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Many higher-educated workers feel at risk of losing their jobs to technology. In a new article in the European Political Science Review (open access), I show that this feeling of vulnerability is associated with a shift in their party preferences, notably in favor of right-wing populist parties.

Research

My newest research looks at the social and political effects of technological change and the digital transformation. Here, I rely mainly on data from the OECD's Risks that Matter survey program, to which my colleagues and I contributed questions on how people perceive the impacts of technology. A key finding from this work is that the higher-educated are now on average almost as worried about losing their jobs to technology as those without higher education — which seems to be driven by exposure to "AI" technology, and which already has meaningful effects on their political attitudes.

Some findings are already published in the Socio-Economic Review, in the European Political Science Review, and in Political Research Exchange, others are under review or available as working papers.

Much of my research from the last few years is concerned with public attitudes toward immigrants and with immigrants' labor market integration, and relies mainly on surveys and survey experiments. For example, a recently published article in Political Studies looks at the psychological factors behind "welfare chauvinist" attitudes, meaning not wanting to give immigrants access to social protection systems. Another study analyzes hiring discrimination against refugees and shows whether male or female refugees face more discrimination by recruiters and why that is (published in the International Migration Review). Related to this, Flavia Fossati, Gemma Scalise, Gerda Hooijer, and I co-edited a special issue in the Journal of European Social Policy which features studies on how employers and trade unions influence the inclusion of immigrants into welfare states and labor markets.

Some other recent studies look at right-wing populist voters and, for example, their attitudes toward social protection and redistribution (published in West European Politics) or the extent to which they hold implicit biases against persons with dark skin tones (published in Acta Politica).

Together with Giuliano Bonoli, Flavia Fossati, Mia Gandenberger, Philipp Trein, and Fréderic Varone, I studied how the Swiss public thought about the COVID-19 pandemic and the government's response to it. We conducted original public opinion surveys, which included survey experiments on people's attitudes toward important questions such as the allocation of ICU beds among COVID-patients ("pandemic triage"), the distribution of vaccines, travel restrictions, and financial aid to small companies. Our results are published in articles in Social Science & Medicine, the Journal of Social Policy, the Journal of European Social Policy, the Swiss Political Science Review, and European Policy Analysis.

You can find additional results and data presented on our interactive data dashboard, and you can download our data here.

As part of my doctoral research, I co-led a research project in which we constructed quantitative measurements of the strictness of job-search and work-availability requirements and sanction rules for unemployment benefit claimants in different countries. The resulting dataset covers 21 advanced democracies between 1980 and 2012. You can find the dataset, a more detailed description of the project, and key findings and publications based on it on the dedicated project homepage.

I also collaborated with Herwig Immervoll on the OECD's related data collection activities on activation requirements for jobseekers. The data can be acccessed from OECD.Stat. The main findings are described in two working papers (see below).

