Maija Setälä
Ph.D., academy research fellow, docent
Contact:
tel. +358 2 333 5956
email: maiset(at) utu.fi
address: Department of Political Science, FIN-20014 University of Turku
home page
Research interests:
- democratic theory
- referendums
- deliberative democracy
- political trust
Project in PCRC:
Maija Setälä studies democratic theories and different forms of citizen participation such as referendums and citizen deliberation. She has taken both theoretical and empirical approaches to these topics. Theoretically, she analyses the possibilities to reach consensus or agreement through democratic deliberation, and the feasibility of democratic deliberation considering the prevalence of strategic action in politics. Empirically, she studies referendums and citizen deliberation in various European contexts applying the methods of comparative politics. In addition, Setälä has applied experimental methods as she has, together with other researchers, organized a field experiment on citizen deliberation. The aim is to organize these kinds of field experiments also in the future. A more detailed description of Setälä’s research interests and projects can be found on her website.