Svanhildur Thorvaldsdottir

Svanhildur Thorvaldsdottir is a Senior Lecturer in Statistics at the Hertie School in Berlin, Germany. She holds a PhD in Political Science from the University of Rochester (NY), a BA in Political Science from Columbia University, and a Master of International Affairs from Columbia's School of International and Public Affairs. Her research focuses on the bureaucracies of international organizations (IOs), budgeting and financial governance within global institutions, and pandemic policy responses. She co-leads the CoronaNet Project, tracking global government policies during the COVID-19 pandemic. Previously, she held postdoctoral roles at Ludwig Maximilians University (LMU) Munich and Technical University of Munich (TUM), and worked as a policy analyst at the International Peace Institute and in the Icelandic Foreign Service at the Embassy of Iceland in Washington, D.C.

Her academic contributions include studies on international public administration structures, published in peer-reviewed articles and book chapters. She applies computational social science methods to analyze policy responses to crises, with expertise in combining qualitative and quantitative research approaches.