Research

non-academic research and writing currently in progress

My current research and writing focuses on a few different areas:

(1) Authoritarianism, democracy, and human rights, currently with a focus on gender – for more information, see “Policy Writing”

(2) I am building out the policy implications of the work that I did at Berkeley on gender and political violence, with the intention of developing it into a non-non academic book.

(3) Tech policy and AI, with a particular focus on the social, political, and educational consequences of erosion of critical thinking and reading comprehension

(4) Examining the consequences of the bifurcation of STEM fields from the humanities and social sciences in an by tech companies

previous academic research

In my book project, which builds on the dissertation 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