News

Professor Alyssa Heinze, who will be joining our department next fall, has published an article in the American Political Science Review. Her article, "Democratic Deepening or Elite Persistence? How Local Elites Adapt to Electoral Reform in Rural India," addresses the problem of "elite capture" of local governance, where local executives lack de facto political authority because they are sidelined by unelected elites. She examines one potential institutional remedy: direct elections.

Soon-to-be-PhD Alexa Federice has accepted a Postdoctoral Fellowship at the University of Vienna in the Department of Government, a leading center for research on comparative politics in Europe. It’s a six-year (!) fellowship where Alexa will get the chance to work on her very cool research agenda on party competition, polarization, and populism in Europe. Congratulations, Alexa!

Professor Heather Elko recently published an article in International Interactions titled "Relative BATNAs and the duration of international negotiations: The case of trade." Her research shows that in international negotiations, when states have more asymmetric levels of costs they each pay for not reaching an agreement, the negotiations tend to be shorter in duration. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/03050629.2026.2621402

Recent PhD Alex Cohen, along with UC Davis PhD alumni Cory Struthers and Professors Scott MacKenzie and Matthew Shugart, have published a new article in Political Research Quarterly, studying the effectiveness of intermittent advocacy and lobbying on climate-related bill outcomes in the California State Legislature. The authors develop an index of interest group diversity and show that letters of support from a diverse set of small, less politically active groups increase the likelihood that a bill passes committee.

Professors Brandon Kinne and Juan Tellez, along with current and former PhD students Anya Stewart, Shreya Murthy, and Patrick Bernhard, recently published an article in International Organization titled "Transnational Networks and Interstate Competition: How Support for Nonstate Actors Increases Conflict between States." Their research shows that government support for foreign nonstate actors -- such as terrorist organizations, rebel groups, and militias -- worsens relations between states and increases the risk of political violence.

Assistant Professor Hanno Hilbig has published "Do Autocrats Respond to Citizen Demands? Petitions and Housing Construction in the GDR" in Comparative Political Studies with Hans Lueders and Sascha Riaz. Using a novel panel of housing-related petitions to the East German government and a difference-in-differences design, the paper shows that construction was targeted at regions with higher petitioning rates. The findings demonstrate that citizen demands can yield tangible improvements in authoritarian regimes, contributing to scholarship on non-democratic responsiveness.

PhD Candidate Daniel Scates won the prestigious Bilinski Fellowship from UC Davis for the 2026-2027 academic year. This fellowship enables Daniel to focus on his research on the impacts of local and non-local exposure to Ukrainian refugees on support for the populist radical right. Congratulations Daniel!

Assistant Professor Hanno Hilbig has published "Estimating Controlled Direct Effects with Panel Data" in the Journal of the Royal Statistical Society: Series A with Matthew Blackwell, Adam Glynn, and Connor Phillips. The paper develops a new semiparametrically efficient estimator for controlled direct effects that relaxes strong identification assumptions by leveraging panel data and a parallel trends design.

Associate Professor Juan Tellez and PhD candidate Anya Stewart published "Economic Subversion in Civil Wars: Evidence from the Colombian Armed Conflict" in International Studies Quarterly. The paper introduces the concept of 'economic subversion'—rebel attacks that disrupt normal economic activity and impose large costs on the state and civilians—and tests its logic using historical data from Colombia's armed conflict (1993–2010).