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Jonathan S Doucette

@jdoucette.bsky.social
1.2K followers 354 following 134 posts

Associate Professor, Department of Politics, Aalborg University. My research examines religion, historical regimes, state formation, and democratization. Personal website: t.co/M1J5XAy13P

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Reposted by Jonathan S Doucette
Adam Scharpf @ascharpf.bsky.social · 16/02/2026
Russia, Venezuela, Iran, China, the Sahel region, the United States ... Want to know why state agents carry out brutal repression — or participate in illegal coups? Our new book "Making a Career in Dictatorship" provides answers — it just got published by @academic.oup.com: tinyurl.com/ystwm3tf
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
Within a few generations, ideas about what counted as a legitimate way to govern a city had changed across Europe. The paper, "Collapse of State Power, the Cluniac Reform Movement, and the Origins of Urban Self-Government in Medieval Europe": www.cambridge.org/core/journal...
cambridge.org
The Collapse of State Power, the Cluniac Reform Movement, and the Origins of Urban Self-Government in Medieval Europe | International Organization | Cambridge Core
The Collapse of State Power, the Cluniac Reform Movement, and the Origins of Urban Self-Government in Medieval Europe - Volume 75 Issue 1
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
Within the Catholic Church the idea that local self-government would lead to responsible office-holding was fomenting a reform movement. This movement allied itself with townspeople and spread the idea that self-government (and ousting of unreformed bishops) was needed to ensure a godly community.
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
For centuries, the norm was that Europe's cities were governed by resident bishops and lords, or their appointees. Then, beginning in the eleventh century, cities started ousting these rulers and governing themselves through councils of citizens. What happened?
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
That framework skips a prior question: why are some institutions seen as legitimate options, while others are not? Democracy has been the only legitimate game in town. Even openly authoritarian regimes feel obliged to hold elections. But history shows that this status quo can change quickly.
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
What can we learn about regime change today from studying historical transitions to early democracy? We usually explain transitions to and from democracy by asking what changes demand for democracy among citizens or elites, or what makes established elites willing to accept it.
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
Does a strong state have to come before democracy? With David Andersen, we scrutinize eight versions of the "state-first" claim using V-Dem data, 1789–2015. Impartial bureaucracy helps democracies survive and deepen. State capacity has no robust effects. See: www.cambridge.org/core/journal...
cambridge.org
State First? A Disaggregation and Empirical Interrogation | British Journal of Political Science | Cambridge Core
State First? A Disaggregation and Empirical Interrogation - Volume 52 Issue 1
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
Does a strong state have to come before democracy? With David Andersen, we scrutinize eight versions of the "state-first" claim using V-Dem data, 1789–2015. Impartial bureaucracy helps democracies survive and deepen. State capacity has no robust effects. See: www.cambridge.org/core/journal...
cambridge.org
State First? A Disaggregation and Empirical Interrogation | British Journal of Political Science | Cambridge Core
State First? A Disaggregation and Empirical Interrogation - Volume 52 Issue 1
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Reposted by Jonathan S Doucette
Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
1/5: How does the development of Eastern Europe and Scandinavia compare to Western Europe? My new Cambridge Element, How Settlers Shaped Eastern Europe and Scandinavia, is out. Chapter 2 compares three transformations in the East with the West: doi.org/10.1017/9781...
doi.org
How Settlers Shaped Eastern Europe and Scandinavia
Cambridge Core - Political Economy - How Settlers Shaped Eastern Europe and Scandinavia
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
5/5 The overall picture is convergence: a later start, fast catch-up, and by 1800 institutions that were in many respects comparable to the West. The rest of the book argues that settlers from Western Europe were central to explaining this convergence.
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
4/5: State formation. In 1400, Eastern states looked much like Western ones: few standing armies and tax collection in the hands of nobles. By 1800, the West had firmer control over its territory, but the East (and Scandinavia in particular) was comparable on tax capacity and meritocracy.
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
3/5: Regime change. Rule via councils chosen by citizens first emerged in Western Europe in the 11th and 12th centuries, in the wake of church reform. In the East, the wave came a century later. I find that about 50% of cities in the West attained self-government against roughly 35% in the East.
