Statistics, Politics and Policy
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sppjournal.bsky.social
Statistics, Politics and Policy
@sppjournal.bsky.social
Applying statistical analysis to (public) policy:
https://www.degruyter.com/journal/key/spp/html
📢 Call for Papers – Special Issue on China: Politics and Policy
Guest Editors: @ettensperger.bsky.social & Lars Konheiser

📅 Submission deadline: January 16, 2026
📩 Submit your manuscript here: mc.manuscriptcentral.com/dgspp
📧 Questions? Contact us at: spp@politik.uni-freiburg.de
July 16, 2025 at 7:58 AM
In issue 1/2025, Muchamad Bachtiar, Irdam Ahmad, Zainal Abidin Sahabuddin, and Trismadi Trismadi conduct a meta-analysis of military expenditure determinants across 15 studies. They find war, ongoing spending, and external threats to be key drivers - while national conditions correlate negatively.
May 21, 2025 at 7:52 AM
In issue 1/2025, Osafu Augustine Egbon and Ezra Gayawan present a spatio-temporal model of violent conflict and fatalities in Nigeria. Using a Cox point process and SPDE approach, they analyze georeferenced conflict data to identify regional patterns and high-risk areas.
May 19, 2025 at 1:56 PM
In our issue 1/2025, Aaron Cooke and John Vivian develop a restricted data-rich dynamic factor model to evaluate vaccination efficacy during the 2020 coronavirus pandemic. Their model can be used for other populations, as they provide an open-source Python package.
May 16, 2025 at 8:50 AM
In issue 1/2025, John O’Reilly proposes the County-Elector Plan to revitalize the Electoral College. Implementable by states, it would avoid a constitutional change and future gerrymandering. Thereby, electoral competition would be shifted from a few battleground states to several hundred counties.
May 14, 2025 at 9:12 AM
📢 Call for Papers – Special Issue on Elections

We welcome contributions on:
🔹 Electoral outcomes & voting behavior
🔹 Campaigns & debates
🔹 Electoral systems & reforms
🔹 Comparative perspectives
🔹 Innovations in electoral analysis

📩 Submit your manuscript here: lnkd.in/e23ee9ik
May 12, 2025 at 9:17 AM
Issue 1/2025 of SPP is available online! It features 4 articles showing the power of quantitative methods in addressing some of the most pressing political challenges:

📌 Electoral Reform
📌 Pandemic Response
📌 Conflict Analysis
📌 Military Expenditure

Access: www.degruyterbrill.com/journal/key/...
May 6, 2025 at 9:48 AM
What drives GDP growth in Ghana? Emmanuel Amoako Koranteng, Gideon Mensah Engmann, and Dioggban Jakperik apply a hierarchical Bayesian model to analyze key macroeconomic variables in our issue 3/2024: real exchange rates, manufacturing, and government expenditure positively impact GDP growth.
March 20, 2025 at 3:02 PM
Declining U.S. influence, particularly in Asia, and rising Chinese engagement: in their contribution to our issue 3/2024, Elizabeth G., Steven Kim, Nicholas Sobrepena, Stone Goethe, and Eric E. analyze media coverage across 96 African and Asian nations and find geopolitical influence.
March 19, 2025 at 1:08 PM
How can we better predict municipal solid waste? In issue 3/2024, Chellai Fatih explores the power of hybrid modeling techniques to forecast municipal solid waste (MSW) generation across OECD countries. The article's findings highlight the need for data-driven waste management policies.
March 18, 2025 at 10:58 AM
How predictable are election outcomes? In issue 3/2024, Richard J. Heggen and Alfred G. Cuzán develop a geometric model to analyze 1,825 elections across five federal democracies. The model incorporates the rate of incumbency decay and predicts election outcomes within a 2–3 point margin.
March 17, 2025 at 2:10 PM
Can Voting Advice Applications (VAAs) capture party relations? In our issue 3/2024, Felix Wieland analyzes data from 63 editions of the German Wahl-O-Mat to track party proximities. His findings suggest that design changes have significantly altered measured proximities between major parties.
March 14, 2025 at 7:42 AM
Talknice Saungweme, Glenda Maluleke, and Nicholas M. Odhiambo of the University of South Africa use a nonlinear autoregressive distributed lag model to study the impact of financial development on Mauritius' economic growth. The results reveal an asymmetric relationship between the two.
November 29, 2024 at 6:16 AM
Marwah S. Siam, Hussein A. Sayed, and Laila O. El-Zeini of Cairo University apply a mixture-function mortality model to examine lifespan length and variation in Egypt from 1950 to 2021. The study reveals increasing longevity and a declining variation in age at death over time.
November 28, 2024 at 1:41 PM
Addressing the pension conundrum, Gustavo De Santis of Università di Firenze explores a novel approach, called IPAYGO. Including demographic and economic challenges, like differential mortality and low fertility rates, IPAYGO offers a sustainable and equitable approach to pensions.
November 27, 2024 at 10:31 AM
The impact of an aging electorate on democratic processes is at the core of Christopher-David Preclik's introduction of "political adultism". He describes "the socially-accepted interpersonal, structural, and institutional discrimination of young and younger people in politics".
November 26, 2024 at 8:57 AM
Is Intending to have children rightist? This is explored by @brunoarpino.bsky.social and @ryomogi.bsky.social who find that individuals on the far-right of the political spectrum are more likely to express positive intentions to have children, controlling for socio-demographic and economic factors.
November 25, 2024 at 9:41 AM