Publications

  • Knotz, Carlo, Flavia Fossati, Gemma Scalise and Gerda Hooijer (guest editors). 2020. "Special Issue: Immigration and the Welfare State – The role of capital and labour" Journal of European Social Policy 30(5).
  • Lutz, Philipp and Carlo Knotz. 2022. "The legitimacy of the welfare state in the age of migration" In: Bent Greve (ed.) De Gruyter Handbook of Contemporary Welfare States (Vol. I), pp. 271-284. Berlin & Boston. [https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110721768-016]
  • Knotz, Carlo. 2024. "Not feeling like winners: The higher educated and the AI revolution" SocArXiv Working Paper. [https://doi.org/10.31235/osf.io/e25cd]
  • Knotz, Carlo, Flavia Fossati, and Fabienne Liechti. 2024. "Explaining the lacking effectiveness of labor market integration programs for workers with immigrant backgrounds: The role of cognitive shortcuts in recruitment". SSRN Working Paper. [Access].
  • Immervoll, Herwig, Carlo Knotz, and Jongmi Lee. 2022. "Activity-related eligibility conditions for receiving unemployment benefits: Results 2022" OECD Report to the European Union. [Download] [Data]
  • Fossati, Flavia, Carlo Knotz, Mia Gandenberger and Giuliano Bonoli. 2021. "Unterstützung für die Schwächsten: Die öffentliche Meinung in der Schweiz während der Corona-Pandemie" In: Christian Ewert and Lea Heyne. One Year with COVID-19. DemocracyNet. pp. 97-103. [Download]
  • Immervoll, Herwig, Carlo Knotz and Ihssane Otmani. 2020. "Activity-related eligibility conditions for receiving unemployment benefits" OECD Report to the European Union. [Download] [Data]
  • Bonoli, Giuliano, Flavia Fossati, Mia Gandenberger and Carlo Knotz. 2020. "What Form Should Solidarity Take During the Health Crisis?" NCCR — on the move in a nutshell 17. [Download]
  • Verbeek, Hans, Benedikt Fritz and Carlo Knotz. 2020. "Ansätze zur Evaluation von Auswirkungen des gesetzlichen Mindestlohns auf die Schwarzarbeit" Report to the German Minimum Wage Commission. Cologne & Berlin: Institut für Sozialforschung & Gesellschaftspolitik. [Download]
  • Knotz, Carlo, Mia Gandenberger, Flavia Fossati and Giuliano Bonoli. 2020. "R.I.C.E. — An Integrated Model of Welfare Deservingness Perceptions” NCCR — on the move Working Paper 26 [Download]
  • Knotz, Carlo and Johannes Lindvall. 2019. "Using Quantitative Methods to Study Welfare State Reforms" Invited contribution to the SAGE Research Methods Cases [doi.org/10.4135/9781526467034]
  • Immervoll, Herwig and Carlo Knotz. 2018. "How demanding are activation requirements for jobseekers?" OECD Social, Employment and Migration Working Papers 215. [doi.org/10.1787/2bdfecca-en]
  • Knotz, Carlo. 2016. Getting Tough on Unemployment: Essays on the politics of unemployment benefit reform in affluent democracies. PhD Dissertation. Lund: Lund University Press. [Access]
  • Knotz, Carlo. 2012. "Measuring the 'New Balance of Rights and Responsibilities' in Labor Market Policy. A quantitative overview of activation strategies in 20 OECD countries" ZeS Working Paper Series 06/12. [Download]
  • Eggen, Bernd and Carlo Knotz. 2009. "Wir leben länger! Aber auch länger gesund? Aspekte zur Lebenserwartung und Gesundheit älterer Menschen" Statistisches Monatsheft Baden-Württemberg 07/2009. Stuttgart: Statistisches Landesamt Baden-Württemberg. [Download]
  • Eggen, Bernd and Carlo Knotz. 2009. "Methodische Anmerkungen zur Lebenserwartung und Gesundheit älterer Menschen" Statistisches Monatsheft Baden-Württemberg 07/2009. Stuttgart: Statistisches Landesamt Baden-Württemberg. [Download]
  • 2024. "Do you think immigrants should not get unemployment benefits?" Medium [Access]
  • 2024. "Using a website as a simple survey randomizer" Medium [Access]
  • 2023. "Using two-step regression to study gender gaps across countries" Medium [Access]
  • 2023. "Conjoint designs with restrictions in JavaScript". Medium [Access]
  • With Mia Gandenberger, Philipp Trein, Flavia Fossati, Frédéric Varone and Giuliano Bonoli. 2020. "In der Schweiz wollen sich viele nicht gegen COVID-19 impfen lassen – fehlendes Vertrauen in die Sicherheit von Impfungen ist die Hauptursache"/"De nombreux Suisses ne veulent pas être vaccinés contre la COVID-19 — le manque de confiance dans la sécurité des vaccins en est la cause principale". DeFacto [Deutsche Version/Version française]
  • 2020. "Crowd avoidance with data science" Medium [Access]
  • 2020. "Governments will soon be talking about 'benefit cheats' and 'scroungers' — political scientists should do the same" European Politics and Policy, London School of Economics [Access]
  • 2020. "Making data dashboard plots talk to each other with ggiraph and Shiny" Medium [Access]
  • With Mia Gandenberger, J. Philipp Trein, Flavia Fossati and Giuliano Bonoli. 2020. "Migration and Mobility During COVID-19: What the Swiss General Public Thinks" NCCR — on the move COVID-19 & Mobility Blog [Access]

A brief bio

Originally from the south of Germany (here), I got to study political science in Mannheim, Barcelona, and Konstanz (2007-2012), and then to do a PhD in political science in Lund, Sweden (2012-2017). After two subsequent stints as a postdoctoral researcher in Bremen and Lausanne, I moved to Stavanger, Norway in early 2021 to start my current position as an associate professor (førsteamanuensis) of political science. Since August 2024 I am also the coordinator of the B.A. Political Science program and the coordinator of the Digital Society Research Group at the University of Stavanger.

You can find more details about my work and background in my CV [Download].


Conferences, workshops, invited talks (most recent)

Other activities

Reviews

Comparative Political Studies, European Sociological Review, Socio-Economic Review, Journal of Politics, British Journal of Political Science, Research in Social Stratification and Mobility, Journal of Social Policy, Journal of European Social Policy, Social Indicators Research, Journal of Social Policy Research/Zeitschrift für Sozialreform, Social Policy & Administration, Social Policy & Society, European Societies, Poverty & Public Policy, Journal of European Public Policy, Interest groups & Advocacy, Oxford Economic Papers, Norsk statsvitenskapelig tidskrift, US National Science Foundation, PLOS One, Social Science & Medicine, West European Politics, Political Research Exchange, International Journal of Public Administration, Kyklos, Applied Economics Letters, Swiss Political Science Review, Journal of Elections, Public Opinion & Parties, International Political Science Review, Scandinavian Political Studies, Political Research Quarterly, Political Studies, International Migration Review, Government & Opposition

Side projects

I've been putting together a (long but non-exhaustive) list of data sources that may be useful for term papers, BA or MA theses, or research projects. The focus is mostly on comparative politics and welfare state research/comparative political economy, but the list includes also many sources on other topics (e.g., peace & conflict or EU politics). My list likely overlaps here and there with the (excellent!) Dataset of Political Datasets.

Learning statistics and working with a statistical programming language such as R can be tough. To make this a bit easier, I put together a package to help students tabulate data with three easy-to-use functions, practice calculating statistical tests and interpreting their results with an interactive Shiny dashboard, and "de-bugging" code chunks with interactive learnr tutorials.

The package can be installed from Github: https://github.com/cknotz/bst290.

Since I've been working quite a bit with data from conjoint survey experiments recently, I wrote some R functions to check these data for potential problems (so called carryover effects and randomization problems). These are now bundled in an R package called 'cjointdatachecks', which can be installed from GitHub. The package includes a vignette, which illustrates how the functions can be used and reproduces results from the Hainmueller et al. (2014, Political Analysis) article.

I'm trying to take one or the other picture of nice stuff (mostly outdoors), and I've recently been playing around with generative art using the aRtsy package for R. Some of the results are on my Deviant Art page.