non-academic projects currently in progress

I am currently working on three short non-academic policy-oriented research projects.

(1) On tech policy: I analyze why nonproliferation has come to be used as an analogy for the development of artificial intelligence (AI) and whether the global non-proliferation regime represents an appropriate model for mitigating and containing the risks from AI.

(2) On tech policy: I examine the bifurcation of STEM fields from the humanities and social sciences in and by tech companies, and the consequences for safety and society.

(3) I am working on a follow-up to my policy work on sexual violence in the conflict in Ukraine, focusing on other contexts in which gender-based violence has become a key factor.

Book Project

In my book project, which builds on the research I conducted during my PhD at Berkeley, I examine the puzzle of inconsistency in insurgent targeting of women during rebel operations. I present a theory of gender-based targeting that argues that targeting women can actually be quite costly to rebel groups, and that this behavior must be considered as part of a broader conflict dynamic between insurgents and counterinsurgents that can increase incentives for insurgents to engage in selective targeting. I find that insurgents facing domestic counterinsurgents are more likely to successfully undermine counterinsurgent success by targeting women, as opposed to foreign or regional counterinsurgents. I rely largely on original interview data I collected during my PhD, using process tracing to leverage within-case variation, and comparative case analysis to leverage between-case variation. I focus my study on three cases: Nigeria, Somalia, and Iraq.

Working Papers

• “Education, Child Marriage, and Wealth Transfer Practices: Explaining Variation in Child Marriage Reduction Between South Asia and West Africa”

• “In Defense of Hearts and Minds: Assessing Three Theories of Counterinsurgency Through the Lens of the American War of Independence”

academic research in-progress

• “The Great Equalizer?: Intersectional Dimensions and Responses to the Pandemic’s Childcare Crisis,” co-authored with Rachel Fisher, University of California, Berkeley