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
2/5: Economic development. Western Europe's urban population was larger throughout the period and more than twice as large in 1800. But the East grew faster: 22-fold between 800 and 1800, against 12-fold in the West. The East's share of Europe's urban population rises steadily from the 11th century.
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
1/5: How does the development of Eastern Europe and Scandinavia compare to Western Europe? My new Cambridge Element, How Settlers Shaped Eastern Europe and Scandinavia, is out. Chapter 2 compares three transformations in the East with the West: doi.org/10.1017/9781...
doi.org
How Settlers Shaped Eastern Europe and Scandinavia
Cambridge Core - Political Economy - How Settlers Shaped Eastern Europe and Scandinavia
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Reposted by Jonathan S Doucette
Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 17/08/2026
What effect sizes can a design reliably detect, and how does that compare to the smallest effect size of interest? These questions are rarely pondered outside of experiments. I (with assistance from Claude) wrote an R package, "simpower", that helps with this: github.com/faranordk/si....
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 17/08/2026
Thanks for the suggestion! That is for sure on my to-do list.
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 17/08/2026
You can also check how power vary by controls, sample size, nr. of treated units, etc. The approach is based on my recent paper, "What Can We Learn about the Effects of Democracy Using Cross-National Data?" (2025), American Political Science Review 119(3): www.cambridge.org/core/journal...
cambridge.org
What Can We Learn about the Effects of Democracy Using Cross-National Data? | American Political Science Review | Cambridge Core
What Can We Learn about the Effects of Democracy Using Cross-National Data? - Volume 119 Issue 3
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 17/08/2026
You simply choose the design (TWFE, event-study, IV or RDD), input your data on the planned X, Y, and controls (or data whose behavior mirrors the intended X and Y), and get an estimated power curve. This is a beta version, so any feedback on errors, bugs, or missing features is much appreciated!
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 17/08/2026
What effect sizes can a design reliably detect, and how does that compare to the smallest effect size of interest? These questions are rarely pondered outside of experiments. I (with assistance from Claude) wrote an R package, "simpower", that helps with this: github.com/faranordk/si....
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Reposted by Jonathan S Doucette
Jake Grumbach @jakemgrumbach.bsky.social · 09/08/2026
🔥🔥🔥 noahdasanaike.github.io/sage.html
The Small-Area Global Elections (SAGE)
Dataset
Noah Dasanaike*
June 30, 2026
Conditionally Accepted at Nature Scientific Data
Abstract
Cross-national research on electoral behavior has been bounded by the granularity of comparative election data. Existing archives aggregate to constituency or country level, omit spatial information, or restrict coverage to a small set of well-documented democracies. The Small-Area Global Elections (SAGE) dataset collects lower-house parliamentary and presidential returns for 110 countries and territories at the smallest unit each electoral authority publishes, geocodes the units, and harmonizes party and candidate identifiers across languages. For most countries the unit is a polling station with fewer than a thousand voters; the full dataset carries roughly ten billion votes cast across more than eight million units. The dataset is openly available in tabular and spatial formats, with companion R and Python packages providing direct access. SAGE supports spatial analyses of electoral behavior across democracies and hybrid regimes at a granularity not previously available for cross-national comparison.Map
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Reposted by Jonathan S Doucette
Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 06/08/2026
What do we know about Europe's self-governing cities? I wrote a survey summarizing what we about 1) why they emerged, and 2) their consequences for Europe's development. osf.io/yqza5/files/...
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 06/08/2026
We further know that self-governing cities were an important prerequisite of parliaments with urban representatives, and there is also some evidence that they matter for later democratization efforts. However, overall we still know little about their consequences for state formation.
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 06/08/2026
In terms of consequences, self-governing cities enjoyed a growth advantage during the medieval period. During the early modern period, non-autonomous cities catch up. Evidence suggest that self-governing cities are more likely to create universities and attract upper tail human capital.
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 06/08/2026
However, they very first wave of transitions were concentrated in cities that were the targets of the Gregorian reform movement within the Catholic Church
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 06/08/2026
In terms of explanations, larger cities are more inclined to become self-governing, and cities exposed to war are more likely to attain autonomy.
