Max-Weber-Institut für Soziologie
Universität Heidelberg
Bergheimer Str. 58
69115 Heidelberg
Kontakt:nora.waitkus@mwi.uni-heidelberg.de
https://waitkus.github.io/
Nora Waitkus’ research focuses on socio-economic stratification in contemporary capitalist societies.
She is mostly interested exploring and explaining cross-national variation and the institutional drivers of wealth and asset inequality and concentration. She further studies class differences, housing inequalities, economic elites, cultural processes in the reproduction of inequality, as well as attitudes towards redistribution using a variety of quantitative approaches.
Her work has been featured in leading journals of the field, such as American Sociological Review, Sociology, Socius, amongst others. She further publishes in journals outside of Sociology (e.g., Feminist Economics, Social Justice Research). For her work on comparative inequality, she received the RC28 Significant Scholarship Award as well as the Aleida Hagenaars Memorial Award.
At the Max Weber Institute, Nora Waitkus teaches mostly in the field of Social Stratification, Institutions and Organisations, Advanced Methods as well as Research Seminars.
Academic Positions
Heidelberg University, Max Weber Institute of Sociology. Professor in Comparative Social Stratification (since 01/25)
London School of Economics and Political Science, International Inequalities Institute. Assistant Professorial Research Fellow (since 08/22)
Tilburg University, Department of Sociology. Assistant Professor (03/21-12/24)
London School of Economics and Political Science, International Inequalities Institute. Postdoc (09/19-07/22)
University of Bremen, Department of Sociology & SOCIUM. Research Associate & PhD Student (03/14-08/19)
Berlin Social Science Center - Research Assistant (01/11-02/14)
Education
University of Bremen, PhD in Sociology (July 2019)
Freie Universität zu Berlin, M.A. Political Science (October 2013)
Institut d’Etudes Politiques (Sciences Po) Bordeaux, Erasmus Studies (2007/2008)
University of Hamburg, B.A. Political Science (May 2010)
Journal Publications
- Stefan Wallaschek and Nora Waitkus (2025). “The Past, the Present, the Future: Self-portrayals of Wealthy Business Owners in the Media” International Journal of Communication, Forthcoming.
- Waitkus, Nora, Mike Savage and Maren Toft (2024). “Wealth and Class Analysis: Exploitation, Closure and Exclusion” Sociology, Online first.
- Manuel Schechtl and Nora Waitkus (2024). “Where Income becomes Wealth: How Redistribution moderates the Association between Income and Wealth” Socius, 10: 1-13.
- Waitkus, Nora (2023). “Ungleicher Besitz. Perspektiven einer klassensoziologischen Untersuchung von Vermögen” Berliner Journal für Soziologie, 3(1): 99-135.
- Lierse, Hanna, Patrick Sachweh and Nora Waitkus (ed.) (2022). “Wealth, Inequality and Redistribution in Capitalist Societies” Social Justice Research, 35(4): 367-378.
- Waitkus, Nora and Stefan Wallaschek (2022). “Wealthy Business Owners and the Legitimization of Inequality in the Press” Social Justice Research, 35(4): 404-435.
- Pfeffer, Fabian T. and Nora Waitkus (2021). “The Wealth Inequality of Nations” American Sociological Review, 86 (4): 567–602.
- Waitkus, Nora and Lara Minkus (2021). “Investigating the Gender Wealth Gap across Occupational Classes” Feminist Economics, 27(4): 114-147.
- Pfeffer, Fabian T. and Nora Waitkus (2021). “Comparing Child Wealth Inequality across Countries” RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences, 7(3): 28-49.
- Savage, Mike and Nora Waitkus (2021). “Property, wealth, and social change: Piketty as a social science engineer” British Journal of Sociology, 72: 39–51.
- Groh-Samberg, Olaf, Nepomuk Hurch and Nora Waitkus (ed.) (2018). “Dynamiken sozialer Ungleichheit” WSI-Mitteilungen, 71(5): 346.
- Groh-Samberg, Olaf, Nepomuk Hurch and Nora Waitkus (2018). “Statuskonkurrenzen und soziale Spaltungen. Zur Dynamik sozialer Ungleichheiten” WSI-Mitteilungen, 71(5): 347-357.
Articles in Edited Volumes
- Waitkus, Nora and Asif Butt (2024). “Vermögensungleichheit und ökonomische Eliten.” Handbuch Sozialstrukturanalyse. Ed. by D. Konietzka und P. Boehnke. Springer. Forthcoming.
- Dewilde, Caroline and Nora Waitkus (2024). “Housing and Inequality”. Handbook of Labor, Human Resource and Population Economics (Ed. by K. Zimmermann). Springer. 1-29.
- Waitkus, Nora and Olaf Groh-Samberg (2019). “The Space of Economic and Cultural Capital: A Latent Class Analysis for Germany”. Blasius, J. et al. (ed.): Empirical Investigations of Social Space. Springer: 81-97.
- Waitkus, Nora and Olaf Groh-Samberg (2018). “Beyond Meritocracy: Wealth Accumulation in the German Upper Classes.” Korsnes, O. et al. (ed.): New Directions in Elite Studies. Routledge: 198-220.
Awards & Prizes
- 2024 Honorable Mention for Karl-Polanyi-Preis. Sektion Wirtschaftssoziologie (DGS)
- 2022 RC28 Significant Scholarship Award, ISA
- 2021 Aldi (Aleida Johanna Maria) Hagenaars Memorial Award, LIS (Luxembourg)
- 2020 SASE Early Career Workshop-Grant
- 2018 RC28 Student Travel Award, Spring 2018 (Seoul, South Korea)
- 2016 Fulbright Scholar Grant, University of Michigan (USA)