The lecture offers an overview of the radical right's interactions with mainstream parties and the effect they have on setting political agendas in the region. The focus is on sensitive policy areas such as minority policies and asylum regulations. Based on a study of shifts in major parties’ policy positions and in minority-related policies, the lecture addresses the question to what extent the radical right has changed the quality of democracy in Eastern Europe. This question shall be answered by comparing three groups of countries that are distinct in terms of the relevance of radical right parties: Bulgaria and Slovakia; Hungary, Poland, and Romania; and the Czech Republic and Estonia.

About the speaker

Michael Minkenberg is professor of Comparative Politics at the European University Viadrina in Frankfurt (Oder). He studied Political Science, History, and Economics at the universities of Heidelberg, Freiburg/Br., Bonn and Cologne and at Georgetown University where he received his M.A. in American Government in 1984. He obtained his Ph.D. at the university of Heidelberg in 1989 and his Habilitation (venia legendi) in Political Science at the university of Göttingen in 1997.

Since 1989, he has taught comparative politics at Georgetown University, the universities of Göttingen and Heidelberg, at Cornell University and Columbia University. From 2007-10 he held the Max Weber Chair for German and European Studies at NYU. 

Minkenberg's research interests include the radical right in liberal democracies; the relationship between religion and politics in Western societies; and, more recently, the role of state architecture in capital cities. He published widely on these topics in journals such as the European Journal of Political Science, Comparative Politics, Government and Opposition, West European Politics, Comparative Political Studies, East European Politics and Societies, the International Political Science Review. 

His most recent publications are, with Zsuzsanna Végh, Depleting democracies: Radical right impact on parties, policies, and polities in Eastern Europe (Manchester University Press 2023), and Religion und Politik in westlichen Demokratien (Religion and politics in Western democracies) (Wiesbaden: Springer VS 2024).