Global politics are being affected by major armed conflicts, economic instability, erosion of democratic rights, growing persecution of political dissent, and widespread denials of existential global challenges such as climate change. We are witnessing the rise of populism, post-truth movements, growing inequalities, and a lack of trust in politics and political systems.

How can we understand the causes and consequences of this overwhelming uncertainty and volatility? What is being done to mitigate for its effects and address the different challenges that emerge in it?

This research theme investigates social media and online rhetoric; how individualism and authoritarianism are changing political imaginaries; and the relationship between truth and politics as performance. It examines the erosion of trust and how the fracturing of social contracts are connected to the foreclosing of social transitions, alternative futures and notions of progress.

It also focuses on the evolving issues that are shaping the future of politics and how the future is perceived and governed in different political systems. It seeks to examine how we can re-imagine democracy for the 21st century and design democratic and deliberative systems that are suited to the challenges we currently face.