PhD Positions

Position details

• Employer: Technical University of Munich, School of Social Sciences and Technology. You must be willing to enroll in a doctoral programme at the TUM School of Social Sciences and Technology.
• Contract: Full-time employment contract (40 hours per week) for 36 months, with social security, health insurance and pension contributions
• Salary: A gross monthly salary of approximately €3,800, before taxes and social security contributions (remuneration in accordance with the MSCA Grant Agreement), includes a MSCA mobility allowance and, if you have a family, the MSCA family allowance is available.
• Location: On site in Munich, Germany, as required by the MSCA programme; with travel for network events. The position requires full-time commitment with a physical presence at the recruiting institution. Teleworking is not permitted.
• Language: The working language is English. German is not required.
• Expected start: 01.02.2027, or upon agreement
• Application deadline: 7 November 00:00 CET

About REGULAIRE

REGULAIRE (Regulatory Learning for the Governance of Transformative Technologies) is a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions Doctoral Network bringing together 15 doctoral candidates at ten European universities to study how regulation can learn to govern transformative technologies such as AI, quantum computing and neurotechnology. Its projects examine how regulators sense emerging problems early, how balanced interventions encourage learning without overcorrection or underreaction, how such interventions alter institutional capacities, and how feedback can be institutionalised so that insights travel across organisations and jurisdictions. Across the network, regulatory learning means treating regulation as a learning architecture that generates, tests and refines knowledge about what works, rather than as one-off rulemaking.

As part of the network, you'll join an international cohort and be supervised across institutions. You will take part in three residential summer schools, methods workshops, monthly paper development seminars and joint work with regulators, standardisation bodies, and international organisations. The network is coordinated by Prof. Urs Gasser (Chair for Public Policy, Governance and Innovative Technology) and Prof. Sandra Cortesi (Chair for Participation and Diversity in Digital Societies) at the Technical University of Munich (TUM).

The doctoral project

Experimental and adaptive governance offers opportunities to learn as technologies develop. It also raises questions about who participates, whose knowledge counts, and how decisions remain transparent and accountable over time. This doctoral project examines how institutions can make room for experimentation and feedback while maintaining public trust and limiting undue influence. You will study how different approaches to transparency, participation and independent scrutiny shape the distribution of influence among public agencies, industry, civil society and other affected groups.

Concretely, the project will develop a framework for assessing accountability in adaptive governance and examine practices such as public reporting, independent review and structured feedback. Depending on the research approach, it may draw on comparative cases, interviews, institutional analysis or other suitable methods. It will identify conditions under which institutions can learn and adjust their approaches while remaining responsive to the public and attentive to risks of capture. Within REGULAIRE, the project contributes to Work Package 5 on institutionalising feedback across institutions.

This project is a good fit if you are interested in technology governance, democratic accountability, public policy, political science, public administration, science and technology studies, law, or related fields.

What you will do

• Shape the research questions and design together with the supervision team, and prepare the ethics, data-management, and open-science materials.
• Collect, manage, and analyse data, for example through institutional ethnography, document analysis, and the co-design of feedback and transparency routines with civil society and oversight actors.
• Write a doctoral thesis and related publications within the doctoral programme and the REGULAIRE plan.
• Take part in local and network-wide training and cohort activities, including three residential summer schools and monthly paper development seminars, and share your work with researchers and practitioners.
• Complete a three-month secondment with a non-academic partner.
• Contribute to research integrity, equality and diversity, open science, and FAIR data practices.

What we are looking for

Essential

• A Master's degree, or an equivalent qualification that gives you access to doctoral studies, completed by the start date. Relevant fields include law, public policy, political science, public administration, organisational theory, science and technology studies, and other social science or interdisciplinary fields.
• A genuine interest in how adaptive regulation can stay transparent, accountable and resistant to capture.
• Skills in, or a demonstrable interest in, institutional ethnography, document analysis and co-design with civil society and oversight actors.
• Professional working proficiency in English, spoken and written. Non-native speakers are very welcome.
• Willingness to travel for the secondment and network activities.
• Eligibility under the MSCA rules (see “Am I eligible?” below), and willingness to enrol in the doctoral programme at the TUM School of Social Sciences and Technology.

