Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law is part of the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies
His insight led to a system that defends rights while it shares and controls power.
Grace Phatteeya Yongsanguanchai is currently majoring in Political Science, with a concentration in Political Economy and Development, and a minor in Economics. She is interested in examining how authoritarian leaders sustain their hold on power and how the nonprofit sector can effectively advance human rights and the rule of law in developing countries. Outside of academia, she enjoys exploring big cities, watching Netflix series, and hanging out with her family.
Major: International Relations
Hometown: Los Angeles, California
Thesis Advisors: Kathryn Stoner
Tentative Thesis Title: Analyzing cultural restitution as a transitional justice mechanism that counters authoritarian weaponization of cultural heritage and supports democratic reconstruction by restoring national identity and collective memory, examined through Russia's systematic looting campaign in Ukraine
Future aspirations post-Stanford: I am planning to attend law school with the goal of practicing in art law and cultural property restitution. The field sits at a complex intersection of international law, domestic property law, and human rights, and my experience at the Louvre made clear how much practical legal expertise is needed both for individual restitution claims and for reforming the international frameworks that currently shield state actors from accountability for cultural crimes. Long-term, I hope to work at an institutional level, whether through a museum's legal department, a major auction house, an international organization, or in policy advocacy, to close the enforcement gaps that allow these crimes to go unanswered.
A fun fact about yourself: I have been a flamenco dancer for over a decade and have performed with the San Francisco Opera, so I spend a great deal of time thinking about both the preservation and the living transmission of cultural heritage.
On March 5, as part of the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law’s Research Seminar Series, Laia Balcells — the Christopher F. Gallagher Family Professor of Government at Georgetown University — delivered a presentation on the impact of transitional justice museums. Balcells presented a series of co-authored studies that have examined the political and social effects of transitional justice museums — institutions that commemorate victims of past violence and shape collective memory in post-conflict or post-authoritarian societies. These museums were presented as part of broader transitional justice efforts, alongside trials, truth commissions, and reparations, all of which aim to address historical injustices and strengthen democratic values. The central question of the research project is whether these museums actually influence visitors’ political attitudes and beliefs, and under what conditions such influence occurs.
Transitional justice museums have become increasingly common around the world, particularly since World War II, as societies have attempted to confront legacies of violence and authoritarian rule. Despite their growing prevalence, their societal impact has remained contested. Some scholars have argued that museums encourage empathy, tolerance, and greater awareness of human rights. Others have warned that they may generate political polarization, especially when the historical narratives they present challenge existing identities or ideological commitments. The presentation, therefore, emphasized the need for systematic evidence to determine when museums persuade audiences and when they instead reinforce existing divisions.
To investigate this question, the research presented by Balcells relied on multiple field experiments conducted in museums across different political contexts. The first case study (co-authored with Valeria Palanza and Elsa Voytas) examined the Museo de la Memoria y de los Derechos Humanos in Santiago, Chile, which commemorates victims of the Pinochet dictatorship. Participants were randomly assigned either to visit the museum or to a control group, and their attitudes were measured before and after the visit. The results suggested that visiting the museum significantly influenced visitors’ emotions and political attitudes. In particular, exposure to the museum increased emotional responses, such as compassion toward victims, and affected views on transitional justice and democratic institutions. Some of these effects also persisted over time, indicating that museum experiences could have lasting attitudinal consequences.
The second case (co-authored with Elsa Voytas) focused on an exhibit on “The Troubles” at the Ulster Museum in Northern Ireland. This context differed from Chile because the conflict involved multiple groups and remained politically sensitive. The research design combined focus groups, field experiments with university students, and survey experiments with members of the general population. Although the exhibit generated strong emotional reactions among visitors, the findings showed little evidence that it significantly changed attitudes toward out-groups or transitional justice policies. Instead, political identities and sectarian divisions remained largely stable. This suggested that in deeply divided societies, emotional responses to historical narratives do not necessarily translate into meaningful changes in political attitudes.
The third case (co-authored with Francesca Parente and Ethan vanderWilden) examined the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, DC. Unlike the previous cases, the Holocaust did not directly implicate the museum’s primary audience in the same way as domestic conflicts. The research tested whether visiting the museum increased support for democratic values and reduced antisemitic attitudes. The findings showed that visits increased agreement with what Balcells and her co-authors described as “inclusive Holocaust lessons,” including stronger support for democracy, human rights, and opposition to genocide and authoritarianism. The museum also increased empathy toward Jewish people and support for Holocaust remembrance, with some effects lasting for at least one month after the visit.
Overall, the comparative analysis suggested that transitional justice museums could shape attitudes, but their effectiveness depended heavily on political and social context. Museums appeared more successful at reinforcing democratic norms and historical awareness than at transforming deeply entrenched intergroup attitudes. The presentation concluded by highlighting what Balcells referred to as the “Transitional Justice Museum Paradox”: societies that most need such institutions to promote reconciliation may also be the places where the likelihood of establishing such museums is lower, and where, if they are built, their impact is most limited.
Georgetown scholar Laia Balcells's research finds that museums commemorating past atrocities can shift political attitudes — but the extent of that shift depends on context.
