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The “Americas” encompass variance in line with expectations; but this variance does not only refer to a North-South bias, but also to different levels of digitalization in Central (Mexico) as well as South America. The latter two regions reflect a quite heterogeneous picture when it comes to the institutionalization of the discipline of political science. For example, Freidenberg (2017: 26–35) differentiates between countries with higher levels of institutionalization (Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay, Chile, México, Costa Rica, Colombia, and Venezuela), countries with an inchoate level (Perú, Ecuador and El Salvador) and countries where political science programs are “almost inexistent” (Honduras, Guatemala, Panamá, Nicaragua, Paraguay, and Bolivia). Although this volume only covers a limited sample, all these levels are represented by at least one example. Despite this heterogeneity, it is a common trait of all South American cases that digitalization had a rather low impact on teaching, and here especially referring to the inclusion of digitalization-related topics into the curricula. More usual is the use of digital tools in the classroom, but this also seems to be selective and does not follow an overall strategy “to make the digital revolution a key component in their education programs” (Sandoval Almazán). The authors identify two reasons for digitalization's limited impact: In some countries such as Bolivia or Peru, there is no governmental strategy to equip universities with digital tools or to focus on digital teaching like. In other places such as Paraguay, the equipment is available, but professors do not use it. Still other locations find a lack of equipment availability and willingness among teachers to use digital tools between private and public universities underlined for most cases, but especially for Mexico, Brazil, and Peru. Additionally, Marenco points to a dysfunctional effect that the introduction of e-learning programs at private universities in Brazil had, due to fact that those programs displayed low quality and e-learning in general received a bad image.

In regard to digitalization as a research subject, the picture is even bleaker. There is only a small number of scholars investigating the causes and consequences of digitialization. At the same time, Duarte and Buquet find reason for optimism for digitalization's impact in Paraguay and Uruguay, respectively. In Uruguay, there is a push towards the internationalization of political science research in general through improved possibilities of networking. Duarte points to the opportunities to participate in international research projects, to adopt international standards in research techniques helping the scholars in Paraguay to “become part of an international academic community in a way that would not be possible otherwise.”

Interestingly, the effect of internationalization in the sense of adopting international standards and thus approaching incrementally to an international scholarly community, does not seem to be not a consensual goal in all national political science communities. Tanaka describes that the traditional approach in Peruvian political science is to be involved in public and political affairs and that this is in tension with international standards, metric, rankings etc. Therefore, he argues for a balance between internationalization and domestic political and policy conditions. Similarly, Sandoval Almazán — highlights the [14] risks of digitalization in Mexico and the fear that the social sciences “will copy contents from other countries” wholesale and fail to adapt to Mexico's unique “reality”. This goes together with the claim that Mexican political science has to develop its own research agenda, based on its history and cultural heritage. All authors agree that their countries still have a long way to go in terms of making intensive use of digital tools for teaching, but even more in terms of addressing digitalization as a research subject.

Very generally speaking, this distinguishes these cases from the United States. Notwithstanding there is one central and critical common feature that Owen also very much underlines: the gap between public and private higher education in general, but also in terms of the potential of digitalization for civic education. The author describes the immense discrepancy in the availability of ICT and instructional resources between elite universities and less selective public institutions in the USA. She exposes that the incorporation of digital skills into the middle and high school civics, social studies, and American government curriculum differs tremendously across schools, but the general finding is that political science education in the U. S. lags behind the shifts in the political environment. Thus, the teachers potentially could develop pedagogies that foster digital citizenship skills, but this is not widely done in the political science classroom. Moreover, Owen sets forth a highly relevant issue underscoring the importance of civic empowerment and the gap that also exists in this regard. The expectation that digital tools are prone for more social inclusion (especially of the poor and minorities) only can be put into practice if there is sufficient access to instruction for these groups.

In the case of Europe, we also find large variation in the impact of digitalization but not as much as in Latin America. On one extreme is Belgium where teaching and learning political science as well as research has been highly influenced by the. Belgian political scientists make broad use of digital tools in teaching political science, e. g. MOOCs or podcasts. It can be stated that a transformation of teaching political science is ongoing, initiated by digitalization. Digitalization has also affected the research system of the Belgian political science community. For example, Belgian political scientists have been among the most visible in promoting research on digitalization and the ABSP has even launched a blog on the topic. Digital tools are also used in order to disseminate the findings of Belgian political scientists to the wider society. On the other side of the scale stands Finland, which is somewhat surprising given that this country is among the better performers in digital technology and e-government. The results of an international study on digitalization of political science in Finland indicates that digital tools only play a minor role in teaching. It seems even to be a wide spread opinion among Finnish political scientists that digitalization rather makes teaching more complicated. Likewise, digital topics and digital instruments are of secondary importance for the Finnish researchers. Other disciplines are dominating the research on digital issues. Hope for the better especially derives from the advanced technological standard of Finland in general and from the priority that the new government poses on digital topics.

Other European countries studied in this volume are located between these two cases being moderately influenced by the digitalization. While the usage of digital teaching and learning tools entered practically all classrooms, there are differences in the inclusion of digitalization (as a teaching subject) as well as in the degree of focusing on it as research subject. Moreover, the potential of the internet for publishing is also exploited to a different degree. While Spain, for example, is a country that has undergone important changes due to the digitalization, the same does not apply to the discipline of political science. It has to be mentioned, however, that the first online university in the world was founded in Spain with the opportunity to graduate in political science. In terms of research, however, Spain has produced much less scholarship on digitalization. France is another European country showing mixed results. Despite government incentives, political science teaching [15] in France is a slower adopter of new digital technologies. That is not to say that there is no innovative usage of digital tools in teaching political science in France. Sciences Po launched its first mobile classes in October 2017 and offers a new master’s course. Although political scientists in France have been slow to research digitalization's effects, there has been a sharp growth on the topic more recently.

