Saga Oskarson Kindstrand

Saga Oskarson Kindstrand earned a Master’s degree in Political Science from the School of Research at Sciences Po Paris. Before relocating to Paris, she completed her Bachelor’s degree at Bournemouth University, where she focused on civil society and state-citizen relations, and undertook a year-long internship at the Foundation for Environmental Education in Copenhagen.

Conferences

"Local Dimensions of Populist Linkage: Revitalising Membership-Based Politics in an Age of Disengagement," ECPR Joint Sessions of Workshops, Prague, April 2025

"Bridging Left and Right: Lessons from the Radical Right’s Party-Building Model," 9th Populism Specialist Group Annual Workshop, Thessaloniki, October 2025

“Going, Going,… Going Populist? Revitalising Membership-Based Politics through Populist Linkage,” ECPS Virtual Workshop Series, “We, the People and the Future of Democracy: Interdisciplinary Approaches." January, 2026 

Currently, Saga is researching party-based linkage and citizen mobilization in European representative democracies, with a particular focus on how political parties engage those who feel underrepresented in policymaking. Her master’s thesis, Populist Linkage: Revitalizing Membership-Based Politics in an Age of Disengagement, was an ethnographic study of party members within the Sweden Democrats. For her doctoral research, she is conducting a comparative analysis of the Sweden Democrats and the Swedish Social Democratic Party to better understand the conditions that enable parties to build strong organizational structures, mobilize members, and foster long-term partisan identities.

Populist Linkage and Revitalising Membership-Based Politics in an Age of Disengagement, supervised by Colin Hay

- 2024–2026: Governance, Democracy and Public Policy: Analytic Approaches to Public Policy, Teaching Assistant to Colin Hay, Master’s-level course in English, Sciences Po (2 × 16 hours)

- 2024–2025: Representation in a Multi-Level System, Teaching Assistant to Ronja Sczepanski, Master’s-level course in English, Sciences Po (16 hours)

- 2025–2026: Democracy in Europe: Backsliding and Competition in Multi-Level Systems, Teaching Assistant to Jan Rovny and Ronja Sczepanski, Master’s-level core course in English, Sciences Po (16 hours)

- 2025–2026: Qualitative Methods, seminar in English, Bachelor’s level, Sciences Po (24 hours)

- 2025–2026: Rethinking the Nordic Political Model? Politics and Society in Scandinavia, seminar in English, Bachelor’s level, Sciences Po (24 hours)

Faculty of Media and Communications Dean’s Prize 2022 (University of Bournemouth)

Saga Kindstrand. Marina Costa Lobo, Ed., The Impact of EU Politicisation on Voting Behaviour in Europe, Cham, Palgrave, 2023. Politique européenne, 2025, N° 88 (2), pp.163-166.