Paulus Wagner

Paulus Wagner is a Part-time Assistant Professor at the Max Weber Programme for Postdoctoral Studies and holds a Max Weber Fellowship in the Department of Political and Social Sciences at the European University Institute. His office is located at Badia Fiesolana, BF194, and he is fluent in German, English, Russian, and French.

Education includes:

• PhD in Comparative Politics from Sciences Po Paris (2023)
• MRes in Social Science from EHESS
• MA in International Political Economy from KCL
• BA in Translation/Interpreting from University of Vienna

He was a visiting researcher at UC Berkeley (2019-20).

Wagner's research examines policy feedback effects of welfare reforms using comparative mixed methods, analyzing how welfare cuts, conditionality, and social investment policies impact conceptions of public solidarity. Additional interests include workplace sociology's influence on political attitudes and right-wing populism dynamics. His work bridges political economy, sociology, and policy analysis.

His scholarly output focuses on welfare state transformations, particularly socio-political feedback mechanisms in European contexts. Recent theoretical work explores how welfare recalibration affects social solidarity frameworks.

As Co-PI of the 'Building Bridges in Polarized Societies' project (2021-23, funded by City of Vienna MA-7), he pioneered interdisciplinary collaborations between social science and film. He teaches comparative politics and welfare state analysis at Sciences Po Paris.