Marc S. Jacob

Marc S. Jacob is an Assistant Professor of Democracy and Global Affairs at the Keough School of Global Affairs, University of Notre Dame, based in the Hesburgh Center for International Studies (Office O236). Previously, he was a postdoctoral scholar at Stanford University's Polarization Research Lab.

Education:

• Ph.D. in Political Science, ETH Zurich, Switzerland
• Undergraduate and graduate degrees from Leipzig University, Germany; Freie Universität Berlin, Germany; and the University of Edinburgh, United Kingdom

Jacob's research centers on political behavior, public opinion, and institutional change, with emphasis on democratization and democratic backsliding. He investigates how citizens perceive electoral integrity and respond to authoritarian challenges across European democracies, Turkey, and Brazil, focusing on partisan gaps in democratic understanding and citizen responses to institutional erosion.

His 2021-2025 publications reveal consistent focus on democratic backsliding mechanisms, including electoral authoritarianism in Turkey, anti-pluralist party impacts in Brazil, and institutional erosion in European contexts. Key trends include citizen sanctioning of elite attacks, divergent democratic perceptions driving political choice, and subnational analyses of party finance and polarization.

No scientific awards were mentioned in source materials.

Information regarding student advising, research grants, or current laboratory affiliations was not provided beyond his past association with Stanford's Polarization Research Lab.