What is the primary focus of the ICPSRT 2027?

The conference focuses on political science and regime types, fostering dialogue on political systems and their implications.

When does the ICPSRT 2027 take place?

The conference is scheduled for two days in the spring.

International Conference on Political Science and Regime Types (ICPSRT) 2027

Name: International Conference on Political Science and Regime Types (ICPSRT) 2027
Start: 2027-04-17T00:00:00Z
End: 2027-04-18T00:00:00Z
Location: Marrakesh

Apr 17–18, 2027Marrakesh, MoroccoIn-person

Registration open

The International Conference on Political Science and Regime Types (ICPSRT) 2027 convenes in Marrakesh, MAR, to foster interdisciplinary dialogue on the multifaceted aspects of political systems. This event serves as a critical forum for scholars, researchers, and practitioners to present and discuss advancements in political science, with a particular focus on the comparative analysis of various regime types and their implications for global governance and societal development. The conference aims to deepen understanding of political structures, transitions, and the dynamics that shape national and international relations.

Committees & topics

Topics
The Discipline of Political Science: Scope, Methods, and Evolution · Systems of Government: Typologies and Institutional Design · The Analysis of Political Activity: Behavior, Participation, and Mobilization · Comparative Politics: Methods and Contemporary Agendas · Democracy and Regime Types: Backsliding, Autocratization, and Hybrid Rule · Identity Politics, National and Social Movements · International Political Economy and Globalization · International Relations: Theory and Contemporary Order

Why it matters

Understanding regime types is fundamental to comprehending the trajectory of nations and the broader international order. The ICPSRT provides a platform for rigorous academic inquiry into the characteristics, evolution, and impact of different political systems, from democracies to authoritarian states. Such analysis is crucial for predicting geopolitical shifts, informing foreign policy, and supporting efforts towards stability and human rights worldwide. The insights generated at this conference can help policymakers and international organizations navigate complex political landscapes and respond effectively to emerging challenges.

The conference's focus extends beyond theoretical discussions, encouraging research that offers practical implications for governance and societal well-being. By examining the strengths and weaknesses of various regime types, participants contribute to a more nuanced understanding of political resilience, institutional design, and the factors that drive or hinder political development. This collective knowledge is vital for addressing global issues such as conflict resolution, economic inequality, and climate change, which are often intertwined with the nature of political power and decision-making within states.

How to prepare

Delegates preparing for the ICPSRT should consider a comprehensive approach to understanding political systems, drawing on lessons such as "Dynamic Analysis" to assess the evolving nature of regimes and "Understanding Motivations" to delve into the underlying drivers of political actors and institutions. A strong grasp of comparative politics, including the "analysis and comparison" of different governance models, will be invaluable for engaging with the diverse research presented.

Furthermore, participants should be prepared to engage with discussions on the practical implications of regime types, considering how political structures influence policy outcomes and international relations. Utilizing frameworks like "What Is Stakeholder Mapping?" and "The Power-Interest Grid" can help in analyzing the various actors within and across different political systems. Understanding "Hidden Stakeholders" and "Mapping Relationships" will also be beneficial for a holistic assessment of political dynamics and their global impact.

Country perspectives

Where the most-relevant 4 countries stand on the core issues in play. Click through for the full country profile.

Morocco

As the host nation, MAR offers a unique perspective on political development within the African and Arab contexts, providing a backdrop for discussions on diverse regime types.

Role in topic

MAR's political system, a constitutional monarchy, presents an interesting case study for discussions on hybrid regimes and political stability in a region undergoing significant transformations. Its experience can inform comparative analyses of governance structures and their adaptive capacities.

United States

The USA, as a long-standing democracy, often serves as a benchmark for studies on democratic institutions and their challenges, influencing global discourse on regime types.

Role in topic

Research from the USA frequently explores democratic consolidation, electoral systems, and the impact of political polarization, offering critical insights into the resilience and vulnerabilities of democratic governance.

China

CHN's unique political system provides a significant case for examining the efficacy and evolution of non-democratic regime types and their global influence.

Role in topic

Studies on CHN contribute to understanding the dynamics of single-party rule, economic development under authoritarianism, and the implications of its rise for the international balance of power and global governance models.

