About the PI | Regulatory Behavior Lab

About the Principal Investigator (PI)

Dr. Dovilė Rimkutė (PI)

Dr. Dovilė Rimkutė is Associate Professor of Public Administration at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and founder of the Regulatory Behavior Lab. Her research examines how regulatory governance functions in practice within multi-level governance systems, particularly in the European Union.

Dovilė has been awarded NWO Veni (2019) and Vidi (2024) grants to conduct research at the intersection of regulatory governance and behavioral public administration, integrating insights from affective science.

Research CV

Dovilė's research focuses on regulatory governance and risk regulation in the European Union’s multi-level governance system. It centers on three main themes: bureaucratic decision-making and responsiveness, citizens’ legitimacy perceptions of regulatory authority, and the role of emotions in regulator–citizen interactions.

Education

2012 – 2016 PhD in Political Science, Geschwister Scholl Institute of Political Science, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München (LMU), Germany.
2009 – 2011 Research Master in Public Administration and Organizational Science, Utrecht University School of Governance, the Netherlands.
2005 – 2009 Bachelor of Science in Sociology, Vilnius University, Lithuania.

Positions

2025 - current Associate Professor of Public Administration, Department of Political Science and Public Administration, VU Amsterdam.
2017 - 2025 Assistant Professor, Institute of Public Administration, Leiden University.

Grants and prizes

2024: Vidi grant on " Emotion Infused Risk Regulation: Rethinking the fundamentals of Regulation for Citizen-Centric Rule-Making", Dutch Research Council (NWO), €850,000. Success rate: 9,6%.
2019: Veni grant on "Risk regulation in the European Regulatory State: Science-based or Reputation induced?", Dutch Research Council (NWO), €250,000. Success rate: 14%.
2022 - 2023: Jean Monnet Fellowship at the Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies (RSC) at the European University Institute (EUI), Florence, Italy. European Commission. Success rate: 6.5%.
2023: Giandomenico Majone Prize honorary mention for the best conference paper at the ECPR Regulatory Governance Conference, University of Antwerp, Belgium.
2012: PhD grant: Marie Curie scholarship for Early-Stage Researchers within the Multi-disciplinary Initial Training Network on Inter-institutional Cooperation in the EU (INCOOP).

Publications

Core Publications:

Rimkutė, D. (2020). Building organizational reputation in the European regulatory state: An analysis of EU agencies' communications. Governance, 33(2), 385-406.
Rimkutė, D. (2020). Strategic silence or regulatory talk? Regulatory agency responses to public allegations amidst the glyphosate controversy. Journal of European Public Policy, 27(11), 1636-1656.
Rimkutė, D., & Van der Voet, J. (2024). When do bureaucrats respond to external demands? A theoretical framework and empirical test of bureaucratic responsiveness. Public Administration Review, 84(6), 1095-1116.
Rimkutė, D., & Mazepus, H. (2025). Citizens' perceptions of the legitimacy of independent agencies: the effects of expertise‐based and reputation‐sourced authority. Public Administration Review, 85(5), 1495-1511.
Rimkutė, D. (2026). Affective regulatory governance: towards an emotion-based understanding of citizen-regulator interactions in regulatory politics. Journal of European Public Policy, 1-26.
Maor, M., Rimkutė, D., & Capelos, T. (2026). Emotions and reputation learning by audience networks: A research agenda in bureaucratic politics. Public Administration Review, 86(1), 156-170.
Mazepus, H. & Rimkutė, D. (2026). Bureaucratic Responsiveness and Legitimacy: The Effects of Independence, Competence, and Warmth on Citizens' Legitimacy Perceptions. Governance, 39(1), e70102. (shared first authorship)

For the full list of publications see Dovilė Rimkutė google scholar page.