The WhoGov Project

Version 1.0

Nyrup, Jacob; Stuart Bramwell; Gabriel Lönn; Kristiansen, Ina Lyftingsmo; Schmid, Jonas Willibald; Matthews, Austin; Thoma, Andreina; Javier Padilla Moreno-Torres; Langsæther, Peter Egge; Knutsen, Carl Henrik, 2026, "The WhoGov Project", https://doi.org/10.18710/OLPOZK, DataverseNO, V1

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Description	We provide open, global data on the people who make up governments, from 1966 to today. We continuously work on expanding the scope of the dataset, including going all the way back to 1789 and gathering more regular data. The project is based at the University of Oslo. WhoGov provides individual-level data on cabinet members globally since 1966. Version 4 has data from 177 countries, covering 60,458 individuals and 9,495 country-years. Information on gender, age, party affiliation, and portfolios. (2026-08-15)
Subject	Social Sciences
Keyword	Cabinet members, Governments, Political elites, Gender, Age, Parties
Related Publication	Is Supplement To: Nyrup, Jacob, and Stuart Bramwell. "Who governs? A new global dataset on members of cabinets." American Political Science Review 114.4 (2020): 1366-1374.doi: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0003055420000490
License/Data Use Agreement	CC BY 4.0

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	0_ReadMe.txt Plain Text - 6.0 KB Published Aug 26, 2026 0 Downloads MD5: 4c0c4968918b81c55586f1c5968120b0 Readme file	Preview "0_ReadMe.txt" Access File File Access Public Download Options Plain Text Download Metadata Data File Citation Download EndNote XML Download RIS Download BibTeX
	whogov_codebookandappendix.pdf Adobe PDF - 293.5 KB Published Aug 26, 2026 0 Downloads MD5: e15105d6ffcf18cc2404c2734c880dd6 Codebook	Preview "whogov_codebookandappendix.pdf" Access File File Access Public Download Options Adobe PDF Download Metadata Data File Citation Download EndNote XML Download RIS Download BibTeX
	WhoGov_update_v4.pdf Adobe PDF - 58.0 KB Published Aug 26, 2026 0 Downloads MD5: 8a6732fe94f8e5ee27dae9fa4c508fe0 WhoGov Version 4 - Data note	Preview "WhoGov_update_v4.pdf" Access File File Access Public Download Options Adobe PDF Download Metadata Data File Citation Download EndNote XML Download RIS Download BibTeX
	WhoGov_crosssectional_V4.0.csv WhoGov Version 4/Comma Separated Values - 3.5 MB Published Aug 26, 2026 0 Downloads MD5: d38ca806e91baac27d74c3afbfedd92a WhoGov Version 4 - Crosssectional.csv	Preview "WhoGov Version 4/WhoGov_crosssectional_V4.0.csv" Access File File Access Public Download Options Comma Separated Values Download Metadata Data File Citation Download EndNote XML Download RIS Download BibTeX
	WhoGov_crosssectional_V4.0.rds WhoGov Version 4/Unknown - 4.1 MB Published Aug 26, 2026 0 Downloads MD5: bb055a402929829a937f4791a039ded0 WhoGov Version 4 - Crosssectional.rds	Access File File Access Public Download Options Original File Format Download Metadata Data File Citation Download EndNote XML Download RIS Download BibTeX
	WhoGov_crosssectional_V4.0.xlsx WhoGov Version 4/MS Excel Spreadsheet - 1.8 MB Published Aug 26, 2026 0 Downloads MD5: 48f9a0ae8d06f38d53b126dab596a664 WhoGov Version 4 - Crosssectional.xlsx	Access File File Access Public Download Options MS Excel Spreadsheet Download Metadata Data File Citation Download EndNote XML Download RIS Download BibTeX
	WhoGov_within_V4.0.csv WhoGov Version 4/Comma Separated Values - 78.2 MB Published Aug 26, 2026 0 Downloads MD5: 3bb6b1fd56c23b3c668e4d370a360c43 WhoGov Version 4 - Individual level.csv	Preview "WhoGov Version 4/WhoGov_within_V4.0.csv" Access File File Access Public Download Options Comma Separated Values Download Metadata Data File Citation Download EndNote XML Download RIS Download BibTeX
	WhoGov_within_V4.0.rds WhoGov Version 4/Unknown - 115.2 MB Published Aug 26, 2026 0 Downloads MD5: 86ebfda55ecb59e9e6273dd1b3bfec0a WhoGov Version 4 - Individual level.rds	Access File File Access Public Download Options Original File Format Download Metadata Data File Citation Download EndNote XML Download RIS Download BibTeX
	WhoGov_within_V4.0.xlsx WhoGov Version 4/MS Excel Spreadsheet - 29.6 MB Published Aug 26, 2026 0 Downloads MD5: a855c1c98c7f458182ba415f75a429e5 WhoGov Version 4 - Individual level.xlsx	Access File File Access Public Download Options MS Excel Spreadsheet Download Metadata Data File Citation Download EndNote XML Download RIS Download BibTeX