Russia

RUS offers a perspective on the complexities of post-Soviet political transitions and the re-emergence of authoritarian tendencies, providing a case for analyzing regime change and stability.

Role in topic

Research on RUS often focuses on the interplay between political leadership, state institutions, and civil society, offering valuable insights into the challenges of democratic backsliding and the consolidation of power in hybrid regimes.

Topics & background

The background behind each topic and the actors that shape it.

The Discipline of Political Science: Scope, Methods, and Evolution

Political science emerged as a distinct academic discipline in the late 19th century, with the founding of institutions such as the École Libre des Sciences Politiques in Paris (1872) and the American Political Science Association (1903). Its intellectual roots stretch back to Aristotle's 'Politics,' Machiavelli, Hobbes, Locke, and Montesquieu, but its modern form was shaped by the behavioral revolution of the 1950s-60s, which sought to apply empirical and quantitative methods to the study of political behavior, institutions, and ideas. The field today is generally divided into subfields including political theory, comparative politics, international relations, public administration, and public policy. Methodological debates between quantitative, qualitative, and formal (rational choice) approaches continue to shape graduate training and research agendas. The post-Cold War period saw renewed attention to democratization, institutional design, and identity, while the 2010s brought a 'credibility revolution' centered on causal inference, experiments, and computational methods. Contemporary political science faces pressure from democratic backsliding, polarization, and the rise of artificial intelligence and big data as both objects and tools of study. Debates persist about the discipline's policy relevance, its Western-centric canon, and the integration of non-Western political thought.

Key players

Systems of Government: Typologies and Institutional Design

Classifications of government date back to Aristotle's distinction among monarchy, aristocracy, and polity (and their corrupt forms), but modern typologies focus on the locus of executive power, the relationship between executive and legislature, and the territorial distribution of authority. Key distinctions include presidential vs. parliamentary vs. semi-presidential systems; unitary vs. federal states; and constitutional monarchies vs. republics. The Westminster model spread through British decolonization, while the US presidential model influenced Latin America, and the French Fifth Republic's semi-presidentialism shaped post-communist Europe. Late-20th-century institutional design debates, led by scholars such as Juan Linz, Arend Lijphart, and Giovanni Sartori, examined which systems best produce stable democracy in divided societies. Federalism, consociationalism, and proportional representation were promoted as tools for managing ethnic and regional cleavages, particularly after conflicts in the Balkans, Iraq, and parts of Africa. Today, hybrid and 'unclassified' systems are increasingly common, and many countries combine formal democratic institutions with authoritarian practices. Constitutional reforms in Russia (2020), Turkey (2017), and several African states have concentrated executive power, while debates in the UK, Israel, and the US center on the resilience of established institutional checks.

Key players

The Analysis of Political Activity: Behavior, Participation, and Mobilization

The systematic study of political activity—voting, protest, lobbying, party membership, and civic engagement—took shape with the behavioral revolution of the mid-20th century. Landmark works such as 'The American Voter' (1960) and Almond and Verba's 'The Civic Culture' (1963) used survey research to map citizen attitudes and participation across countries. Later scholarship by Robert Putnam ('Bowling Alone'), Sidney Verba, and others extended this to social capital and unequal voice. From the 1990s onward, the rise of contentious politics scholarship (Tilly, Tarrow, McAdam) integrated social movements, revolutions, and protest cycles into mainstream analysis. The Arab Spring (2010-11), Occupy, Hong Kong's 2019 protests, and the 2020 racial-justice mobilizations underscored the importance of networked, often leaderless, mobilization. Meanwhile, declining trust in parties and falling turnout in many established democracies prompted concern about a participation crisis. Digital platforms have transformed how political activity is organized, financed, and measured, raising questions about misinformation, foreign interference, and the privatization of public discourse. Scholars now grapple with how to study political behavior when much of it occurs on opaque, algorithmically curated platforms.

