Party system institutionalization has been traditionally viewed as an essential condition for the consolidation of democracy (Mainwaring, 1999; Hicken and Kuchonta, 2014; Casal Bértoa, 2017). However, there is a far less agreement in the literature about what institutionalizes party systems in the first place. Seeking to fill this gap, the current paper, building on a mixed-method approach, aims to provide an answer to the question of how such institutionalization occurs and why the degrees of institutionalization vary across countries.

Understanding the determinants of electoral turnout has long been the focus of political science, with important meta-analyses from Geys (2006) and Smets and Van Ham (2013). These and other studies have been used to understand the cost of voting. However, one potential cost of voting that is not well understood is voter identification (ID) laws. Currently, findings on voter ID laws are mixed and only exist within the United States (Highton 2017). Yet it is important to understand voter ID in a comparative context because the costs of voting may be different outside of the US.

The latest generation of data-powered technologies such as Data Science and Artificial Intelligence are being widely used across the private sector and seem to have potential for the public sector also. However, past governments have struggled to maximise the potential of successive generations of information technology, lagging decades behind firms. This talk considers how these data-powered technologies can be developed from a public sector perspective.

The phenomenon of foreign actors employing directed political communication to sway the politics of another country is easier and more prevalent than ever. Disinformation campaigns do not solely transmit deceitful political information abroad, but they also aim at changing pre-established attitudes regarding politics and democratic institutions. Powerful non-democratic states have both the means and the incentive to spread such discourse to democratic and un- democratic countries.

Ambassador Rytis Paulauskas is the Permanent Representative of the Republic of Lithuania to the United Nations since May 2021. Prior to his appointment to the Permanent Mission of the Republic of Lithuania to the United Nations, Mr. Paulauskas served as Director of Information and Public Relations Department of his country’s Ministry for Foreign Affairs from 2016 to 2021. He was Permanent Representative of the Republic of Lithuania to the UN and other International Organizations in Geneva between 2012 and 2016. Amb.

A degree in global governance and diplomacy prepares students for a career in an international organisation, a (global) NGO or the civil and/or diplomatic service. But it also prepares them for a route less travelled: the entrepreneurial journey. We usually tend to associate entrepreneurship and start-ups with the corporate world. But also in the political and the human rights world entrepreneurs build new organisations and institutions with the intent to have an impact.

The UK is amongst the most advanced western nations in Crisis Management. The doctrine, guidance and standards that underpin the way the UK approaches threats and hazards is a tried and tested approach that is shared with our allies and partners around the World. The Civil Contingencies Secretariat is the coordinator of crisis management within the UK, working to ensure that we prevent, prepare for, respond to and recover from crisis following recognised and collectively agreed processes.

Tom Fletcher CMG is Principal of Hertford College, a former UK Ambassador, NYU Professor and No 10 foreign policy adviser to three Prime Ministers, and the author of ‘The Naked Diplomat: Power and Politics in the Digital Age’. His Foundation for Opportunity supports good people to do good things in public life. Tom led a review of British diplomacy for the UK Foreign Office in 2016, and on the future of the United Nations for the UN Secretary General in 2017. In 2018 he authored a report on the skills the next generation need to thrive in the 21st century.

Kristina Lunz is the Co-Founder and Co-Executive Director of the Centre for Feminist Foreign Policy (CFFP). From January 2019 to January 2020 Kristina worked as an advisor to the German Federal Foreign Office where she conceptualised and built the feminist network Unidas initiated by the German Foreig Minister, Heiko Maas. Prior to that, she was the Gender and Coordinations Officer for the United Nations Development Programme in Myanmar and NYC, and also worked on ‘Women, Peace and Security’ (WPS) during her time at the NGO Sisma Mujer in Bogotá, Colombia.