Young Researchers Program in Policy Evaluation - 2026 edition

LIEPP is renewing its programme to support young researchers in policy evaluation for the year 2026.  This programme aims to provide support to young researchers who would also like to develop a component of their work on the implications of their research for public action, and to do so from an interdisciplinary perspective.

The programme is open to doctoral students (who must be enrolled in a doctoral program at Sciences Po or Université Paris Cité at the time of application) and recent PhD graduates (who have defended their thesis less than two years ago, with the thesis having been defended after August 31, 2024, and whose primary affiliation is a Sciences Po or Université Paris Cité laboratory), in all disciplines.

It has the following objectives:

• To promote and support the work of young researchers;
• To facilitate the translation of academic research into useful results for the evaluation of public policies;
• To promote interdisciplinary dialogue in research, with a view to encouraging the emergence of interdisciplinary projects;
• To give greater visibility, among public actors and civil society, to the work of young researchers who contribute to the evaluation of public policies.

Winners of the 2026/2027 programme

LABARUSSIAT Floriane, political science, CEVIPOF (Sciences Po) : Watchdog Under Conditions: Citizen Expectations, Affective Reactions, and Democratic Polarization in Response to Accountability Journalism

What do citizens concretely expect from the media's watchdog role, and what shapes their evaluations of it? This project addresses a significant empirical gap in the literature on media and democracy. Building on a first factorial vignette experiment (N = 4,000) in France, we have shown that watchdog fulfillment evaluations and tone satisfaction respond to distinct psychological mechanisms, and that cumulative exposure to accountability reporting produces stark polarizing effects on institutional trust. We now test two additional factors not previously examined: media outlet labels effects and the role of sources cited in accountability articles. We also replicate the experiment in a different political context (the United States) to assess the generalizability of our findings. Together, these studies produce cumulative, comparative evidence on the conditions under which accountability journalism is perceived as legitimate — with direct implications for press freedom policy and the democratic sustainability of watchdog reporting.

SAÏSSET Eulalie, economics, CRIS & Department of Economics (Sciences Po) : A Fair Share of Land: No Net Land Take and the Quest for Equity in Soil Conservation

France has adopted the ‘No Net Land Take’ (ZAN) target, reflecting a shift towards recognising land as a finite resource that must be preserved. Given this physical constraint, the question arises as to the remaining land budget: how should the land still available for use be allocated among different land uses and stakeholders? This thesis first introduces an analytical framework for land justice, drawing on existing literature on social equity, the protection of agricultural land and urban environmental inequalities. It then examines three types of socio-economic equilibrium disrupted by the integration of an ecological component into spatial planning: that of local authorities, whose tax revenues are tied to land use; that of households and businesses challenging land regulation through litigation; and that of owners of developed land, whose potential land rent is called into question. As France is a pioneer in soil conservation, it aims to make a substantial contribution to the academic discourse on environmental justice and sustainable land use practices.

KIPP Lorenz, economics, Department of Economics (Sciences Po) : Médias, identités et compétition électorale

This project studies how social cleavages translate into electoral competition through the information environment. It brings together two empirical studies linked by a shared question: how does the diffusion of political information; through campaign platforms or digital media, shape the way pre-existing social divisions map into electoral behaviour? The first study (with Elliott Ash, ETH Zurich, and Aarushi Kalra, Oxford) estimates the effect of exposure to anti-Muslim content on a major Indian short-video platform (around 200M users) on BJP voteshare in the 2024 Indian general election. The second study (with Julia Cagé, Sciences Po, and Caroline Le Pennec, HEC Montréal) uses a newly digitised corpus of French campaign manifestos to examine how programmatic content responds to electoral rules and to the social cleavages of the period. Both studies speak to a shared policy question: the regulation of political information and the design of electoral rules.

GIARD Coline, sociology, CSO (Sciences Po) : Soigner autrement, gouverner autrement ? Le développement des thérapies alternatives et complémentaires en France

Complementary and alternative medicines (CAM) encompass a broad range of therapeutic practices that fall outside conventional medicine and have experienced significant growth since the 1970s: osteopathy, naturopathy, reiki, quantum therapy... In France, most of these practices are not officially recognized by the state, in a context of medical monopoly over the healthcare sector. Nevertheless, their diffusion is widespread and more than 100,000 practitioners provide such therapies – as many as general practitioners. How can we explain the growth of these practices in a seemingly unfavorable setting, in relation to the state and conventional medicine? This doctoral research aims to understand the mechanisms behind this expansion through a study conducted among state actors, medical and alternative organizations, and practitioners themselves. It examines the activities undertaken to regulate CAM and explores the reasons for their distinctive form of organization within the healthcare field, since they are not based on dedicated legal standards. It also analyzes how these forms of governance reshape practices and contribute to opening up spaces for their development.

STAHL Eva, sociology/philosophy, CSO (Sciences Po) : Pratiques d’assistance médicale à la procréation depuis 2021 - Réseaux de soins, décisions de prise en charge et inégalités territoriales

The 2021 French Bioethics Act extended access to assisted reproductive technologies (ART) to female same-sex couples and single women, whereas it had previously been restricted to heterosexual couples. The inclusion of these new patient groups has led to significant changes in the organization of fertility clinics and care networks. The first part of my PhD examined the professional logics that emerged within ART teams in response to this broader definition of infertility. The second stage of the project shifts the analysis to a meso-sociological level, focusing on the organizational constraints that shape both the functioning of fertility services and the construction of patient pathways. A central theoretical question concerns the organizational production of inequalities through the implementation of legal rights. My application to the LIEPP Program focuses on this second stage of the project.

