Zsofia Bocskay

Zsofia Bocskay is a post-doctoral researcher at the CEU Democracy Institute and a member of the Research Group on De- and Re-Democratization. She holds a PhD in Political Science from Koç University, Istanbul, where she remains affiliated. Her research focuses on political communication in autocratizing states, particularly how government and opposition parties use agenda-setting, populist appeals, and campaign negativity to shape public discourse. While her core work centers on elite-level communication, she also studies media systems and voter behavior more broadly, including the role of misinformation, issue positioning, and political news consumption in competitive authoritarian regimes. She pays special attention to local elections, examining how political actors use these arenas to consolidate or challenge power. Her research has been published in The International Journal of Press/Politics. Zsofia also organizes the DRD Workgroup’s Illuminating Books series on recent academic work in democracy and politics.