Vanessa Endrejat Receives Doctorate

Vanessa Endrejat was awarded her doctorate at the end of March by the University of Cologne. Her dissertation, “Out of Balance, Out of Sight? How the Epistemic Community of Government Finance Statisticians Shapes European Debt Calculations,” explores public debt calculations in Europe, the policy decisions that flow into them, and who makes the decisions. Endrejat examines how, since the introduction of the euro, an expert group of statisticians has shaped debt calculation methods. This is particularly relevant given that European debt has risen significantly since the financial crisis and different policy areas are treated differently in the balance sheets. The dissertation draws attention to the controversial nature of debt calculations and reveals the role of expert groups in European governance. Vanessa Endrejat was a doctoral student at the International Max Planck Research School on the Social and Political Constitution of the Economy (IMPRS-SPCE) between 2019 and 2023. She is currently a postdoctoral researcher in Lucio Baccaro’s Political Economy Research Area at the MPIfG.