Proposal submission

Submitting proposals

The submission form for paper and poster presentations was closed on 22 April at 11:59 pm BST.

Notifications will be sent out by 10 May 2026. Registration will also open by 10 May 2026. Details can be found under Registration.

Presenters will be eligible for submission to a special issue in the journal Network Science after the conference, with the conference programme committee serving as guest editors.

The best poster will receive a prize worth £200 at the conference.

If you have any queries, please contact us at polinetworks2026@gmail.com.

Scope

We welcome abstract submissions related to political networks (broadly defined), including qualitative, quantitative, formal, philosophical, and computational approaches. This can include (but is not limited to):

• policy networks, state-society relations, interest groups, advocacy, lobbying, governance networks, policy diffusion, discourse networks, and networks in public administration

• discussion networks, electoral and political behaviour and its contextual mechanisms, election campaigns, polarisation, public opinion, population-level networks, and political influence and persuasion

• global networks and international relations, such as conflict, peace, security, defensive alliances, diplomatic ties, and international organisations

• methodology for network data, including temporal, multi-level, and higher-order networks, statistical modelling, measurement, text as networks, and simulation of complex systems

• legislative networks, parliamentary relations, judicial and legal networks, elite networks, patronage, political institutions, political economy, networks in comparative, American, British, or European politics

• networks in collective action, protest, civil society, social movements, race, ethnicity, and identity, mobilisation, opposition, democratisation, or backsliding

• networks in digital, social, and environmental politics and policy sectors, including public health, climate, AI, inequality, energy, sustainability transitions and societal transformations

Submissions are encouraged from political science, sociology, economics, psychology, business, statistics, computer science, physics, network science, complex systems, and related disciplines.