Political Networks

The Political Networks Section aims to provide a multidisciplinary space of convergence for scholars with diverse research interests who share an understanding of the importance of network processes and their analysis in political life. This is coupled with strong attention to the integration (and advancement) of theory and empirical data. Political networks are conceived of in a broad sense –as defined around political actors, events that are relevant to the political biographies of individuals, and the use of digital communication technologies within political dynamics. Thus, ties may consist of exchanges of resources, information, and symbols, as well as of collaborations and communications both on- and offline. Panel 1: Climate Policy Networks Climate change is a ‘wicked problem’ and a major challenge to governance and policymaking. Policy network analysis allows us to capture the ‘wicked’ complexities of formal institutional and informal linkages between diverse yet interdependent policy actors and enables us to explain how such arrangements shape climate change policymaking and policy implementation. The call is open to theoretical, empirical, and methodological contributions to climate policy networks, specifically but not exclusive multi-layer, comparative, and longitudinal network analyses. We particularly welcome studies on climate policy and multi-level governance, coalition politics, and climate network perspectives in socio-ecological systems. Panel 2: Comparing Political Networks Comparing political networks over time and space is a powerful strategy to support causal explanations of the antecedents or consequences of network structures. Comparisons over space can include cross-country comparisons or within-country comparisons across regions or policy sectors. Comparisons over time can include network observations at several discrete time points or be based on the dynamic assessment of network evolution. Despite the potential benefit of such comparisons to our understanding of political networks, such research designs remain rare. The panel thus invites papers with an explicit comparative research design related to political networks. Panel 3: From Texts to Networks: Semantic, Socio-Semantic, and Discourse Networks Collecting data on political networks via organizational surveys is a considerable challenge. At the same time, large volumes of texts containing information on political actors and their relations are publicly available. This panel showcases research activities, which obtain discourse, semantic, and socio-semantic networks from text data, and shows how network research might benefit from approaches that 1) use text as a database for political networks; 2) utilize various text analysis approaches to find ties between actors; or 3) combine text analysis with social networks. Panel 4: Network Analysis in International Relations This panel examines the added value of network analysis to examine questions of international cooperation pertaining to IR. We welcome submissions that apply relational approaches on fields such as foreign policy analysis or crisis management and, specifically, studies from the Global South, which remain underrepresented in political network research. This panel aims to cross-fertilize IR research with relational public policy scholarship and to critically examine the usability of relational approaches in IR. Panel 5: Movement and Collective Action Networks Over the past two decades, the world has experienced significant waves of mobilization and contention, from local grassroots initiatives to transnational protest movements. This panel examines how movements and collective actors have adapted their network structures, action repertoires, and strategic orientationsin response to shifting social, economic, political, and environmental contexts, as well as evolving political opportunity structures. By foregrounding the macro–micro dynamics of networked collective action, we explore how collaboration, coordination, and interconnection develop among groups and individuals engaged in contentious politics and social activism. Panel 6: The Politics of Environmental Networks Environmental problems such as climate emergencies, biodiversity loss, natural resource depletion, and associated environmental justice concerns have spurred a vast amount of research on environmental governance, which has increasingly adopted network perspectives. However, there is much to learn about how politics in different environmental networks relates to the broader governance contexts and systems shaping policy and, ultimately, socio-environmental outcomes, and specifically, from studies conducted in the Global South, an underrepresented region in political network research. This panel aims to bring together state-of-the-art political network analysis approaches that study the diverse features of the politics of environmental networks. Panel 7: Network Structures, Policy Output, and Performance This panel invites papers that examine the impact of political network structures on policy output and performance. Political networks, encompassing relationships among government officials, interest groups, civil society, and international bodies, shape decision-making processes and influence the development, adoption, and implementation of policies. By analyzing different network structures, this panel explores how network configurations affect policy output and performance. We specifically invite papers that conduct qualitative comparative analysis (QCA), but also other studies investigating the impact of network structure. This panel aims to bridge and advance theoretical and empirical perspectives on networks as drivers in shaping policy outcomes. Panel 8: Exploring Collaboration and Conflict in Environmental Governance This panel seeks papers investigating the interplay of conflict and collaboration within environmental governance processes. The transformative capacity of environmental policies is increasingly constrained by social polarization, hindering efforts to forge sustainable futures. Conflicts emerge where stakeholder expectations are unmet and governance is weak: is this inevitably detrimental, or an inherent component of political change processes? This panel discusses questions that address this ambiguity by employing diverse relational approaches to illuminate the processual interplay between collaborative and contentious politics, and how analyzing conflicts inform adaptive and effective environmental governance. Panel 9: Statistical Interdependence and Diffusion This panel brings together scholars working at the intersection of statistical network analysis and spatial econometrics to advance the study of interdependent processes across spatially or relationally connected units. We welcome contributions examining how behaviors, policies, innovations, or shocks diffuse through spatial and network structures —whether between countries, regions, organizations, or other actors. By integrating methods that analyze both node-level dynamics and the evolution of ties, this panel aims to bridge methodological divides and promote cross-fertilization between spatial and network approaches. We particularly encourage work that develops or applies models capturing complex feedback between structure and behavior, and that sheds light on higher-order interdependencies, contagion, and co-evolutionary diffusion patterns across diverse empirical domains.