Dr. Miklós Sebők is a research professor of the HUN-REN Centre for Social Sciences and director of the poltextLAB artificial intelligence laboratory in Budapest. He earned an M.A. degree in politics at the University of Virginia and an M.A. degree in economics at the Corvinus University of Budapest. He received his Ph.D. in Political Science from ELTE University of Budapest.

He is the research director of the Hungarian Comparative Agendas Project, the research co-director of the Artificial Intelligence National Lab at CSS, and the principal investigator of the V-SHIFT Momentum research project (funded by the Hungarian Academy of Sciences). He also leads the “BABELGLOB” Excellence research project of the Hungarian National Research, Development and Innovation Office. Additionally, Dr Sebők is the executive director of the COMPTEXT conference and an international advisory board member of the Italian Political Science Review. He is the co-creator of the ParlLawSpeech dataset (parllawspeech.org), the ParlText dataset (parltext.org), the Hungarian Comparative Agendas Project datasets (cap.tk.hun-ren.hu), and work package leader of the ENO-PROMPT project sponsored by the European Commission.

His work has appeared in Business and Politics, Comparative European Politics, Computational Communication Research, East European Politics, Europe-Asia Studies, European Journal of Political Research, European Political Science, European Political Science Review, International Journal of Parliamentary Studies, International Political Science Review, Intersections – East European Journal of Society and Politics, Japanese Journal of Political Science, Journal of Comparative Politics, Journal of Computational Social Science, Journal of Legislative Studies, Journal of Public Budgeting, Journal of Public Policy, Journal of the Knowledge Economy, Parliamentary Affairs, Plos One, Policy Studies Journal, Political Analysis, Social Science Computer Review, Socio-Economic Review and White House Studies.

His book chapters have been published by Oxford and Palgrave. He served as the editor for the first Hungarian handbook on “Quantitative Text Analysis and Text Mining in Political Science” (L’Harmattan, 2016) and on “Text Mining and Artificial Intelligence in R” (Typotex, 2021), and most recently as co-editor of Policy Agendas in Autocracy, and Hybrid Regimes: The Case of Hungary (Palgrave, 2021).

During his scientific and public activities, he has provided academic service by serving as a reviewer for several prestigious journals, including American Politics Research, Canadian Journal of Political Science, Governance, International Area Studies Review, International Journal of Social Welfare, Intersections – East European Journal of Society and Politics, Journal of the Knowledge Economy, Party Politics, Policy and Politics, Policy Studies Journal, Political Analysis, Political Research Exchange, Political Science Research and Methods, Politics & Policy, Quality and Quantity, Regulation & Governance, SAGE Open and Socio-Economic Review.

Dr. Miklós Sebők was invited to hold talks at the Institute of Philosophy and Sociology of the Polish Academy of Sciences, SciencesPo Paris, Syracuse University, Université de Namur, University of Texas at Austin, and the Department of Government of the University of Vienna.

For additional information and news please see the following social media handles: Linkedin, Twitter/X, BlueSky

Selected Publications

2025 (forthcoming) Drifting Away from the U.S. and Integrating with China? ‘Eastern opening’ and the FDI-realignment of Hungary during the Orbán regime (Co-authors: Sándor Kozák, Ágnes Tőrös) Europe-Asia Studies. DOI Coming Soon. Repository link. Additional cited material.

2025 The Concept of Tailor-made Laws and Legislative Backsliding in Central-Eastern Europe (Co-author: Kiss Rebeka) Comparative European Politics. https://doi.org/10.1057/s41295-024-00403-6. Repository link.

2025 Levelling up quantitative legislative studies on Central-Eastern Europe: Introducing the ParlText CEE Database of Speeches, Bills, and Laws (Co-authors: Csaba Molnár, Anna Takács) Intersections. East European Journal of Society and Politics. https://doi.org/10.17356/ieejsp.v10i4.1327. Repository link.

2024 The geopolitics of vaccine media representation in Orbán’s Hungary—an AI-supported sentiment analysis (Co-authors: Orsolya Ring, Márk György Kis, Martin Balázs Bánóczy, Ágnes Dinnyés) Journal of Computational Social Science. https://doi.org/10.1007/s42001-024-00325-z. Repository link.

2024 Leveraging Open Large Language Models for Multilingual Policy Topic Classification: The Babel Machine Approach (Co-authors: Máté Ákos, Orsolya Ring, Viktor Kovács, Richárd Lehoczki) Social Science Computer Review, 43(2): 295-317. https://doi.org/10.1177/08944393241259434. Repository link.

2024 Staying on the Democratic Script? A Deep Learning Analysis of the Speechmaking of U.S. Presidents (Co-authors: Amnon Cavari, Ákos Máté), Policy Studies Journal. 52(4): 709–729. https://doi.org/10.1111/psj.12534. Repository link.

