Research Interests

Vera Messing, PhD is a research professor at the Center of Social Sciences, Budapest. Presently she is the director of the Institute of Sociology at the CSS.  She earned her PhD at the Budapest Corvinus University in 2001. She has over 20 years’ of experience in empirical research on ethnicity, minorities, migration, social exclusion, media representation of vulnerable groups and ethnic conflicts as well as social science methodologies. Her work focuses on comparative understanding of different forms and intersections of social inequalities and ethnicity and their consequences in the field of education and labour market. She is specifically interested in policy and civil responses to ethnic diversity. Another focus of her research concerns social science methodology, validity and reliability of qualitative and quantitative data. She is the principal researcher of the European Social Survey (ERIC) since 2012 and partner to numerous European FP7 and Horizon research project (EDUMIGROM, RECWOWE, NEUJOBS, ESS SUSTAIN-2). Her publication list includes over 50 articles and book chapters in journals such as Identities; Ethnicities, Ethnic and Racial Studies, Intersections, Intercultural Education, Housing Studies, Social Sciences.

Selected Publications

Messing, Vera. "Conceptual and methodological considerations in researching “Roma migration”." Constructing Roma Migrants: European Narratives and Local Governance (2019): 17-30. Springer Publ. 

Ságvári, Bence, Vera Messing, and Dávid Simon. "Methodological Challenges in Cross-comparative Surveys: The Case of Understanding Attitudes towards Democracy in Hungary." Intersections. East European Journal of Society and Politics 5, no. 1 (2019)

Messing, Vera, and Bence Ságvári. "Are anti-immigrant attitudes the Holy Grail of populists? A comparative analysis of attitudes towards immigrants, values, and political populism in Europe." Intersections. East European Journal of Society and Politics 7, no. 2 (2021): 100-127

Árendás, Zsuzsanna, and Vera Messing. "‘I was told the position has already been filled’: Barriers to mobility and coping strategies of highly qualified Roma youth on their way to the business sector in Hungary." Intersections. East European Journal of Society and Politics 8, no. 2 (2022): 41-58

Árendás, Z., Durst, J., Katona, N., & Messing, V. (2022). The Limits of Trading Cultural Capital: Returning Migrant Children and Their Educational Trajectory in Hungary. In Children and Youths' Migration in a Global Landscape (Vol. 29, pp. 115-139). Emerald Publishing Limited

Árendas, Z., Trąbka, A., Messing, V., Pietrusińska, M.J. and Winogrodzka, D., (2023). Agency of Migrant Youth in Hostile Sociopolitical Environments: Case Studies from Central Eastern Europe. Social Sciences, 12(4), p.210.

Research Projects

European Social Survey, European Research Infrastructure Consortium; PI in Hungary (2002-)

ESS-SUSTAIN-2 Horizon2020 project (2020-24)