The Portuguese case is interesting, as there the teaching system is hardly influenced by the digitalization, in favor of more established methods. In contrast, political scientists seem to be further ahead in respect to research, measured by the number of dissertations considering digitalization as well as researchers publishing digital related articles to an amount that is above the average worldwide. Likewise, there could be found increased international collaborations within the research system, which has been made possible through the usage of digital tools. Poland has to be regarded as a country with a political science community that is only moderately affected by the digitalization. Based on survey results, the authors point out that teaching political science in Poland has been influenced by digitalization. Besides Web 1.0-tools, there is a significant usage of Web 2.0-instruments, like YouTube and Facebook, through lecturers. The most important tools are, however, e-learning platforms, whereas there are no Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) or similar innovative alternatives. Furthermore, there are no institutionalized research units, dealing with the topic of digitalization. A remarkable characteristic in the Polish research system is the outstanding share of political science journals offering open access via; actually, the majority of journals follows such an approach.

The last two European countries under consideration — the United Kingdom and Germany – are not as digitalized as one might assume. Although it is a norm to use digital technologies when teaching political science at British universities, there are only few opportunities to learn advanced skills in the field of digitalization. The minor significance of digitalization is also reflected by the curriculum of most universities, where the term is seldom mentioned explicitly, and the absence of a professorship on politics and digitalization. The minor role of digitalization for British political scientists is also mirrored by the small number of articles in traditional political science journals in the UK dealing with digitalization. This seems to change due to the significant role of social media during the 2017 elections and Brexit. It is worth mentioning that there are social science research centres, such as the Oxford Internet Institute, dealing with digitalization. Roughly, the same can be said about Germany. It is difficult to find a digital infrastructure in the teaching system within the universities. There are, however, regular courses dealing with digitalization in some political science departments in Germany. In contrast to the rather minor role digitalization plays in teaching political science in Germany, the research on this topic is doing slightly better. Since the late 1990s, German political scientists publish regularly on this issue. Similar to the UK, Germany installed a research centre, the Waizenbaum Institute for the Networked Society, which is a government-launched and -financed institute and, among others, carried by political scientists.

The two Asian cases do not display a strong influence of digitalization. Japan seems to be a little less influenced by digitalization than India a nationwide report indicates, however, that the vast majority of universities in Japan have introduced digital learning management systems. Nonetheless, the actual usage is rather poor. Another restriction results from the desire of most Japanese students to learn in “some kind of traditional classroom structure” rather than exclusively online. Furthermore, digitalization is of minor importance for political science researchers in Japan. One explanation for this could be that in Japan it is the discipline of sociology traditionally dealing with media and information. Another reason for the absence of a lively political science dominated research field on digitalization might be that political science in Japan often belongs to law faculties.

[16] One of the more remarkable findings comes from South Korea. Being one of the most digitalized countries in the world, its universities could also be expected to be at the forefront of the digital revolution. To be sure, there are cyber universities, devices that register the attendance in classes and course management systems, which are an integral part of each class. Surprisingly, however, the discipline of political science rather neglected digitalization as a as well as a research topic. For example, only a tiny share out of the huge amount of massive open online courses comes from political science. Furthermore, only two of 226 political science online courses deal with digitalization. In addition, there is very little research on digitalization conducted by political scientists, which could be attributed to, among other reasons, the low acceptance rates of papers dealing with digitalization in domestic political science journals. Thus, the high degree of digitalization of the Korean university system in general is economy- and government-induced; at the same time, the activities of the political science community are only relatively slightly influenced by digitalization.

The smallest impact of digitalization on political science can be found in sub-Saharan Africa and the MENA region. Two notable exceptions are South Africa – as regional hegemon in Africa and emerging soft power in the Global South – and Tunisia – as the only young democracy resulting from the Arab Spring. In South Africa, very similar to other countries, ICT are more easily integrated into teaching, but less into the curricula. And in terms of research, the country is also rather an incipient ground. An interesting aspect, however, is the political relevance of social media platforms on political participation and its relevance to higher education. For example, as Isike describes, following the Arab Spring in North Africa, political participation of young South Africans has increased, and the “Fees Must Fall”-movement (see #FeesMustFall) could be linked to the ‘discovery’ of social media as a tool of political change. Leaders of the movement used social media to mobilize support among young and old South Africans and they eventually succeeded in influencing the government’s position, culminating in its announcement of free higher education and training for poor and working class South African undergraduate students in December 2017 effective 2018.

Finally, Tunisia is an example of a country with a very low impact of digitalization in every regard (teaching and research). Ben-Salem argues that the marginal status of political science as a discipline, the inadequate resources of higher education institutions and of the state itself, the economic conditions of students and a certain resistance to as reasons for digitalization's weak impact. Thus, the main challenge lies in establishing an independent discipline distinct from legal studies. In terms of research, Ben-Salem arguesthat it would be beneficial for the development of political science in the region on one side to achieve interdisciplinarity, but on the other side also “to outgrow the thesis of exceptionality that makes the MENA region an irreducible space to the conceptual tools elaborated by the West.”