Biography
Dr. Larissa Meier is an Assistant Professor in Conflict Sociology. She obtained her PhD in Political Science and Sociology from the Scuola Normale Superiore in Florence and completed her undergraduate studies at the Universities of Zurich and Hamburg. Before joining Trinity College Dublin, she was a postdoctoral researcher at Bielefeld University in Germany. Her research explores the causes and consequences of contemporary political conflicts, with a particular focus on social movements, political violence, and civil resistance. Larissa specializes in qualitative and mixed-methods research designs. She has also worked for international organizations, including the OSCE in Serbia and UNDP in Kosovo. Her work has been published in Social Problems, Government & Opposition, and Perspectives on Politics, among others. She is currently working on a book manuscript on political activism in high-risk environments and co-supervises the research project "The German Peace Movement in the Context of the Ukraine War" (2024-2027), funded by the German Foundation for Peace Research.
Publications and Further Research Outputs
Peer-Reviewed Publications
Meier, Larissa, Peña, Alejandro and Nah, Alice., Political Activism and the Experience of Adversity, Qualitative Sociology, 2026
Meier, Larissa, Dollbaum, Jan Matti, Daphi, Priska and Haunss, Sebastian, Varieties of Resistance against the Radical Right: Explaining divergent Trajectories of Counter-Mobilization in two German Cities, Mobilization: An international Quarterly, 30, (1), 2025, p13 - 32
Daphi, Priska & Meier, Larissa, Composite protests of the distrustful - When left and right mobilize together, Current Sociology, 2025
Daria Meier, L., Dollbaum, J. M., Daphi, P., & Haunss, S, When Topics of Protest and Counter-Protest Diverge: Asymmetrical Issue Contestation in Left-Right Street Confrontations, American Behavioral Scientist, 2025
Dollbaum, Jan Matti, Meier, Larissa, Daphi, Priska and Haunss, Sebastian, Protest Types and Protester Profiles: testing meso-micro Associations between Event Characteristics and Participant Attitudes, Acta Politca, 60, 2024, p621 - 647
Daphi, Priska, Dollbaum, Jan Matti, Haunss, Sebastian, and Meier, Larissa, Local Protest Event Analysis: Providing a more comprehensive Picture, West European Politics, 48, (2), 2024, p449 - 463
Meier, Larissa, Peña, Alejandro and Nah, Alice, From Collusion to Autonomy: Patterns of Hybrid Repression and Human Rights Activism, Government & Opposition, 60, (3), 2024, p773 - 798
Meier, Larissa, Understanding Non-Participation in Armed Groups during the Sri Lankan Civil War, Social Problems, 72, (2), 2023, p660 - 674
Meier, Larissa, Spatiotemporal Variation in Armed Group Recruitment among Former Members of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, Sociological Forum, 37, 2022, p510 - 532
Gregor Wiedemann, Jan Matti Dollbaum, Sebastian Haunss, Priska Daphi, and Larissa Daria Meier, A Generalized Approach to Protest Event Detection in German Local News, Proceedings of the Thirteenth Language Resources and Evaluation Conference, Marseille, France. European Language Resources Association, 2022, p3883 - 3891
Meier, Larissa, Between Coercion and Representation: Exploring Variation in Support Relations between Tamil Civilians and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), Partecipazione e Conflitto, 15, (1), 2022, p157 - 171
Peña, Alejandro, Meier, Larissa and Nah, Alice, Exhaustion, Adversity, and Repression: Emotional Attrition in High Risk Activism, Perspectives on Politics, 21, (1), 2021, p27 - 42
Meier, Larissa, An Intersectional Approach to the Understanding of Patterns of Marginalization among Ex-combatants with Disabilities in Sri Lanka, Conflict, Security & Development, 20, (4), 2020, p441 - 465
Meier, Larissa, The Strategic Use of Emotions in Recruitment Strategies of Armed Groups: The Case of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, 44, (12), 2019, p1148 - 1166
Non-Peer-Reviewed Publications
Meier, Larissa and Daphi, Priska, Conflicts over Peace: The Fragmentation of the Protest Landscape in the Aftermath of the Russian Invasion of Ukraine, Forschungsjournal Soziale Bewegungen, 38, (1), 2025, p136 - 149
