VOTEPRO Podcast VOTEPRO

Snap legislative elections were held in Israel on 17 September 2019 to elect the 120 members of the twenty-second Knesset. Following the previous elections in April, incumbent Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu failed to form a governing coalition, the first such failure in Israeli history. Prof. Liron Lavi breaks down the Israeli political and election system and gives us a bonus update on what happened after the votes were tabulated!

Liron Lavi is a Research Fellow at the Y&S Nazarian Center for Israel Studies. She received her PhD in Political Science in 2017 from Tel-Aviv University, where she studied the role of time in elections and democracy in Israel. During her doctoral research, Liron was also a Visiting Graduate Researcher at the Y&S Nazarian Center and UCLA's Department of Political Science from 2015 to 2017. Her doctoral work earned her the Best Dissertation Award from the Israeli Political Science Association in May 2018.

Liron's research interests include political communication; elections and democracy; Israeli politics; philosophy of time; and national identity. Her current work focuses on the 2015 and 2019 Israeli elections and the 2016 U.S. elections as she studies the effect of new media on democracy and its legitimacy. Liron is the recipient of the 2013 Warren E. Miller Scholarship and the Faculty of Social Science Dean Excellence Award in 2007, 2010, and 2013. Her research has been presented in international meetings including the Israeli, the Western and the American Political Science Associations and published in top academic journals, including Nations and Nationalism and Political Studies.

On September 9, Sweden goes to the polls and votes for local, national and regional elections. Prof. Sofie Blombäck of Mid Sweden University breaks down the political and electoral systems in Sweden, and how Sweden administers a large-scale election with small parties and women in mind.

South Carolina is in great hands! Thad Hall, Deputy Director of Voter Registration and Elections in Richland County, describes the financial planning, material, human and financial resources, contract negotiation, public relations and office automation, required to do his job.

My first podcast in French! Philippe Poirier is Professor in Political Science at the University of Luxembourg. He holds a Chair in Legislative Studies from the Luxembourg Parliament and is heading the European governance research program at the University of Luxembourg. Since 2005, his research projects have been financing by the European Commission, the European Parliament, the European Science Foundation, the Council of Europe, the Luxembourg National Research Agency and the National Parliament for an amount of € 2.9 million. He has been appointed permanent honorary visiting professor at the University of Paris Sorbonne (Celsa), University of the Agean (Greece ) and Collège des Bernadins. He is Scientific Advisor for the Council of Europe Group of States against Corruption and for the European Parliament Committee on Constitutional Affairs. He's Executive Director of Etudes Parlementaires Series, Publishers Larcier.

Professor Theresa Reidy of the University College Cork in Cork, Ireland discusses the upcoming presidential elections and referendum on blasphemy. Grab a Guinness and have a listen!