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 06/08/2026
Besides my own work on the topic, It highlights contributions by, for example, @stasavage.bsky.social @essobecker.bsky.social @scottfabramson.bsky.social @wahlfabi.bsky.social @fhollenbach.org
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 06/08/2026
What do we know about Europe's self-governing cities? I wrote a survey summarizing what we about 1) why they emerged, and 2) their consequences for Europe's development. osf.io/yqza5/files/...
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 03/07/2026
The Dominican order was also instrumental in spurring the spread of the printing press. The order valued education highly. Thus, it supported the establishment of printing presses in order to expand its libraries and to create preaching material. 4/N: www.emerald.com/jhpe/article...
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 03/07/2026
Due to the order's participation in the settling of Eastern Europe, it was especially instrumental in spreading such institutions outside of their initial points of origin. 3/N: www.cambridge.org/core/element...
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 03/07/2026
The order's exceptionally well-developed representative institutions inspired local secular elites in cities to alter their institutions 2/N: www.cambridge.org/core/journal...
cambridge.org
The Diffusion of Urban Medieval Representation: The Dominican Order as an Engine of Regime Change | Perspectives on Politics | Cambridge Core
The Diffusion of Urban Medieval Representation: The Dominican Order as an Engine of Regime Change - Volume 19 Issue 3
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 03/07/2026
In terms of its role in Europe's development, the Dominican order is perhaps most known for its part in the inquisition. However, it also had a more benevolent impact on regime change and the development of human capital 1/N
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 11/06/2026
1/N: How did Western European settlers impact economic development in Eastern Europe and Scandinavia? In many but not all cases, the short run impact was destructive as settlement was related to conquest and repression. However, this changed in the long run www.cambridge.org/core/element...
cambridge.org
How Settlers Shaped Eastern Europe and Scandinavia
Cambridge Core - Political Economy - How Settlers Shaped Eastern Europe and Scandinavia
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Reposted by Jonathan S Doucette
Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 11/06/2026
My new Elements ("How Settlers Shaped Eastern Europe and Scandinavia") is now published at: www.cambridge.org/core/element... It is free to read for the next 14 days!
cambridge.org
How Settlers Shaped Eastern Europe and Scandinavia
Cambridge Core - Political Economy - How Settlers Shaped Eastern Europe and Scandinavia
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Reposted by Jonathan S Doucette
Cambridge University Press Political Science & IR @cambup-polsci.cambridge.org · 12/06/2026
New Cambridge Element, How Settlers Shaped Eastern Europe and Scandinavia by Jonathan Stavnskær Doucette, out now! Read for free for the next 2 weeks at cup.org/3PRJCos
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 11/06/2026
I argue that settlers from Western Europe shaped European state formation and transformed the political and economic fate of Eastern Europe and Scandinavia between 800 and 1800. The resulting emergence of new more capable states intensified geopolitical competition across the European continent.
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 11/06/2026
My new Elements ("How Settlers Shaped Eastern Europe and Scandinavia") is now published at: www.cambridge.org/core/element... It is free to read for the next 14 days!
cambridge.org
How Settlers Shaped Eastern Europe and Scandinavia
Cambridge Core - Political Economy - How Settlers Shaped Eastern Europe and Scandinavia
263
Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 11/06/2026
6/N This had implications for European state formation as a whole, which I will discuss in a future post!
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 11/06/2026
5/N The urban character of Eastern Europe and Scandinavia would have been quite different without this internal wave of settlement. I estimate that in a counterfactual world without settlers, the average town would have had 8700 inhabitants in 1800 instead of 11000.
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 11/06/2026
4/N I find, on average, that settles towns grew substantially larger than non-settled towns. However, this size differential is concentrated among towns that were small prior to settlement.
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 11/06/2026
3/N In support of this, I find earlier adoption of the printing press and additional connections to trade routes in settles versus non settled towns. I will save the evidence on institutions for a later post.
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 11/06/2026
2/N Settlers changed the economic fortunes of locations in three ways: They introduced fortuitous economic institutions to attract migrants; they connected cities to trade networks; they introduced technologies and came up with new technologies when faced with existing know-how and conditions.