CHEN Fan, history, CESSMA (UPC) : Gouverner les mobilités chinoises : médiations diplomatiques, savoirs administratifs et régulation des travailleurs migrants sous les régimes d’exclusion (1912–1945)

Long focused on Western exclusion policies and on the experiences of Chinese migrants, the historiography has largely neglected the forms of intervention developed by the Chinese state toward Chinese populations abroad. This research examines how, between 1912 and 1945, the Chinese state developed new practices of migration governance within a context of increasingly restrictive international exclusion policies. Drawing on diplomatic, police, and administrative archives preserved in France, Canada, Peru, and China, the dissertation analyses the role of Chinese diplomats and consulates in conflict mediation, the production of administrative knowledge, and the regulation of migratory mobility. It also demonstrates how these practices contributed to the shaping of migration policies and forms of public action between China and host societies. This research contributes to a transnational history of migration governance mechanisms and the regulation of mobile populations during the first half of the twentieth century.

KABA Nesta, geography, LIED (UPC) : Les effets socio-territoriaux de l’innovation technologique dans le secteur minier : l’extraction directe de lithium au Chili et aux Etats-Unis

The global energy transition relies on growing demand for lithium, a mineral central to the manufacture of lithium-ion batteries used in electric vehicles and energy storage. Geographically concentrated, its extraction weighs heavily on certain territories and fuels lasting socio-environmental conflicts. Faced with these tensions, states and mining companies are experimenting with new strategies to secure production, reflecting a shared drive to reassert control over the political economy of the transition balancing resource sovereignty imperatives with a stated commitment to environmental responsibility. These approaches rely on so-called "innovative" extraction technologies, most notably direct lithium extraction, presented as more efficient and less destructive. This project examines what these innovations do to the territories they operate in and to the power relations that run through them. Through a comparative study of Maricunga (Atacama, Chile) and the Salton Sea (Imperial Valley, California), it analyses how these new practices reshape conflict dynamics and social acceptance, as well as the relationships between industry, the state and local populations. Technologies are treated here as fully political objects carriers of transition narratives that reframe the terms of public debate in territories shaped by a long history of extraction.

VOISIN Camille, economics/cognitive science/sociology, CRIS (Sciences Po) : Organiser les enseignements de français et de mathématiques en groupes au collège : évaluation réaliste des effets sur les conditions d’apprentissages et les compétences socioémotionnelles

The ability grouping policy (« réforme des groupes de besoins »), introduced in French middle schools since September 2024 for French and mathematics instruction, was designed to improve academic performance and better manage classroom heterogeneity through differentiated learning. This project, complementary to a large-scale quantitative survey conducted in partnership with the DEPP (Ministry of National Education), aims to document the perceptions and experiences of both students and teachers regarding the organisation of instruction in groups. Drawing on an ethnographic approach combining classroom observations and interviews across schools with varied educational contexts and policy implementation modalities, the project seeks to shed light on the mechanisms through which the policy may produce effects on learning conditions, teaching practices and students' socio-emotional skills.

LEROUX Caroline, sociology, CERLIS (UPC) : Quitter l'agriculture en cours de carrière, entre invisibilisation et faible institutionnalisation

Among farmers, leaving the profession before retirement is common: 21% of departures in 2022 occurred before the age of 55. Yet these career transitions remain largely overlooked and underrepresented in public policy. In the 1950s, these moves were viewed as “career transitions,” supported by public programs; since the 2000s, they have been seen primarily as “early departures,” within a context focused on farm establishment and generational renewal. Current public policies thus focus almost exclusively on entry into the profession, while mid- career exits remain marginal. Support systems for exiting the workforce primarily target situations of economic hardship or social distress, rather than individuals considering a career change for other reasons. Support for such career transitions remains rare and localized. This imbalance raises questions about what public policy chooses to highlight—and what it does not—and how these career paths are framed as individual problems rather than a collective issue.

DEZA Alice, psychology, LaPsyDe (UPC) : Formation et évolution des inégalités scolaires et psychosociales en fonction du genre chez les très jeunes enfants

Gender inequalities in educational trajectories emerge long before students make decisions about scientific fields of study or enter the labour market. Recent evidence from the French Ministry of Education’s statistical department (DEPP) suggests that differences between girls and boys appear during the earliest years of schooling and evolve differently across domains of competence. While girls initially outperform boys in both mathematics and language skills, their advantage in mathematics gradually diminishes throughout preschool and disappears by the first year of primary school. This PhD project aims to investigate how academic and psychosocial gender inequalities develop and evolve during early childhood. It draws on several longitudinal datasets, including the DEPP Preschool Cohort Study (Panel Petite Section 2021) and the French national assessments. Using these data, the project will examine the role of teaching practices and teacher characteristics, adults’ perceptions, and parental practices in shaping these disparities. Its ultimate goal is to inform educational policies aimed at reducing gender inequalities from the earliest stages of schooling.