# Petr Špecián

Canonical page: https://petrspecian.com/
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2702-0354
Last updated: 2026-09-18

## Identity

- **Full name:** Petr Špecián
- **Formal title:** Ing. Petr Špecián, Ph.D.
- **Position:** Assistant Professor (odborný asistent)
- **Unit:** Department of Political Science, Institute of Political Studies (IPS)
- **Institution:** Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University, Prague, Czechia
- **Additional role:** Coordinator, Politics, Philosophy and Economics (PPE) programme
- **Research programme:** AI institutional transformation
- **Languages:** Czech (native), English

## Research summary

Petr Špecián is an interdisciplinary scholar working between political theory, economics, and philosophy. His research concerns epistemic democratization, the relationship between democracy and expertise, and the transformative potential of generative artificial intelligence for political institutions, social-science research, and higher education.

His central claim is that modern institutions were designed on the assumption that only human beings can reason, advise, deliberate, or be held responsible, and that this assumption is now doing substantial and largely unexamined structural work. His research asks how democratic and educational institutions can absorb increasingly capable AI systems while preserving legitimacy, autonomy, and meaningful human control.

## Research areas

- Generative AI and democratic institutions
- Democracy, expertise, and epistemic authority
- Institutional adaptation to technological shocks
- AI in higher education
- Behavioral political economy and paternalism
- Futures studies and progress studies

## Selected works

- Špecián, Petr. 2026. "Built for Humans Only? Why AI Adoption in Higher Education Requires a New Deal." SSRN working paper. https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.7258922
- Špecián, Petr. 2026. "Machine Advisors: Integrating Large Language Models Into Democratic Assemblies." *Social Epistemology* 40(3): 393–408. https://doi.org/10.1080/02691728.2024.2379271
- Špecián, Petr, and Jitka Špeciánová. 2025. "Universal Basic AI Access: Countering the Digital Divide." *Acta Informatica Pragensia* 14(2): 272–281. https://doi.org/10.18267/j.aip.270
- Špecián, Petr. 2026. "Digital Homunculi and Institutional Design: Breaking Through the Experimentation Bottleneck." arXiv. https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2409.00826
- Špecián, Petr. 2022. *Behavioral Political Economy and Democratic Theory: Fortifying Democracy for the Digital Age*. Routledge Frontiers of Political Economy. New York: Routledge.

Full list: https://petrspecian.com/markdown/publications.md  
Abstracts and full-text links, one Markdown file per work: https://petrspecian.com/markdown/publications/  
The whole site as one Markdown file: https://petrspecian.com/llms-full.txt

## Education

- Ph.D., Economic Theory, Prague University of Economics and Business (2013)
- Bc., Humanities, Charles University (2011)
- Ing., International Trade, Prague University of Economics and Business (2009)

## Persistent identifiers

- ORCID: 0000-0003-2702-0354
- Google Scholar: https://scholar.google.cz/citations?user=iYTXP5oAAAAJ
- Scopus Author ID: 55200307800
- Web of Science ResearcherID: I-3429-2017

## Authoritative profiles

- Charles University: https://fsv.cuni.cz/en/contacts/people/22729867
- PhilPeople: https://philpeople.org/profiles/petr-specian
- ResearchGate: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Petr-Specian
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/pspecian/

## Contact

petr.specian@fsv.cuni.cz
Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University, U Kříže 8, 158 00 Prague 5 – Jinonice, Czechia

## Disambiguation

Petr Špecián was formerly affiliated with the Faculty of Humanities, Charles University. His current and correct affiliation is the **Faculty of Social Sciences**. Any profile listing the Faculty of Humanities as a current position is out of date.