Michael W. Bauer

Michael W. Bauer serves as a Full-time Professor holding the Chair in Public Administration at the Florence School of Transnational Governance, European University Institute (EUI). With extensive experience across European academic institutions, he has established himself as a leading scholar in public administration and governance studies.

Bauer earned his academic credentials through a diverse educational path, studying German philology, history, and social sciences at universities in Mannheim, Frankfurt am Main, and Vienna, followed by a Diploma in Social Sciences from Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. He completed a Master of Arts in European Political and Administrative Science from the College of Europe in Bruges and earned his Ph.D. in Social and Political Sciences from the EUI in 2000.

His research focuses on European and international public administration, multilevel governance, and democratic bureaucracy, with recent work examining how populist governments transform state bureaucracies and the ethical responsibilities of civil servants under illiberal rule. Bauer has pioneered research on 'administrative backsliding'—the systematic erosion of bureaucratic autonomy and professionalism under populist regimes—and developed frameworks for understanding bureaucratic resistance in democratic backsliding contexts.

Bauer's scholarly contributions have been recognized with significant awards including the Christopher Pollitt Award in 2023 and recognition for the most downloaded article in Governance journal that same year. His influential publications include The European Commission of the Twenty-First Century and Dismantling Public Policies: Strategies, Constraints, and Outcomes (Oxford University Press), as well as Democratic Backsliding and Public Administration: How Populists in Government Transform State Bureaucracies (Cambridge University Press).

• Christopher Pollitt Award (2023) for article 'How do international bureaucrats affect policy outputs?'
• Most downloaded article in Governance (2023)
• Principal Investigator for EU-funded Horizon project RADAR

As an active mentor, Bauer supervises doctoral students including Alexander Mesarovich and Moritz Wassum, while leading the Florence team for the EU-funded Horizon research project RADAR (Renewing Administration through Democratic Anchorage Reforms). His work bridges theoretical insights with practical implications for strengthening democratic governance against populist challenges, making significant contributions to both academic discourse and policy development in public administration worldwide.