Citation Metadata

Persistent Identifier	doi:10.18710/OLPOZK
Publication Date	2026-08-26
Title	The WhoGov Project
Subtitle	Mapping the people who govern us - Worldwide & Across centuries
Alternative URL	https://whogov.net/
Author	University of Oslohttps://orcid.org/0000-0001-6368-441X London School of Economicshttps://orcid.org/0000-0002-3983-0445 Gabriel LönnUniversity of Oslo University of Oslohttps://orcid.org/0009-0006-5991-1441 University of Oslohttps://orcid.org/0000-0001-8062-1330 https://ror.org/00hj54h04https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8972-8329 University of Oslohttps://orcid.org/0009-0001-1433-8630 Javier Padilla Moreno-TorresUniversity of Oslo https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1565-0394 University of Oslohttps://orcid.org/0000-0002-5470-9045
Point of Contact	Use email button above to contact. Nyrup, Jacob (University of Oslo)
Description	We provide open, global data on the people who make up governments, from 1966 to today. We continuously work on expanding the scope of the dataset, including going all the way back to 1789 and gathering more regular data. The project is based at the University of Oslo. WhoGov provides individual-level data on cabinet members globally since 1966. Version 4 has data from 177 countries, covering 60,458 individuals and 9,495 country-years. Information on gender, age, party affiliation, and portfolios. (2026-08-15)
Subject	Social Sciences
Keyword	Cabinet members Governments Political elites Gender Age Parties
Related Publication	Is Supplement To: Nyrup, Jacob, and Stuart Bramwell. "Who governs? A new global dataset on members of cabinets." American Political Science Review 114.4 (2020): 1366-1374. doi https://doi.org/10.1017/S0003055420000490 https://doi.org/10.1017/S0003055420000490
Language	English
Producer	University of Oslo (UiO) https://whogov.net/
Contributor	Data Collector: Bokobza, Laura Data Collector: Høgfeldt, Cecilia Data Collector: Faarvang, Winnie Data Collector: Therkildsen, Camilla Data Collector: Vikner, Jakob Data Collector: Thomas, Sirimon Data Collector: Maguire, Ruairi Data Collector: Pripitu, Sara Data Collector: Salkeld, Isabella
Funding Information	Nuffield College Aarhus University University of Oslo European Research Council: 101221191
Distributor	University of Oslo (UiO) https://dataverse.no/dataverse/uio
Depositor	Nyrup, Jacob
Deposit Date	2026-07-07
Time Period	Start Date: 1966-09-01; End Date: 2025-07-01
Date of Collection	Start Date: 2018-01-01; End Date: 2026-07-01
Data Type	Observational data
Series	WhoGov version 4.0: Version 1 to 3 are found at https://politicscentre.nuffield.ox.ac.uk/whogov-dataset/.
Data Source	Data are coded by the project team from publicly available sources, including government websites and directories, encyclopaedias, Wikipedia/Wikidata, and historical and biographical reference works. CIA World Leaders and Cabinet Members of Foreign Governments is the origin source for the data from 1966-2016. All recorded information concerns individuals acting in their public capacity as members of government. The collection procedure is described in Nyrup and Bramwell (2020) (see above) and, for Version 4, in WhoGov_update_v4.pdf.

Social Science and Humanities Metadata

Unit of Analysis	Individual-level (minister-year) Cross-sectional (country-year)
Data Collector	The WhoGov Project
Frequency	Annual

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