectuals utilized various philosophical, theoretical, and cultural resources while adapting, appropriating, and rearticulating ideas to engage with the subject. It will shed light on the critical-mindedness and agency of contemporary Chinese intellectuals and enhance our understanding of intellectual praxis and knowledge production in a non-Western context.
DFG, 2025-2027

In its second funding phase, the WONAGO project continues to investigate powerful world order narratives in Latin America, Africa, the Middle East and Asia. It particularly aims to understand those perceptions in these regions that - as currently in the Ukraine war - differ significantly from prevailing ideas in the U.S., the EU, and their allies.
BMFTR, 2024-2027

Religious leaders are active for (interreligious) peace in many contexts and, for example, use their rhetoric to advocate for peace. The effectiveness of religious leaders’ rhetoric depends on the interplay of religious leaders being the messengers and the contents of their words—the message itself. This project (re)tests the (comparative) effectiveness of religious leaders as peace messengers and effective content of peace messages. The project also examines effects of an intervention.
DFG, 2024-2026

The production of raw materials and agricultural goods is often associated with unsustainable labor and environmental conditions - particularly in countries of the Global South. In response, several European countries have introduced binding corporate due diligence regulations since the mid-2010s. Given their complexity and global scope, value chains pose a particular challenge for effective sustainability governance. This project investigates the largely unexplored impacts of these regulations - especially on conditions in the countries of production.
Volkswagen Foundation, 2024-2028

The rapid loss of biodiversity and ongoing climate change are also the result of intensive agriculture. At the same time, they jeopardize agriculture and food security. The Leibniz Lab "Systemic Sustainability" brings together relevant knowledge in science and society on this fundamental challenge in order to promote the development and implementation of systemic solutions.
Leibniz Association, 2024-2027

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, 2024-2026

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