What I study
My research interests lie at the intersection of global governance and AI ethics, with a special focus on EU foreign policy. My PhD supervisor is Jacint Jordana.
How I do it
Mixed methods researcher here. From a methodological point of view, I’m curious about the use of computational methods in IR and political science. In particular, I enjoy learning more about text mining, NLP and machine learning techniques.
What else I do
I am also a predoctoral research fellow at the Institut Barcelona d’Estudis Internacionals (IBEI). There, I am working for GLOBE, an exciting Horizon 2020 project on “Global Governance and the European Union: Future Trends and Scenarios”.
I am a PhD candidate in political science and international relations at Pompeu Fabra University. You can follow me on Twitter or LinkedIn. You can also reach out via email. If I don’t respond to an inquiry immediately, I’m likely playing volleyball at the beach.
Publications
Below, you will find some selected publications. If interested, you can also find me on Google Scholar and ResearchGate.
- Roger, C.; Jordana, J.; Holesch, A.; Schmitt, L. 2022. Global Governance Research: Exploring Patterns of Growth, Diversity, and Inclusion. Global Governance: A Review of Multilateralism and International Organizations.
- Badell, D.; Schmitt, L. 2021. Contested views? Tracing European positions on lethal autonomous weapon systems. European Security. https://doi.org/10.1080/09662839.2021.2007476
- Schmitt, L. 2021. Mapping global AI governance: a nascent regime in a fragmented landscape. AI Ethics. https://doi.org/10.1007/s43681-021-00083-y
- Schmitt, L. 2021. What’s in a tweet? Twitter’s impact on public opinion and foreign affairs. Documents CIDOB. https://doi.org/10.24241/docCIDOB.2021.11
- Schmitt, L. 2020. Global AI governance and the Brussels effect. GLOBE Blog.
Teaching
I am currently teaching “Advanced Social Research” and “Machine Learning for Social Sciences” for the Master’s programmes at IBEI. In the past, I gave seminars on Comparative Politics and Democratization for the Master’s in International Relations programme at IBEI.
Work in progress
- “Good To See You” - a project using NLP techniques to measure the impact of EU leaders’ in-person meetings on their speeches
- “Bad Hygiene” - a quantitative study on the effect of the cordon sanitaire on co-sponsorship of amendments in the European Parliament
- “AI and democracy: threat or tool” - a systematic analysis of national AI strategies to explore how they conceptualise and frame the nexus of AI and democracy
- Using machine-learning to estimate party polarization as expressed through parliamentary speech
- A text mining analysis of Twitter data to study the EU’s external relations with China
- Analysis of an original large-scale survey of international organizations’ staff on their views about future global governance challenges; via the GLOBE project
- An ongoing mapping of stakeholders and recent developments in global AI governance
CV
Short bio below. A full PDF version of my CV is available upon request.
Professional experience
- Since November 2019: predoctoral researcher at Institut Barcelona d’Estudis Internacionals (IBEI), Barcelona
- March 2018 - November 2019: Policy Analyst at the European Political Strategy Centre (EPSC), the European Commission’s in-house think tank
- 2016-2017: Chief Copy Editor at St Antony’s International Review
- 2015-2016: Internship at the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW Berlin)
Education
- Since November 2019: PhD in Political and Social Sciences, Pompeu Fabra University, Barcelona
- 2017: MSc in Latin American Studies, University of Oxford
- 2016: BSc in European Economic Studies, University of Bamberg
- 2015: Exchange year at Troy University, USA
Extracurricular experience
- Since March 2020: Member of the Europaeum Scholars Programme
- 2010-2017: Held various leadership positions at international conferences of the European Youth Parliament