Shahin, S., Daphi, P., Haunss, S., & Meier, L, Introduction: How Protests and Counterprotests Interact"Mutual Influences, Context Conditions, and Consequences, American Behavioral Scientist, 2025
Larissa Meier, Protest, Conflict, and Social Change, Zeitschrift für Konfliktmanagement, 28, (2), 2025, p58 - 62
Displacement or Mobilization? A Comparative Analysis of the Impact of Successful/Prominent Protest Movements on Urban Protest Activities Using the Example of Pegida, Legida and Stuttgart 21 in, editor(s)Salheiser, Axel, Alexopoulou, Maria, Yendell, Alexander and Meier, Christian , Social Cohesion in Light of Multiple Inclusions and Exclusions: Perspectives, Findings, Trends, 2023, pp119 - 136, [Meier, Larissa; Dollbaum, Jan Matti; Daphi, Priska and Haunss, Sebastian]
Meier, Larissa; Daphi, Priska and Haunss, Sebastian, Stop the Wars - Disarmament and De-escalation Now! A Survey of Participants in the Easter March in Bielefeld, 2023
Meier Larissa, Dynamics of Violence and Reciprocal Escalation in Protest as a Path to Radicalization, Bürger & Staat, 3, 2023
Meier, Larissa and Daphi, Priska, Peace Movement and War: Why was the Easter March Movement hardly able to benefit from Public Outrage over the Russian Invasion of Ukraine?, Forschungsjournal Soziale Bewegungen, 35, (4), 2022, p580 - 595
OSCE Peacekeeping in, editor(s)Institute for Peace Research and Security Policy at the University of Hamburg/IFSH , OSCE Yearbook 2015, NOMOS, 2016, pp149 - 163, [Meier, Larissa]
Meier Larissa, A Role for OSCE Peacekeeping: From the 1992 Helsinki Guidelines to the Special Monitoring Mission to Ukraine, 2015
Research Expertise
Projects
- Title
- Welcome or Resist? Far Right, Civil Society, and Contentious Politics of Asylum in Ireland
- Summary
- Asylum seeker- and migrant-related protests in the Republic of Ireland have become increasingly frequent following the arrival of tens of thousands of refugees after Russia"s invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022. While many protests aim to prevent the establishment of asylum accommodations, local communities have also mobilized to welcome refugees or counter anti-asylum protests. This project investigates the contentious dynamics surrounding asylum accommodations. The research focuses on three main questions: 1. Actor constellations: Who initiates protests? What roles do existing far-right groups and political parties play? Are institutional actors involved, and if so, in what capacity? Is there evidence of counter-mobilization? 2. Tactics and frames: What strategies and frames do different actors employ to advance their positions? 3. Protest outcomes: How effective are these protests in achieving their goals? By examining these questions, the project explores how contentious episodes around asylum seeker accommodations unfold, providing new insight into rising local conflict dynamics and their escalation into a broader national protest wave.
- Funding Agency
- Arts and Social Sciences Benefactions Fund 2025/26
- Date From
- 01.06.2025
- Date To
- 2026
- Title
- The German Peace Movement in the Context of the Ukraine War: Changing Internal Discourses and Conflicts of Interpretation
- Summary
- Peace activists are currently facing harsh criticism. In particular, their opposition to arms deliveries to Ukraine is met with incomprehension. How do peace activists react to these challenges? This is the question that the profile project investigates. It focuses in particular on the internal discourses and interpretive struggles between activist groups. First, we will examine the interpretations of conflict causes and peace strategies discussed in activist groups in relation to the current Ukrainian war and to what extent these patterns of interpretation differ from earlier understandings. Second, the project examines the extent and nature of conflicts of interpretations between different peace groups.
- Funding Agency
- German Foundation for Peace Research
- Date From
- 2024
- Date To
- 2027
- Title
- Adversity, Security, and Gender in High-Risk Activism
- Funding Agency
- Departmental Research Development Fund, University of York, UK
- Date From
- 2021
- Date To
- 2022
Recognition
Memberships
European Sociological Association
The Centre on Social Movement Studies (Cosmos), Florence, Italy