Silvia Erzeel is Associate Professor at the Department of Political Science and the VUB Centre for Democratic Futures. Between 2021-2024, she is chair of the program board of the VUB programs in Political Science (Bachelor Politieke Wetenschappen, Master Democratie en Leiderschap and Master European and International Governance).

Her research interests focus on the causes and consequences of gender and social inequalities in representative democracy, and how representative democracy is innovated to include the views and needs of all. She often studies these topics from a comparative perspective, using survey research and/or in-depth interviewing.

She has a keen interest in how gender shapes key processes of representative democracy:

• Her PhD (VUB, 2012) dealt with the substantive representation of women in national and regional parliaments in Europe.
• Her postdoctoral project (funded by F.R.S-FNRS, UCLouvain) focused on the feminization of right-wing parties, both in relation to the electorates of these parties and the initiatives and strategies of parties to involve women.
• She has also studied the effects of gender quotas, especially in relation to how parties deal with, value and implement quotas and the intersectional aspects of these considerations.

In recent years, Silvia also studies how representative actors and institutions (such as parties and parliaments) navigate the so-called crisis of representative democracy, and how they respond to it in innovative ways. She is particularly interested in innovations aimed at the inclusion of traditionally underrepresented groups, such as women, young people, and educational groups.

Her methodological background is situated within domain of comparative research and methods. Several recent publications offer methodological reflections on the opportunities and challenges of comparative research in addressing issues of gender equality, inclusion and intersectionality.