On December 3, 2025, the Jan Koum Israel Studies Program at CDDRL hosted Dr. Emmanuel Navon, a French-born Israeli international relations scholar and author of The Star and the Scepter: A Diplomatic History of Israel, for a webinar moderated by Amichai Magen, Director of the Jan Koum Israel Studies Program. Covering 3,5000 years of Israeli foreign policy, Navon—a lecturer on International Relations at Tel Aviv University and a senior fellow at the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security—explored tensions between political realism (the "scepter") and idealism (the "star") that have shaped Jewish diplomatic thought throughout history. Focused on Vladimir Jabotinsky, David Ben-Gurion, and others, Navon argued that from October 7, 2023, Israeli strategic thinking shifted: facing ideologically-driven enemies willing to sacrifice everything for Israel's destruction, Israelis watched the "iron wall" doctrine of deterrence collapse physically and conceptually.
Navon noted that post-October 7 Israel must move strategically beyond containment and actively dismantle existential threats. He also described a spiritual reawakening among Israelis redefining their Jewish identities in response to unrelenting hatred. He contextualized the global focus on Israel within debates over Western values, democracy, and resistance to Islamist ideology. In response to audience questions about antisemitism, information warfare, and the blurring lines between Israeli foreign policy and diaspora concerns, Navon outlined how, through sophisticated propaganda and rhetoric centered on justice and self-determination, Israel's adversaries project their own colonial ambitions and human rights abuses onto Israel.
A full recording of the webinar can be viewed below:
Dr. Emmanuel Navon, author of “The Star and the Scepter,” explored the enduring tension between realism and idealism in Jewish diplomacy and the paradigm shift following October 7.
The October 22, 2025, session of the Israel Insights webinar series featured a discussion with Professor Azar Gat, the Ezer Weitzman Chair of National Security and Head of the International and Executive MA Programs in Security and Diplomacy in the School of Political Science, Government and International Affairs at Tel Aviv University. Hosted by the Jan Koum Israel Studies Program (JKISP) at the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law, the webinar was moderated by JKISP Director Amichai Magen. Gat described “the problem with the Palestinian problem" as outlined in his recent essay for Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies (INSS), detailing his approach to why the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has remained uniquely challenging despite decades of negotiation and apparent consensus around a two-state solution. The primary "Palestinian ethos," he argued, has not centered on creating an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel, but rather it has centered on the rectification of what is perceived as the injustice of 1948, wherein the Jewish state was established. In the Q&A, Gat and Magen explored implications for Israeli strategy, regional normalization, and the balance between realism and hope in future negotiations.
A full recording of the webinar can be viewed below:
In an Israel Insights webinar, Professor Azar Gat examined how unresolved questions of historical legitimacy have shaped decades of failed negotiations.
The starkly different paths of economic development followed by China and the West leading to the Industrial Revolution is often being attributed to environmental factors. This column argues that institutions and culture played a key role in setting Europe and China on divergent paths well before the onset of the Industrial Revolution, but the role they played was mediated by a critical difference between the two civilizations: the nature of their prevalent social organizations. A key factor behind China’s remarkable economic resurgence has been its capacity to adapt traditional institutions and cultural practices to the needs of a modern economy.
Latin American politics has undergone substantial transformation through the resurgence of Indigenous communities as political actors. This review examines Indigenous movements' evolution from social mobilization to institutional governance, analyzing how they captured political power in Bolivia and Ecuador while reshaping constitutional frameworks regionally. Indigenous identity proves endogenous to political exclusion, with census data showing dramatic increases in self-identification linked to political empowerment. Approximately 58 million Indigenous peoples (9.8% of regional population) concentrate in 2,174 municipalities where they constitute majorities. Traditional governance institutions demonstrate superior democratic practices compared to conventional systems. Contemporary challenges include environmental criminalization of defenders, digital colonialism through AI knowledge extraction, and hybrid legal pluralism. Three research priorities emerge: historical trauma as determinant of political behavior; Indigenous health disparities as political barriers; and youth political participation in urban settings. Political science must incorporate Indigenous epistemologies and recognize these communities as engines of democratic innovation.
India’s services sector is internationally renowned and has helped propel the country’s economic growth. Indeed, in recent years, a majority of the value added to India’s GDP has been concentrated in services. Especially noteworthy are India’s software and computing services, which include large multinational conglomerates like Infosys and Tata Communications Services.
Yet as Indian software has flourished, the growth of its computer hardware and manufacturing has been sluggish. Tellingly, India is still a net importer of hardware and other electronics. At first glance, this divergence is puzzling because both the software and hardware sectors should have benefited from India’s educated labor pool and infrastructure. How can these different sectoral outcomes be explained?
Fig. 1: Electronics production value compared to software and software service revenues.
In “Comparing Advantages in India’s Computer Hardware and Software Sectors,” Dinsha Mistree and Rehana Mohammed offer an explanation in terms of state capacity to meet the different functional needs of each sector. Their account of India’s computing history emphasizes the inability of various state ministries and agencies to agree on policies that would benefit the hardware sector, such as tariffs. Meanwhile, cumbersome rulemaking procedures inherited from British colonialism impeded the state’s flexibility. Although this disadvantaged India’s hardware sector, its software sector needed comparatively less from the state, building instead on international networks and the efforts of individual agencies.
