Hometown: Buenos Aires, Argentina
Academic Institution: Johns Hopkins University
Discipline and degree conferral date (or expected): PhD Candidate in Political Science, expected summer 2024

Research Interests: State capacity, bureaucratic politics, democratization, comparative historical analysis, American political development, and Latin American politics.

Dissertation Title: Building Bureaucratic Capacity: The Political Origins of Civil Service Reforms

What attracted you to the CDDRL Pre/ Postdoctoral program? I was drawn to CDDRL’s vibrant intellectual community and their concern with addressing the crucial questions of our time from an interdisciplinary and methodologically plural perspective. I was also attracted to the opportunities the Center offers to learn from scholars working on governance and democracy in different regions around the world.

What do you hope to accomplish during your nine-month residency at CDDRL? I look forward to working on my book project during my residency at CDDRL. Based on my dissertation, the book concerns effective representative governance and the paths countries can take to achieve it. The study highlights the importance that varieties of patronage have for bureaucratic reform in democratic contexts — some types of patronage are more likely to create favorable conditions for reform than others due to the incentives that their personnel management practices create.

Fun fact: My first job was in the Argentine bureaucracy, which I now study!

Hometown: Belfast, Northern Ireland
Academic Institution: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Discipline and degree conferral date (or expected): PhD Candidate in Political Science, expected June 2024

Research Interests: Identity politics, interracial solidarity, political discussion, political violence, the carceral state, and American politics.

Dissertation Title: Essays on the Content and Consequences of Political Discussion

What attracted you to the CDDRL Pre/ Postdoctoral program? I was drawn to CDDRL’s interdisciplinary approach to the study of democracy. I am particularly excited to engage with scholars working on identity politics, deliberation, and political violence. 

What do you hope to accomplish during your nine-month residency at CDDRL? During my time at the Center, I’m hoping to complete several articles on political discussion, interracial solidarity, and the carceral state. I’d also like to start some new projects on related topics with collaborators at CDDRL. 

Fun fact: I’m a big fan of cold water swimming and am trying to complete 50 swims this year.

Hometown: Vancouver, BC, Canada
Academic Institution: Harvard University (PhD) / European University Institute (Max Weber Fellow)
Discipline and degree conferral date (or expected): PhD in Government, November 2023 

Research Interests: Political parties, party organization, group identity, cleavages, civil society, and political communication.

Dissertation Title: Identity politics, old and new: Party-building in the long twentieth century

What attracted you to the CDDRL Pre/ Postdoctoral program? I really love how CDDRL brings together scholars working across regions and topics, truly embodying the spirit and method of ‘comparative politics.’ My work focuses on Western Europe but takes a lot of influence from scholarship on party politics elsewhere in the world. Moving forward, I want to become more embedded in broader comparative debates about democracy and political development, and I think CDDRL will be a great place to start joining those conversations. 

What do you hope to accomplish during your nine-month residency at CDDRL? I’m currently in the early stages of expanding my dissertation into a book, which requires adding a bunch of new cases and additional data. I’m hoping to make substantial progress on this while at CDDRL and to also start thinking more seriously about which questions and ideas I want to pursue for my next big project. 

Fun fact: During the pandemic, I got back into reading fiction, and I really love it! Last year, I read over a hundred novels and am on track to hit that milestone again in 2024.

Hometown: Saint Petersburg, Russia
Academic Institution: European University Institute
Discipline and degree conferral date (or expected): PhD in Political and Social Sciences, expected October 2024

Research Interests: Migration and citizenship, political behavior, and civil society.

Dissertation Title: Three Essays on Russian Political Migration Following the 2022 Full-Scale Invasion of Ukraine

What attracted you to the CDDRL Pre/ Postdoctoral program? I'm drawn to CDDRL for its interdisciplinary focus and emphasis on the practical impacts of research, which aligns with my previous experience as a practitioner and my goals as a social scientist.

What do you hope to accomplish during your nine-month residency at CDDRL? I want to develop a book project about politically-induced migration. I also plan to continue serving as the co-principal investigator in my research project OutRush, a panel survey of Russian migrants that I co-lead with Emil Kamalov.

Fun fact: I wrote most of my PhD dissertation while listening to the electronic musician Christian Löffler.

Hometown: Laguna Beach, California
Academic Institution: Princeton University
Discipline and degree conferral date (or expected): PhD Candidate in Sociology and Social Policy, expected July 2024

Research Interests: Inequality, poverty, democratic governance, law and society, justice and reentry, work and organizations, and social policy.

Dissertation Title: Humanizing Institutions: Inequality, Dysfunction, and Reform in the Parole Process

What attracted you to the CDDRL Pre/ Postdoctoral program? CDDRL’s commitment to scholarship on key challenges associated with democratic governance and the rule of law and its sustained investment in producing research that will work to promote equity and justice in contemporary society aligns deeply with my scholarly orientation. 

What do you hope to accomplish during your nine-month residency at CDDRL? I aim to publish academic articles and work on a book manuscript documenting persons’ grounded experiences serving parole in the United States. While doing so, I will advance my broader intellectual project — to identify how state processes may better serve involved parties and ameliorate inequality. I look forward to engaging with CDDRL scholars committed to bridging the divide between scholarship and practice and, most importantly, to asking critical questions about the work and health of democratic governance. 

Fun fact: I’m a firm believer in spending ample time outdoors (surfing, hiking, and more!), tripling the garlic in recipes, and indulging in well-placed, dumb jokes.