2023 Comparative European legislative research in the age of large-scale computational text analysis: A review article (Co-authors: Sven-Oliver Proksch, Christian Rauh, Péter Visnovitz, Gergő Balázs, Jan Schwalbach), International Political Science Review, 46(1), 18-39. https://doi.org/10.1177/01925121231199904.

2023 The Transparency of Constitutional Reasoning: A Text Mining Analysis of the Hungarian Constitutional Court’s Jurisprudence (Co-authors: Fruzsina Gárdos-Orosz, Rebeka Kiss, István Járay), Studia Iuridica Lublinensia 32 (3): 11-44. doi:10.17951/sil.2023.32.3.11-44. Repository link.

2023 Machine Translation as an Underrated Ingredient? Solving Classification Tasks with Large Language Models for Comparative Research (Co-authors: Ákos Máté, Lukasz Wordliczek, Dariusz Stolicki, Ádám Feldmann), Computational Communication Research 5 (2): 1-34. doi:10.5117/CCR2023.2.6.MATE. Repository link.

2023 The Concept and Measurement of Legislative Backsliding (Co-authors: Rebeka Kiss, Ádám Kovács), Parliamentary Affairs, gsad014, doi:10.1093/pa/gsad014

2023 Introducing HUNCOURT: A New Open Legal Database Covering the Decisions of the Hungarian Constitutional Court for Between 1990 and 2021 (Co-authors: Rebeka Kiss, István Járay), Journal of the Knowledge Economy, https://doi.org/10.1007/s13132-023-01395-6. Repository link.

2022 How Orbán won? Neoliberal disenchantment and the grand strategy of financial nationalism to reconstruct capitalism and regain autonomy. Socio-Economic Review, https://doi.org/10.1093/ser/mwab052.

2022 Creating an Enhanced Infrastructure of Parliamentary Archives for Better Democratic Transparency and Legislative Research – Report on the OPTED forum in the European Parliament (Brussels, Belgium, 15 June 2022) (Co-author: Rebeka Kiss), International Journal of Parliamentary Studies 2 (2): 278–84. doi:10.1163/26668912-bja10053

2022 Measuring legislative stability – A new approach with data from Hungary, (Co-authors: Bálint György Kubik, Csaba Molnár, István Járay, Anna Székely), European Political Science 21: 491–521. doi:10.1057/s41304-022-00376-8. Repository link.

2022 Punctuated Equilibrium and Progressive Friction in Socialist Autocracy, Democracy and Hybrid Regimes (Co-authors: Ágnes M. Balázs, Csaba Molnár), Journal of Public Policy 42 (2): 247–69. doi:10.1017/S0143814X21000143. Repository link.

2022 Mission adapted: the hidden role of governors in shaping central bank operating missions in Hungary (Co-authors: Kristin Makszin and Jasper Simons), East European Politics 38 (1): 101–22. doi:10.1080/21599165.2021.1907351

2021 Understanding Agenda Dynamics in Non-democracies. In Zsolt Boda, Miklós Sebők (eds.), Policy Agendas in Autocracy, and Hybrid Regimes: The Case of Hungary, 3–16. Comparative Studies of Political Agendas. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan.

2021 The (real) need for a human touch: testing a human-machine hybrid topic classification workflow on a New York Times corpus, Quality & Quantity 56, 3621-3643. doi: 10.1007/s11135-021-01287-4. Repository link.

2021 The effect of central bank communication on sovereign bond yields: The case of Hungary (Co-authors: Ákos Máté and Tamás Barczikay), Plos One 16 (2). doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0245515. Repository link.

2021 Policy Agendas in Autocracy, and Hybrid Regimes: The Case of Hungary (Co-editor with Zsolt Boda), Comparative Studies of Political Agendas. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan. doi:10.1007/978-3-030-73223-3. ISBN 978-3-030-73222-6

2021 The Data and Methods of the Hungarian Comparative Agendas Project. In Zsolt Boda, Miklós Sebők (eds.), Policy Agendas in Autocracy, and Hybrid Regimes: The Case of Hungary, 63–73. Comparative Studies of Political Agendas. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan. doi:10.1007/978-3-030-73223-3_4

2020 From State Capture to ‘Pariah’ Status? The Preference Attainment of the Hungarian Banking Association (2006-2014) (Co-author: Sándor Kozák), Business and Politics 23 (2): 179–201. doi:10.1017/bap.2020.8

2020 The Multiclass Classification of Newspaper Articles with Machine Learning: The Hybrid Binary Snowball Approach (Co-author: Zoltán Kacsuk), Political Analysis 29 (2): 236–49. doi:10.1017/pan.2020.27. Repository link.