The authors provide a historically and theoretically rich account of the political forces shaping India’s economic rise. The paper not only compares distinct moments in Indian history but also draws parallels with other landmark cases, like South Korea’s 1980s industrial surge. Such a sector-based analysis could be fruitfully applied to understand why different industries succeed or lag in emerging economies.
In order to become competitive — both domestically and (especially) internationally — hardware manufacturers often need much from the state, what the authors call a “produce and protect regime.” This can include the construction of factories and the formation of state-owned industries (SOEs), as well as tariffs to reduce competition or labor laws that restrict union strikes. Perhaps most importantly, manufacturers need a state whose legislators and bureaucrats can coordinate with each other in response to market challenges. Such a regime is incompatible with excessive “red tape” or with the “capture” of regulators by narrow interest groups. Because customers tend to view manufactured goods as “substitutable” with each other, firms will face intense competition as regards price and quality.
Fig. 2: Inter-agency coordination required for sectoral success.
The situation is very different for service providers, whose success depends on building strong relationships with customers. States are not essential to this process, even if their promotional efforts can be helpful. Coordination across government agencies is similarly less important, as just one agency could provide tax breaks or host promotional events that benefit service providers. Compared with manufacturing, customers tend to view services as less substitutable — they are more intangible and customizable, which renders competition less fierce. Understanding India’s computing history reveals that the state’s inability to meet hardware manufacturers’ needs severely constrained the sector’s growth.
Although India inherited a convoluted bureaucracy from the British Raj, the future of its computing industry in the 1960s seemed promising: political elites in New Delhi supported a produce-and-protect regime, relevant agencies and SOEs were created, and foreign computing firms like IBM successfully operated in the country.
Yet by the 1970s, some bureaucrats and union leaders feared that automation would threaten the federal government’s functioning and India’s employment levels, respectively. Strict controls in both the public and private sectors were thus adopted, for example, requiring trade unions — which took a strong anti-computer stance — to approve the introduction of computers in specific industries. The authors make special mention of India’s semiconductor industry. It arguably failed to develop due to lackluster government investment, the need for manufacturers to obtain multiple permits across agencies, decision makers ignoring recommendations from specialized panels, and so on.
Meanwhile, implementing protectionist policies proved challenging. For example, decisions to allow the importation of previously banned components required permission from multiple ministries and agencies. After India’s 1970s balance-of-payments crisis, international companies deemed inessential were forced to dilute their equity to 40% and take on an Indian partner. IBM then left the Indian market. At the same time, SOEs faced growing competition over government contracts and workers, owing to the growth of state-level SOEs.
The mid-1980s represented a partial turning point as Rajiv Gandhi became Prime Minister and liberalized the computing industry. Within weeks, Rajiv introduced a host of new policies and shifted the government’s focus from supporting public sector production to promoting private firms, which would no longer face manufacturing limits and would be eligible for duty exemptions. Changes to tariff rates and import limits would not require approval from multiple agencies. Meanwhile, international firms reengaged with Indian markets via the building of satellite links, facilitating cross-continental work, such as between Citibank employees in Mumbai and Santa Cruz.
However, this liberalizing period was undermined and partially reversed after 1989, when Rajiv’s Congress Party (INC) lost its legislative majority and public policy became considerably more fragmented. Anti-computerization forces, especially the powerful Indian trade unions, worked to stymie Rajiv’s reforms. Pro-market reformists were forced out of their positions in Indian bureaucracies. Rajiv was assassinated in 1991, after which Congress formed a minority government with computer advocate P. V. Narasimha Rao as PM. Yet all of this occurred at a delicate time, as India was at risk of defaulting and had almost completely exhausted its foreign exchange.
By the late 1990s, both the hardware and software sectors should have benefited from the rising global demand for computers, yet India’s history of poor state coordination hindered manufacturers. Meanwhile, software firms were able to take advantage of global opportunities given their comparatively limited needs from state actors and political networks — for example, helping European Union banks change their computer systems to Euros. Ultimately, the Indian state has powerfully shaped the fortunes of these different sectors.
*Research-in-Brief prepared by Adam Fefer.
CDDRL Research-in-Brief [4-minute read]
We show how exposure to partisan peers, under conditions requiring high stakes cooperation, can trigger the breakthrough of novel political beliefs. We exploit the large-scale, exogenous assignment of soldiers from each of 34,947 French municipalities into line infantry regiments during World War I. We show that soldiers from poor, rural municipalities---where the novel redistributive message of the left had previously failed to penetrate---voted for the left by nearly 45% more after the war when exposed to left-wing partisans within their regiment. We provide evidence that these differences reflect persuasive information provision by both peers and officers in the trenches that proved particularly effective among those most likely to benefit from the redistributive policies of the left. In contrast, soldiers from neighbouring municipalities that served with right-wing partisans are inoculated against the left, becoming moderate centrists instead.