Key players

Comparative Politics: Methods and Contemporary Agendas

Comparative politics, one of political science's core subfields, studies political phenomena across countries to identify patterns and causal relationships. Its modern form was shaped by mid-century area studies, the development of large-N cross-national datasets (Polity, V-Dem, Freedom House), and small-N comparative-historical work by scholars such as Barrington Moore, Theda Skocpol, and Samuel Huntington. The subfield has alternated between universalist theorizing and context-sensitive case work. Major research agendas have included modernization and democratization (Lipset, Przeworski), the origins of dictatorship and democracy, ethnic conflict, state-building, and the political economy of development. Since 2000, attention has shifted toward authoritarian resilience, hybrid regimes, clientelism, and the comparative study of populism. The 'autocratization wave' identified by V-Dem and others since the mid-2010s has reoriented debates from 'why democracies emerge' to 'why they erode.' Methodologically, comparative politics has been at the center of the credibility revolution, incorporating natural experiments, regression discontinuity, and field experiments, while continuing to value ethnography and historical analysis. Concerns about external validity, case selection, and Western bias remain central.

Key players

Democracy and Regime Types: Backsliding, Autocratization, and Hybrid Rule

Since Samuel Huntington's 'third wave' of democratization (1974-91), the number of electoral democracies expanded dramatically, peaking in the early 2000s. Indices from Freedom House, Polity, and V-Dem documented this expansion but, since around 2006, have recorded a sustained reversal. Cases such as Hungary, Turkey, Venezuela, India, and the United States have prompted debates about 'democratic backsliding,' 'competitive authoritarianism' (Levitsky and Way), and 'autocratization' (Lührmann and Lindberg). Contemporary regime typologies distinguish liberal democracies, electoral democracies, electoral autocracies, and closed autocracies. Hybrid regimes combine multiparty elections with serious restrictions on civil liberties, media, and judicial independence. Mechanisms of backsliding typically include executive aggrandizement, judicial capture, attacks on independent media, gerrymandering, and the criminalization of opposition—often within the formal letter of the law. Major authoritarian powers, particularly China and Russia, actively contest liberal-democratic norms in multilateral forums and offer alternative governance models. At the same time, democratic openings in places like Zambia, Brazil (2022), and Poland (2023) suggest that backsliding is not inevitable. The current debate centers on what conditions sustain democratic resilience and how international actors should respond to ambiguous, often legalistic, erosions of democracy.

Key players

International Political Economy and Globalization

International political economy (IPE) emerged as a distinct field in the 1970s with works by Robert Keohane, Susan Strange, and Charles Kindleberger, in response to the breakdown of the Bretton Woods fixed-exchange system and the oil shocks. It examines how political authority and market forces interact across borders—trade, finance, investment, monetary relations, and development. Classical debates pitted liberal, mercantilist, and Marxist traditions; later work emphasized regimes, hegemonic stability, and varieties of capitalism. The post-1989 era of hyperglobalization saw the WTO's creation (1995), China's WTO accession (2001), the proliferation of global value chains, and rapid financialization. The 2008 global financial crisis, the Eurozone debt crisis, and the rise of China as a manufacturing and creditor power challenged the liberal consensus. Since the mid-2010s, US-China decoupling, the COVID-19 supply-chain shock, Russia's invasion of Ukraine, and industrial-policy revivals (US CHIPS Act, EU Green Deal Industrial Plan) have ushered in an era often described as 'weaponized interdependence' or 'fragmented globalization.' Key contemporary issues include sovereign debt distress in low-income countries, dollar dominance and de-dollarization debates, climate-trade linkages (CBAM), digital-economy governance, and the politics of critical minerals. Multilateral institutions face legitimacy challenges as middle powers and emerging economies demand reform.

Key players

International Relations: Theory and Contemporary Order

International relations (IR) as a discipline is often dated to the establishment of the first IR chair at Aberystwyth in 1919, founded in response to World War I. Its major theoretical traditions—realism (Morgenthau, Waltz, Mearsheimer), liberalism (Keohane, Nye), constructivism (Wendt, Finnemore), and critical/postcolonial approaches—have structured debates about power, cooperation, norms, and identity in world politics. The Cold War shaped much early theorizing around bipolarity, deterrence, and nuclear strategy. The post-Cold War 'unipolar moment' generated debates over US hegemony, the democratic peace, humanitarian intervention, and the spread of liberal norms. The 2000s and 2010s shifted attention to the rise of China, Russian revisionism, the war on terror, and the diffusion of power to non-state actors. Russia's 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine, escalating US-China strategic competition, conflict in the Middle East, and gridlock in the UN Security Council have intensified arguments that the world is entering a new multipolar—or, some argue, 'non-polar'—era. Contemporary IR scholarship engages climate change, pandemics, cyber and AI governance, nuclear proliferation, and the resilience of international institutions. Debates persist about whether the 'liberal international order' is collapsing, transforming, or being selectively contested, and how middle powers and the Global South will shape what comes next.

