The University of Helsinki (UH) places in the 50-100 range, elevating it to the top 0.5% of the world’s universities (91st in both the QS World and Times Higher Education rankings, 56th in the Shanghai ranking and 71th in Taiwan ranking). Among the Nordic countries, UH ranks as the first (Times Higher Education) or second-best multidisciplinary university (QS World). In nearly all of the most important rankings, UH is a founding member of the League of European Research Universities (LERU), a consortium of 23 leading multi-faculty research-intensive universities. A further manifestation of scientific quality and impact is more than 60 ERC grants, nearly 50% of ERC grants nominated to Finland. 50% of Thomson Reuters’ highly cited Finnish researchers are in UH. The University of Helsinki is the oldest and largest institution of academic education in Finland, an international scientific community of 40,000 students and researchers. UH has 11 faculties, several research-oriented institutes, multidisciplinary research networks, and campus units, as well as units attending to the duties of a national authority. UHEL has an annual budget of 750 million euros.
UH was awarded 49 Marie Curie projects during FP7 and has so far received funding for 36 MSCA projects in H2020.
The Faculty of Social Sciences at the University of Helsinki explores social and societal phenomena and problems in our changing world from global, European, national and local perspectives. In terms of both methods and themes, the Faculty is Finland’s most diverse and internationally successful research unit in the social sciences.
Key personnel
Dr. Takis S. Pappas (PhD Yale) is a docent at the University of Helsinki, Finland. In the past, he was tenured professor at the University of Macedonia, Greece, and has held teaching and research positions at the European University Institute in Florence, Princeton University, Yale University, the University of Strasbourg, the University of Oslo, the Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg, the University of Luxembourg, and the Central European University, Budapest, Hungary. Besides comparative populism and liberal democratic politics, his published work extends in the fields of political leadership, patronage politics, parties, and party systems, and has appeared in American Behavioral Scientist, Comparative Political Studies, Constellations, Government and Opposition, Journal of Democracy, Party Politics, Rivista Italiana di Scienza Politica, West European Politics, and the Oxford Research Encyclopedia, among others. He has authored Making Party Democracy in Greece (Macmillan 1999), The Charismatic Party: PASOK, Papandreou, Power (Patakis, 2009, in Greek), Populism and Crisis Politics in Greece (Palgrave 2014), and On the Tightrope: National Crises and Brinkmanship in Greece from Trikoupis to Tsipras (Ikaros 2017, in Greek). He co-edited European Populism in the Shadow of the Great Recession (ECPR Press, 2015). He is currently finishing a new book under the title Populism: A Theoretical Framework (forthcoming 2018).
Dimitris Skleparis is a Lecturer in the Politics of Security at Newcastle University. He received his Ph.D. in Political Science from Queen Mary University of London (2015). He has published in a range of international peer-reviewed journals and has contributed to a number of edited volumes, research project reports, and policy briefs. He also has considerable media and consultancy experience. Dimitris has previously worked as Lecturer in Politics at the University of Glasgow, as Internship Programme Lecturer and Coordinator at the University of California (Edinburgh Study Centre), and as Teaching Assistant at Queen Mary University of London. He has also worked as Research Associate at the University of Glasgow, and as Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Hellenic Foundation for European and Foreign Policy (ELIAMEP). Dimitris is currently a member of Yasar University UNESCO Chair on International Migration (2016-2020), and Internal Communications Officer of Greek Politics Specialist Group (GPSG) of the Political Studies Association (PSA).
For more information about the University of Helsinki, please visit their website.