Postdoctoral opportunities: Elite Network Shifts

09 05-12

Research program

Elite Network Shifts (ENS) is an interdisciplinary research program in digital humanities. It brings together researchers in computational techniques (language technology, complex network analysis) and historical sociologists interested in Third World regime change, especially in Indonesia.

Historians have composed a large body of literature on the major Indonesian regime transitions of 1945–50 and 1998 using conventional techniques. Elite circulation is a central theme in that literature. New computational techniques offer the possibility of approaching the same problem in a novel way, complementing existing knowledge and acquiring new insights.

ENS will extract elite names and analyse their network relationships from substantial electronic archives of news media. It will focus on the transitional events of 1945 and 1998 for which data are already in our possession. For 1945, the sources consist of recently digitized national and subnational newspapers for the period 1942–1957. For 1998, they consist of newspaper articles published on the (then new) Internet between 1994 and 2010.

Research consortium

The consortium consists of the Royal Netherlands Institute of Southeast Asian and Caribbean Studies (KITLV), the NIOD Institute for War, Holocaust and Genocide Studies, the University of Amsterdam, the Institut Teknologi Bandung (ITB), Erasmus University Rotterdam, and Data Archiving and Networked Services (DANS). KITLV coordinates the project.

ENS is part of the E-humanities group, an initiative of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Sciences (KNAW), which hosts projects in computational humanities as well as cultures of e-humanities.

Postdoctoral positions

ENS is offering postdoctoral research positions for subprojects 2 and 3. The main focus of those subprojects is the combination of social and complex network analysis with historical research on Indonesian elite rotation. ENS is open to discussion with strong candidates about a flexible allocation of tasks for each subproject; in particular, subproject 2 can be split. ENS aims for a strongly collaborating team of two or three postdoctoral researchers.

ENS is offering at least two postdoctoral positions.
Duration: at least two and up to three years (negotiable).
Starting date: February 2013 (negotiable)
Location: based at KITLV, Leiden, The Netherlands
Salary: according to “CAO-Nederlandse universiteiten”, depending on age and experience, in scale 10 or 11 (with a maximum of € 3,755 gross per month).

Qualifications

The successful candidate will be prepared to collaborate with an interdisciplinary team of researchers. This includes regular participation at activities of the E-humanities group, located at the Meertens Institute, Amsterdam.
The candidate is fluent in English.
Candidates will have a PhD and a proven research record in one of the following three fields, and a demonstrable affinity with another one:

Social sciences (preferably historical sociology, history, sociology, anthropology or political science), specialised in research about Indonesia (preferably elites, and history of Indonesia) (see subproject 2). Reading ability of the Indonesian language.

Social network analysis, computational and statistical methods, computational sociology, digital research methods (see subproject 2).

Complex systems, background in either mathematics, physics, or engineering. Specialised in socio- and econophysics or internet and web science; with a focus on evolving complex networks (see subproject 3).

Invitation to apply

Applications should be submitted electronically and include:

CV
Two recent publications
A letter (maximum 2 A-4 sheets) motivating the application, and proposing a preferred task allocation and timetable
Names and contact details of two referees