Institute of Communication and Media Studies (icmb)

Team from A-Z

Franziska Barbara Keller (PhD 2015, Department of Politics, New York University) is a political scientist investigating the role of social networks in authoritarian regimes and (dis)information campaigns. As an assistant professor at icmb, she will lead a SNSF-financed project on the role of experts and their networks in generating our knowledge about the politics in China and Russia from 2025 until 2030. Before joining the icmb, she was an assistant professor at the Division of Social Science of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, a position she left because of the deteriorating political situation in Hong Kong and China. She has also done PostDocs at Columbia University (2015-16) and UC San Diego (2017-18, financed through an SNSF Postdoc.Mobility grant). Before returning to academia, she has assisted protecting refugees in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, for the UNHCR (2009-10), helped fight human trafficking in the United Arab Emirates with the NGO vivere (2009) and worked as assistant editor for the Chinese-language site of swissinfo.ch (2004-06).

Publications

Publication Year Type

Presentations

  • Keller, Franziska Barbara (30.10.2024): China Watchers, GIGA China Series, German Institute for Global and Area Studies, Hamburg, Germany (online)
  • Keller, Franziska Barbara (07.09.2024): A Network Approach to the Generation of Knowledge about Authoritarian Regimes, American Political Science Association Annual Meeting, Philadelphia, USA
  • Keller, Franziska Barbara (4.6.2024): The Diffusion of Expert Opinion and the Risk of Echo Chambers, European Political Science Association Annual Conference, Cologne, Germany
  • Keller, Franziska Barbara (17.04.2024): How do we learn about authoritarian politics? Thinking about the role of experts, their networks and government propaganda. Key note speech for FRIAS Conference “Understanding the Rise of Autocrats in the 21st Century: Digital Propaganda, Populism, and (Hybrid) Warfare”, Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies, Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg, Germany
  • Keller, Franziska Barbara (9.2.2024): China Watchers (and Echo Chambers), Swiss Political Science Association Annual Congress, University of St. Gallen, Switzerland
  • Keller, Franziska Barbara (8.12.2023): Knowing when and how to fail: Leaving a tenure-track job or not?, Behind the Veil of Success: Learning from (Academic) Failures and Mistakes, University of Bern, Switzerland
  • Keller, Franziska Barbara (18.10.2023): Astroturfing: how to detect fake grassroots movements on Twitter and other social media platforms, Information Pollution on the Web: Sources, Algorithms and Recipients, University of Bern, Switzerland
  • Keller, Franziska Barbara (02.09.2023): Should we be worried about echo chambers among China Watchers? American Political Science Association Annual Meeting, Los Angeles, USA
  • Keller, Franziska Barbara (01.09.2023): Wolf Warriors and Their Pups: The PR of China’s Presence on Twitter? American Political Science Association Annual Meeting, Los Angeles, USA
  • Keller, Franziska Barbara (11.07.2023): Should we be worried about Echo Chambers among China Watchers? University of Bremen, Germany
  • Keller, Franziska Barbara (27.10.2022): Wolf Warriors and their pups: China's presence on Twitter, Digital Democracy Workshop, DigDemLab, University of Zürich, Switzerland
  • Keller, Franziska Barbara (08.09.2021): Astroturfing in Hong Kong and elsewhere: patterns of coordination in hidden Twitter campaigns, 8th European Communication Conference (online), European Communication Research and Education Association (ECREA)
  • Keller, Franziska Barbara (28.05.2021): Wolf Warriors and their pups: China’s presence on Twitter, Empirical Political Science Working Group in Hong Kong (EPSinHK), City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR

Research interests

Social networks, authoritarian regimes, political elites, (dis)information campagnes, social media, China, Russia.

Lectures

FS 2025: Qualitative Methoden in den Sozialwissenschaften

HS 2024: Forschungspraktikum I & II: Politische Eliten in den Medien

HS 2023: Forschungspraktikum I & II: Staatspropaganda in sozialen Medien?

FS & HS 2022: Forschungspraktikum I &II : Falsche und echte Basisbewegungen in sozialen Medien

2016, 2018-2021: The World of Politics (Introduction to Political Science)

2017, 2019, 2020-2021: Introduction to Social Network Analysis

Media appearances