In the 2025 federal election, German society seemed to be more divided than ever. Christiane Eilders and Olaf Jandura (Düsseldorf University of Applied Sciences) use current survey data to show how various lines of conflict have developed and what role the use of information via social media plays. To do this, they combine milieu research with its differentiated findings on political communication behaviour, topic-specific attitudes and party affinity, with polarisation research on ideological and affective divisions.
- To what extent do different milieus ideologically move apart from one another?
- Has affective rejection of other groups become more pronounced?
- Is German society still relatively unpolarised?
- How does rejection relate to the particularly controversial issues of migration and climate change in the election?
Please register for the event by email to kolleg@cais-research.de and indicate, whether you will participate at CAIS or online. A buffet is planned after the event.
Christiane Eilders is Scientific Director at the Center for Advanced Internet Studies (CAIS) and head of the research group “Societal Cohesion in Digital Media Environments”. She studied communication science at LMU Munich, where she also completed her doctorate in 1996. After working at the Hans Bredow Institute in Hamburg and at the Social Science Research Center Berlin and completing her habilitation at the Free University of Berlin, she moved to the University of Augsburg as a professor and from there to Heinrich-Heine-University (HHU) Düsseldorf, where she is professor for Communication and Media Studies since 2011.
Olaf Jandura is co-head of the research focus communication research at the Department of Economics at the Düsseldorf University of Applied Sciences (HSD) and adjunct professor at the Institute for Social Sciences at the Heinrich-Heine-University Düsseldorf (HHU). His research and teaching focuses on questions of political communication, analyses of media offerings and communication practice in political-communicative milieus. As part of the DIID, he is researching the fragmentation of online content and audiences, as well as the quality of online surveys.