Alper Şükrü Gençer

I am a Ph.D. candidate in Political Science at New York University. My research examines how citizens and politicians navigate democratic accountability under conditions of complexity, polarization, and crisis. Across projects, I study democratic backsliding, affective polarization, crisis governance, and public resource allocation, with a particular interest in how voters evaluate bundled reforms, mobilize against threats to democracy, and hold incumbents accountable under changing political conditions.

My dissertation develops a behavioral account of democratic backsliding. I study why citizens sometimes fail to recognize or resist reforms that weaken democratic institutions. I argue that citizens may accept democratic harm not because they support backsliding directly, but because institutional costs are embedded in broader reform packages, obscured by complexity, or presented through selective information. I use survey experiments, causal inference, and formal theory to study political decision-making under uncertainty.

Methodologically, I develop and apply experimental and causal-inference tools to improve how political scientists measure political beliefs and misperceptions and conduct experiments with optimmally allocated budget. My dissertation research has been supported by the American Political Science Association Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement Grant, the Identities & Ideologies Project at NYU, and the NYU George Downs Prize.