Key players

Resources

News, lessons, and country profiles to prep for International Conference on Political Science and Regime Types (ICPSRT) 2027.

Recent reporting to ground your prep

West Bengal Voter Deletion Crisis 2026

Rahul Gandhi Defends Tamil Nadu's Autonomy

India's 131st Amendment Bill

West Bengal Voter Deletion Crisis

Lessons

Bite-sized lessons to build the basics

Hidden Stakeholders

Dynamic Analysis

What Is Stakeholder Mapping?

The Power-Interest Grid

Courses

Guided courses that go deeper on the topic

Media & Press Relations

Advanced Negotiation

Multilateral Negotiation

Policy Brief Writing

The states in play, with the data that shapes their stance

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

By committee

Frequently asked questions

International Conference on Political Science and Regime Types (ICPSRT) 2027

Apr 17–18, 2027Marrakesh, MoroccoIn-person

Registration open

Committees & topics

Topics
The Discipline of Political Science: Scope, Methods, and Evolution · Systems of Government: Typologies and Institutional Design · The Analysis of Political Activity: Behavior, Participation, and Mobilization · Comparative Politics: Methods and Contemporary Agendas · Democracy and Regime Types: Backsliding, Autocratization, and Hybrid Rule · Identity Politics, National and Social Movements · International Political Economy and Globalization · International Relations: Theory and Contemporary Order

Why it matters

How to prepare

Country perspectives

Where the most-relevant 4 countries stand on the core issues in play. Click through for the full country profile.

Morocco

As the host nation, MAR offers a unique perspective on political development within the African and Arab contexts, providing a backdrop for discussions on diverse regime types.

Role in topic

United States

The USA, as a long-standing democracy, often serves as a benchmark for studies on democratic institutions and their challenges, influencing global discourse on regime types.

Role in topic

China

CHN's unique political system provides a significant case for examining the efficacy and evolution of non-democratic regime types and their global influence.

Role in topic

Russia

RUS offers a perspective on the complexities of post-Soviet political transitions and the re-emergence of authoritarian tendencies, providing a case for analyzing regime change and stability.

Role in topic

Topics & background

The background behind each topic and the actors that shape it.

The Discipline of Political Science: Scope, Methods, and Evolution

Key players

Systems of Government: Typologies and Institutional Design

Key players

The Analysis of Political Activity: Behavior, Participation, and Mobilization

Key players

Comparative Politics: Methods and Contemporary Agendas

Key players

Democracy and Regime Types: Backsliding, Autocratization, and Hybrid Rule

Key players

International Political Economy and Globalization

Key players

International Relations: Theory and Contemporary Order

Key players

Resources

News, lessons, and country profiles to prep for International Conference on Political Science and Regime Types (ICPSRT) 2027.

Recent reporting to ground your prep

West Bengal Voter Deletion Crisis 2026

Rahul Gandhi Defends Tamil Nadu's Autonomy

India's 131st Amendment Bill

West Bengal Voter Deletion Crisis

Lessons

Bite-sized lessons to build the basics

Hidden Stakeholders

Dynamic Analysis

What Is Stakeholder Mapping?

The Power-Interest Grid

Courses

Guided courses that go deeper on the topic

Media & Press Relations

Advanced Negotiation

Multilateral Negotiation

Policy Brief Writing

The states in play, with the data that shapes their stance

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

Country dossier

By committee

Committees & topics

Why it matters

How to prepare

Country perspectives

Topics & background

Resources

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Frequently asked questions

Committees & topics

Why it matters

How to prepare

Country perspectives

Topics & background

Resources

Related conferences

2nd Ministerial Conference on Peacekeeping in Francophone Environments

10th African Peace and Security Annual Conference (APSACO) 2026

International Conference on Global Crises, Public Policy, and Poverty (ICGCPP) 2026

International Conference on Human Rights Education and Peace Advocacy (ICHREPA)

International Conference on International Law, Global Security, and Human Rights

International Conference on International Law and Sustainable Development

Frequently asked questions