2019 The Politics of Manufactured Crisis: Political Entrepreneurship and the Fiscal Wars of the early 2010s in the U.S., Intersections: East European Journal of Society and Politics 5 (3): 73–96. doi:10.17356/ieejsp.v5i3.522

2019 The Hungarian Policy Agendas Project (Co-author: Zsolt Boda). In: Frank R Baumgartner, Christian Breunig, Emiliano Grossman (eds.) Comparative Policy Agendas: Theory, Tools, Data, 105–13. Oxford: Oxford University Press

2019 Electoral Reforms, Entry Barriers and the Structure of Political Markets: A Comparative Analysis. (Co-authors: Attila Horváth, Ágnes M. Balázs. European Journal of Political Research 58 (2): 741–68. doi:10.1111/1475-6765.12309

2018 Punctuated Equilibrium In Democracy and Autocracy: An Analysis of Hungarian Budgeting Between 1868 and 2013. (Co-author: Tamás Berki) European Political Science Review 10 (4): 589–611. doi:10.1017/S1755773918000115

2018 Institutional Entrepreneurship and the Mission Creep of the National Bank of Hungary. In: Caner Bakir, Darryl S L Jarvis (eds.) Institutional Entrepreneurship and Policy Change: Theoretical and Empirical Explorations, 243–78. Houndmills in Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-70350-3_10

2018 From Pledge-Fulfilment to Mandate-Fulfilment: An Empirical Theory (Co-author: András Körösényi). Intersections: East European Journal of Society and Politics 4 (1): 115–32. doi:10.17356/ieejsp.v4i1.130

2017 Exercising Control and Gathering Information: The Functions of Interpellations in Hungary (1990-2014). (Co-editor with Bálint Kubik, Csaba Molnár) Journal of Legislative Studies 23 (4): 465–83. doi:10.1080/13572334.2017.1394734

2017 Incrementalism and Punctuated Equilibrium in Hungarian Budgeting (1991-2013) (Co-editor with Tamás Berki) Journal of Public Budgeting, Accounting & Financial Management 29 (2): 151–80. doi:10.1108/jpbafm-29-02-2017-b001

2016 Mandate Slippage, Good and Bad. Making (Normative) Sense of Mandate-Fulfillment. Intersections: East European Journal of Society and Politics 2 (1): 123–52. doi:10.17356/ieejsp.v2i1.131

2016 Coding Policy Influence with ATLAS.ti: Methodological Notes from a Study on Hungarian Banking. In: Friese, S. – Ringmayr, T. (eds.) ATLAS.Ti User Conference 2015: Qualitative Data Analysis and Beyond, 1–15. Berlin: Universitätsverlag der Technischen Universität Berlin.

2015 Delegation and the Crisis­-Driven Political Development of Bailout Institutions: The Case of Japan Between 1992 and 2003. Japanese Journal of Political Science 16 (4): 459–88. doi:10.1017/S1468109915000262

2015 Who Decides in Times of Crisis?: A Comparative Examination of Bureaucratic Delegation in 4 EU Countries (2008-2010). Journal of Comparative Politics 2015 (2): 38–52 

2010 President Wilson and the International Origins of the Federal Reserve System – A Reappraisal. White House Studies 10 (4): 425–47 

Books in Hungarian

2021 Szövegbányászat és mesterséges intelligencia R-ben (Text Mining and Artificial Intelligence in R) (Co-editor with Ákos Máté and Orsolya Ring). Budapest: Typotex Kiadó. ISBN 978-963-493-139-3. Repository link.

2020 A magyar jogalkotás minősége: Elmélet, mérés, eredmények (The Quality of Hungarian Legislation: Theory, Measurement, Empirical Results) (Co-editor with György Gajduschek and Csaba Molnár). Budapest: Gondolat. ISBN 978-963-556-001-1

2020 Empirikus jogi kutatások (Empirical Legal Studies) (Co-editor with András Jakab). Budapest: Osiris. ISBN 978-963-276-384-2

2019 Itt van Amerika: Az amerikai politika hatása Magyarországon (America is here: The Americanisation of Hungarian Politics) (Co-editor with Balázs Böcskei). Budapest: Athenaeum. ISBN 978-963-293-978-0

2019 Paradigmák fogságában: Elitek és ideológiák a magyar pénzügyi kapitalizmusban (Captured by Paradigms: Elites and Ideologies in Hungarian Finance Capitalism). Budapest: Napvilág. ISBN 978-963-338-005-5

2018 A magyar közpolitikai napirend (The Hungarian Policy Agenda) (Co-editor with Zsolt Boda). Budapest: MTA TK PTI. ISBN 978-963-418-018-0

2016 Kvantitatív szövegelemzés és szövegbányászat a politikatudományban (Quantitative Text Analysis and Text Mining in Political Science) Editor and contributor to several chapters. Budapest: L’Harmattan. ISBN 978-963-414-229-4

2014 Hatalom szabályok nélkül – Kormány és törvényhozás viszonya a pénzügyi válság idején (Power without Rules – Executive-Legislative Relations in Times of Financial Crisis). Budapest: Új Mandátum. ISBN 978-963-287-076-2

For a Hungarian version, see https://poltextlab.com/sebok-miklos. 

For a bio focusing on achievements in the field of political economy, see https://poltextlab.com/polecon.

High-resolution profile photo of Dr. Miklós Sebők.