W2 Professorship (W3 tenure track position) in Political, Social or Communication Science

This professorial position is a fixed-term public sector appointment for a maximum period of five years. Upon a positive tenure evaluation (teaching appraisal and external assessment of research work), the appointee will be promoted to a permanent professorship (lifetime tenure) at the German academic salary scale W3.

The university is also inviting applications for a W3 professorship in Computational Social Science (m/f/x) . This appointment is open regarding the candidate’s specific research focus within the field of political, social or communication science.

The successful candidate will define their own research agenda, provided that it:

• Demonstrates excellence in political, social or communication science
• Addresses current societal questions
• Makes use of novel digital data sources
• Establishes clear links with computer science

The professorship is embedded in the SOUNDS research project, which investigates societally relevant questions through:

• Novel digital data sources
• Digital behavioural traces
• Social media data
• AI-based methods

Based in the Department of European Social Research , the appointee will work at the intersection of political science, sociology and communication science , pursuing theory-driven, comparative research on:

• Public communication and societal change
• Political and social opinion formation
• The mediated public sphere
• Processes of social change

The role includes contributing to the development of joint research questions, methods and publications with the wider SOUNDS project and computer science.

• Develop and lead externally funded research , including third-party funding applications at national and European level
• Participate actively in coordinated funding initiatives (e.g., Collaborative Research Centres)
• Teach courses on:
  • Empirical social research
  • Digital communication research
  • Computational methods
• Supervise student theses
• Mentor early-career researchers

• Excellent academic standing in political science, sociology and/or communication science
• Empirical and quantitative focus
• Strong record of working with novel digital data sources to address societally relevant questions
• Openness to formal affiliation with the Department of Computer Science
• Established international research network
• Excellent publication track record
• Proven experience in securing third-party funding (grants awarded, applications submitted or in preparation)

• Willingness to teach in English
• Willingness to teach in German in the medium term

• Promotion and fostering of internationalization at Saarland University
• Support for projects expanding collaboration within international cooperative networks , such as:
  • Transform4Europe (European University Alliance)
  • University of the Greater Region (UniGR)

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