Creation: second half of 2020.
Group leaders: Vladimir Avetian and Edgar Jimenez Bedolla
Composition: Researchers, postdoctoral fellows, doctoral students and research engineers from the Chair and the ACSS-PSL Institute, as well as external academic partners; experts from French and European public institutions (on a more occasional basis).
Theme: This working group focuses on the relationships between public and political institutions, civil society and the market, studying them through the lens of tools and concepts specific to political economy, institutional economics and law and economics.
Particular emphasis is placed on the collection and use of original data and the systematic use of textual data. The work is structured around a variety of research projects, including: analysing interactions between political and economic institutions; the behaviour of elected officials and the implications for public policy; European policy-making through the lens of a detailed study of the legislative process and public consultations; and comparing regulatory practices across OECD countries.
With a strong empirical focus, the work developed and analysed is discussed by social science researchers (economics, political science, law) and data science specialists. It aims to explain the dynamics at work in the construction of governance frameworks for industries and markets and to analyse their economic and social consequences.s.
Work organisation: Regular sessions (Mondays from 5:30 p.m. to 7 p.m.).
Topics covered in 2025:
- The role of governance in the design and implementation of public policy, particularly through stakeholder engagement (civil society, businesses, economic actors) and market dynamics.
- The use of natural language processing methods (NLP, large language models, LLM) to transform texts into econometrically usable data: legislative corpora, public consultations, media.
- The study of institution-market-society relationships under different political regimes: for example, mobility between the political and economic worlds (‘revolving doors’) and transitional effects between authoritarianism and democracy.
- A comparative or historical dimension: for example, the study of trajectories in different countries, regimes or periods to better understand institutions and their dynamics.
- The role of the media, public information, discourse and textual data in democratic governance and economic regulation.
Results 2025:
- Around twenty sessions held between March and November 2025, with strong international and multidisciplinary participation.
- Consolidation of internal expertise at the Institute in the analysis of large text corpora, the use of NLP/LLM methods, and the integration of these methods into applied political economy work.
- Development and strengthening of external collaborations and partnerships: researchers from foreign institutions, international research centres, and new institutional actors.
- Greater visibility for the workshop within the Institute and its networks, contributing to scientific activity and attracting young researchers and data engineers.