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 11/06/2026
1/N: How did Western European settlers impact economic development in Eastern Europe and Scandinavia? In many but not all cases, the short run impact was destructive as settlement was related to conquest and repression. However, this changed in the long run www.cambridge.org/core/element...
cambridge.org
How Settlers Shaped Eastern Europe and Scandinavia
Cambridge Core - Political Economy - How Settlers Shaped Eastern Europe and Scandinavia
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Reposted by Jonathan S Doucette
Yiqing Xu @yiqingxu.bsky.social · 24/05/2026
On panelView, and why we should always look at our data first.. yiqingxu.substack.com/p/plot-your-...
yiqingxu.substack.com
Please look at your (panel) data
Many of the most egregious issues can be avoided by simply looking at the data.
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Reposted by Jonathan S Doucette
Roman Senninger @rsenninger.bsky.social · 11/05/2026
New paper out in Nature Human Behaviour. "Government policy documents across 185 countries largely cite Global North sources" with @seramirezruiz.bsky.social DOI: doi.org/10.1038/s415... Ungated: rdcu.be/fh0Ss
doi.org
Government policy documents across 185 countries largely cite Global North sources - Nature Human Behaviour
This analysis of 1.2 million policy documents from 185 countries identifies global inequalities in whose knowledge is cited in policymaking. Governments in the Global South rely more on foreign source...
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Jonathan S Doucette @jdoucette.bsky.social · 07/05/2026
IN DANISH Underviser du i kvantitativ metode? Så har jeg forfattet en lille artikel om (mis)brugen af kontrolvariable (på dansk) der kan læses i Politica: politica.dk/fileadmin/po...
politica.dk
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Sascha O. Becker @essobecker.bsky.social · 04/04/2026
ASREC Europe Venice 🇮🇹 Fri/Sat 25/26 Sep 2026 co-organized with @valerueda.bsky.social 3 keynotes: Mara Squicciarini 🎉 @saumjha.bsky.social 🎉 Joel Mokyr 🎉 Submit here by 30 April 👉 forms.office.com/Pages/Respon...
forms.office.com
Microsoft Forms
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Reposted by Jonathan S Doucette
Carl Henrik Knutsen @chknutsen.bsky.social · 17/03/2026
V-Dem v.16 is now released, w. updated scores for 2025. Most countries remain stable from 2024, but some clear improvements (on diff’t democracy indices), incl. S. Korea, Sri Lanka & Mauritius. Largest declines came, by far, in the US. This figure shows 10-yr changes on the Liberal Dem. index.
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Ryan Briggs @ryancbriggs.net · 11/02/2026
I have a new paper. We look at ~all stats articles in political science post-2010 & show that 94% have abstracts that claim to reject a null. Only 2% present only null results. This is hard to explain unless the research process has a filter that only lets rejections through.
It must be very hard to publish null results
Publication practices in the social sciences act as a filter that favors statistically significant results over null findings. While the problem of selection on significance (SoS) is well-known in theory, it has been difficult to measure its scope empirically, and it has been challenging to determine how selection varies across contexts. In this article, we use large language models to extract granular and validated data on about 100,000 articles published in over 150 political science journals from 2010 to 2024. We show that fewer than 2% of articles that rely on statistical methods report null-only findings in their abstracts, while over 90% of papers highlight significant results. To put these findings in perspective, we develop and calibrate a simple model of publication bias. Across a range of plausible assumptions, we find that statistically significant results are estimated to be one to two orders of magnitude more likely to enter the published record than null results. Leveraging metadata extracted from individual articles, we show that the pattern of strong SoS holds across subfields, journals, methods, and time periods. However, a few factors such as pre-registration and randomized experiments correlate with greater acceptance of null results. We conclude by discussing implications for the field and the potential of our new dataset for investigating other questions about political science.
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American Political Science Review @apsrjournal.bsky.social · 02/02/2026
From our August Issue: What Can We Learn about the Effects of Democracy Using Cross-National Data? by JONATHAN STAVNSKÆR DOUCETTE. www.cambridge.org/core/journal...
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John Holbein @johnholbein1.bsky.social · 02/02/2026
So much of classic political science research is woefully underpowered. I'm glad we're slowly coming to our senses.
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