About

I am an associate professor in the Department of Government in the School of Public Affairs at American University. I study comparative politics, the political economy of development, and the causes of—and ways to mitigate—intergroup conflict, prejudice, and polarization. Much of my research involves experiments or other methods for causal inference and the collection of original survey and behavioral data. I have worked in a number of countries, including Indonesia, Colombia, Uganda, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Lebanon, and the United States. 

I am also a Co-Director of the Democratic Erosion Consortium (DEC), which is a growing network of researchers, policymakers, and practitioners using evidence-based strategies to understand and counter democratic erosion worldwide. Additionally, I am a member of the Evidence in Governance and Politics (EGAP) network and a co-convener of the Northeast Workshop in Empirical Political Science.

Previously, I was an assistant professor at the University of Pittsburgh; a fellow at the Niehaus Center for Globalization and Governance at Princeton University; and a post-doctoral fellow at the Center for Global Development in Washington, DC. I received my Ph.D. in political science from Columbia University.