Helpful, but not required

• Hands-on experience with institutional ethnography, interviews or document analysis.
• Experience with participatory or co-design methods, for example with civil society organisations or oversight bodies.
• Familiarity with research on transparency, accountability or regulatory capture.
• Work experience in civil society organisations, oversight or regulatory bodies, or public administration.

Don't meet every point? Please apply anyway. We know that strong candidates often hold back unless they match every item on a list. If this project excites you and you meet the essential criteria, we would like to hear from you. Non-linear career paths, career breaks and experience outside academia are all valued.

Supervision, training and mobility

You'll be supervised by Prof. Urs Gasser (TUM, primary supervisor). You'll meet your primary supervisor at least once a month and the full team at least four times a year. Your progress and training are recorded in your Career Development Plan.

Your three-month secondment will give you practical exposure to public-interest safeguards in digital regulation, including anti-capture mechanisms, transparency routines and legitimacy-preserving oversight.

Network-wide training includes three residential summer schools (regulatory learning and foresight at TUM; methods and analytics at BI Norwegian Business School; academic writing and impact at the University of St. Gallen), monthly paper development seminars, and annual network reviews aligned with major community events. Over the project, you'll earn at least 20 ECTS through local and network-wide training, including at least 10 ECTS from network-wide activities.

Am I eligible?

Applicants of any nationality can apply. Because the position is funded by the EU's Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions, a few rules apply:

• You must not already hold a PhD. If you have defended a doctoral thesis but not yet formally received the degree, you are also not eligible.
• You must be “mobile”. In the 36 months before your start date, you must not have lived, worked or studied mainly in Germany for more than 12 months. Holidays, compulsory national service and time spent in a procedure to obtain refugee status do not count.
• You must be able to enrol in the TUM doctoral programme in time.

Example: If you start on 1 January 2027, look back to 1 January 2024. If you spent more than 12 months of that period living, working or studying mainly in Germany, you are not eligible for this position. You may still be eligible for REGULAIRE positions in other countries, so please check the network's other openings.

Formal wording: Applicants may be of any nationality. To be eligible for MSCA funding, the selected candidate must, on the first day of MSCA employment: (i) not hold a doctoral degree; candidates who have successfully defended a doctoral thesis but have not yet formally received the degree are not eligible; (ii) comply with the MSCA mobility rule, meaning they must not have resided or carried out their main activity (work, studies, etc.) in Germany for more than 12 months during the 36 months immediately preceding that date, excluding compulsory national service, short stays such as holidays, and time spent in a procedure for obtaining refugee status under the Geneva Convention; and (iii) be enrolled in, or meet the conditions required for timely enrolment in, the doctoral programme leading to the degree specified in this notice. The appointment is conditional on documentary verification of these conditions and fulfilment of the host institution's doctoral admission requirements.

How to apply

Please submit your application through the online application form by 7 November 00:00 CET. Your application should include:

• A CV (no photo, date of birth or marital status needed).
• Copies of your degree certificates and transcripts. English translations are fine if the originals are in another language; certified copies are only needed if you are offered the position.
• A short research proposal of no more than 2 pages, explaining how you would approach this project, what interests you about it and what you would bring to it. We are not looking for a finished research design; we want to see how you think.
• Contact details for two referees. Letters requested only from shortlisted candidates.

Equal Opportunity

We want REGULAIRE to reflect the diversity of the societies that regulation serves. We welcome applications from people of all nationalities, genders, ethnic and social backgrounds, ages, religions or beliefs, sexual orientations and abilities, and we particularly encourage applications from groups that are underrepresented in academic research, including first-generation university graduates.

The position is suitable for disabled persons. Disabled applicants will be given preference in case of generally equivalent suitability, aptitude and professional performance.