Research Projects

For my comparative and transnational research on democratic and autocratic transformations, I combine ethnographically informed fieldwork with discourse analysis and legal and policy analysis. In my research group „Secularity, Islam, and Democracy in Indonesia and Turkey,“ I worked with three PhD students and postdocs from Indonesia and Turkey. We conducted more than one hundred interviews with religious authorities and political actors to trace how religious dynamics connect to broader patterns of political change. This work has produced peer-reviewed articles in area studies, political science, urban studies and legal studies, as well as my book on religious nationalism in post-Suharto Indonesia.

In my new project on civic education in Germany, I collaborate with experienced civil society partners who focus on education about antisemitism and other forms discrimination. Through participatory research, we evaluate and develop new formats of democratic education for increasingly fragmented and plural societies.

“Democracy and Interfaith Initiatives: Civic Education, Democracy, and Religion” (funded by the Berlin University Alliance 2020-2021)

As part of this interdisciplinary project (2020-2021), we examined how religious and political education can strengthen democracy, focusing on Indonesia's pro-democratic interfaith initiatives and comparing them with Germany's separated systems. Through interviews and discussions, I collaborated with scholars and practitioners from both countries to analyze the c

Beyond Social Cohesion: Global Repertoires of Living Together (RePLITO)

I was part of the "Beyond Social Cohesion: Global Repertoires of Living Together" (RePLITO) project, led by Prof. Dr. Schirin Amir-Moazami and Prof. Dr. Nadja-Christina Schneider and funded by the Berlin University Alliance (2021-2024). The project examined marginalized repertoires of living together across multiple regions to rethink social cohesion from a trans

Secularity, Islam, and Democracy in Indonesia and Turkey (funded by the VolkswagenStiftung 2018-2025)

Through my project "Secularity, Islam, and Democracy in Indonesia and Turkey" (funded by the VolkswagenStiftung 2018-2025), I examined how competing religious, economic, and political elites drive democratic backsliding. Using interviews and media analysis, my research teams and I focused on religious authorities in increasingly polarized political landscapes acr

„Exploring and Activating the Democratic Potential of Religion in Times of Growing Antisemitism and Racism” (funded by the VolkswagenStiftung 2025-2030)

My project team explores how religious education can strengthen democracy in response to increasing tensions along religious and identity-based categories of belonging in Germany and elsewhere. I collaborate with specialists from political science, education, civic education, as well as representatives of various religious denominations, to develop and test new f