In the tenth episode of the Political Science Podcast, Enes Kulenović talked with Goran Čular, associate professor of the Faculty of Political Science at the University of Zagreb and president of the Croatian Political Science Society (HPD). In the first part of the conversation, Čular spoke about the conference of the Central European Political Science Association (CEPSA) held in Dubrovnik this fall, which was hosted by HPD together with the University of Dubrovnik. In the second part of the conversation, Čular presented research on parties and voting behavior in Croatia – his latest article, on the use of preferential voting, and the earlier one in collaboration with colleague Dario Nikić Čakar on the electoral system and problems of consolidating democracy in Croatia. Čular pointed out the intriguing paradox that voters’ use of preferential voting in Croatia does not follow publicly expressed views of distrust in parties and shows that voters altogether respect the party’s choices, while at that, the right-wing voters unexpectedly appear as the least disciplined. In the last part of the conversation, on the state of political science, Čular pointed out the weak communication between the specialized sub-disciplines of political science and the reduction of space for conducting a mutually intelligible discussion as a problem. On the less somber side, at least for the discipline itself, as positive examples of the integration of knowledge, Čular pointed out the joint dealing of political scientists with big contemporary problems such as the fate of liberal democracy.
Listen to the episode on CPSA's Youtube channel, and Spotify:
