*Indicates a student co-author.
Appel, Hilary. “Minority Rights, the Roma, and Neoliberal Reform in EU Accession.” East European Politics, vol. 40, no. 1, 2024, pp. 21-42.
Abstract: After the dissolution of the Soviet bloc, joining the European Union was a top priority for most East European countries. To join the EU, the Copenhagen Membership Criteria required that candidate countries develop stable democratic institutions, establish the rule of law, defend human rights, and ensure the protection of minorities in addition to creating free markets. While the EU was extraordinarily successful in promoting economic criteria for membership in minute and fundamental ways, its record of using the incentive of membership as a way of promoting and protecting minority rights was much more mixed, especially for the diverse Roma population.
Appel, Hilary. “Competing Narratives of the Russia-Ukraine War: Why the West Hasn’t Convinced the Rest.” Global Policy, vol. 15, 2024, pp. 559-569.
Abstract: This article examines the narratives surrounding Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 and beyond. Since the start of the war, Western characterizations of Russia's foreign policy as revanchist and imperialist have been overshadowed by the more successful framing by the Kremlin that its actions were driven by the need to push back on American unipolarity and Western imperialist tendencies. This article examines how the Russian narrative on the war has been embraced by leaders in core BRICS countries, shaping their position vis-a-vis Russia and the war. Drawing on theories of strategic narratives, this article highlights how leaders in China, India, Brazil and South Africa understand the war and create conditions in which Russia can prosecute its war against a neighbor with their support or acquiescence. The article concludes with a brief discussion of why theories of strategic narratives have been underappreciated relative to more standard power-based and materialist explanations of the war's outbreak, scope, and trajectory by scholars of international relations.
Appel, Hilary and Rachel Epstein, “Introduction, Russia’s War Against Ukraine.” Ethics and International Affairs, vol. 38, no. 3, Fall 2024.
Abstract: Russia's war against Ukraine has had devastating human consequences and destabilizing geopolitical effects. This roundtable takes up three critical debates in connection with the conflict: Ukraine's potential accession to the European Union; the role of Ukrainian nationalism in advancing democratization; and the degree of human rights accountability, not just for Russia, but also for Ukraine. In addition to challenging conventional wisdom on each of these issues, the contributors to this roundtable make a second, critically important intervention. Each essay explores the problem of concealed political and normative commitments within much of the research on Russia's war against Ukraine by unearthing biases intrinsic to particular conceptualizations. The collection also questions the perceived separation between "interests" and "values" that permeates policy analysis. This roundtable further draws attention to the ethical problems that scholars and policymakers bring to policy debates through the occlusion of their preexisting political commitments. It argues for greater transparency around and awareness of the ways in which values, not just evidence, inform research findings and policy positions.
Appel, Hilary and Madeline Dornfeld* '25. "Ukraine's EU Membership Prospects: Taking on Europe's Budgetary and Institutional Hurdles." PONARS Policy Memo 882, March 7, 2024.
Abstract: Before Russia's full-scale invasion in 2022, the likelihood of Ukraine joining the European Union (EU) was a distant prospect at best. Enlargement fatigue plagued many existing member states, the financial costs of membership were especially high, concerns over corruption and the quality of governance damaged Ukraine's reputation as a reliable member, and its borders were not secure. And while all these challenges persist, the debate over the Ukrainian accession has changed dramatically following the Russian full-scale invasion in February of 2022 with greater optimism over the prospects of Ukraine's accession. This policy memo examines key areas of reform that the EU must address to avoid the political traps and pitfalls that lie ahead, in particular during the renegotiation of the CAP and structural funds.
Appel, Hilary. Review of Bread and Autocracy: Food, Politics and Security in Putin's Russia, by Janetta Azarieva, Yitzhak M. Brudny, and Eugene Finkel. Nationalities Papers, September 2024.
Ascher, William and Shane Joshua Barter. Moving within Borders: Addressing the Potentials and Risks of Mass Migrations in Developing Countries. Palgrave Macmillan, 2023.
Ascher, William. “The legacy of Harold D. Lasswell’s commitment to the policy sciences of democracy: observations on Douglas Torgerson’s The Policy Sciences of Harold Lasswell.” Policy Sciences, vol. 57, 2024, pp.901-906.
Abstract: The continuity of Harold D. Lasswell’s legacy as a champion of democratic policysciences is demonstrated.
Ascher, William. “The Prospects for Ethnic Minorities in Southeast Asia: Using Policy Sciences to Avoid Analytic Pitfalls and Poor Policies.” Policy Sciences and the Human Dignity Gap: Problem Solving for Citizens and Leaders, edited by Susan G. Clark, Evan J. Andrews, and Ana E. Lambert. Springer Cham, 2024 and 2025, pp. 259-266.
Abstract: This chapter examines threats to wellbeing and culture of ethnic minorities in Southeast Asia and prospects to advance their human dignity. It focuses on this policy problem from the perspective of a development practitioner in a foreign assistance agency. It draws on all the previous chapters. The chapter starts with the standpoint of this potential practitioner. It applies the social process to understand the opportunities and risks that the Dayaks face from their own perspectives while connecting the problems, policies, and other actions that account for them. It then uses the decision process to identify those policies’ weaknesses and evaluate other possible actions. The chapter evaluates different types of policies, such as conditional cash transfers, which, from a development practitioner’s perspective, often seem a viable prospect for advancing human dignity. The chapter concludes by integrating the value categories and a reorientation to help avoid future analytic pitfalls and poor policies.
Blitz, Markof The Politics of German Idealism: Law and Social Change at the Turn of the 19th Century, by Christopher Yeomans. Choice Magazine, vol. 61, 2024.
Blitz, Mark. Review of Kantian Dignity and its Difficulties, by Karl Ameriks. Choice Magazine, vol. 62, 2024.
Blitz, Mark. Review of The Greatest of All Plagues, by David Lay Williams. Choice Magazine, vol. 62, 2024.
Blitz, Mark. Review of Regenerative Politics, by Emma Planinc. Choice Magazine, vol. 62, 2024.
Bou Nassif, Hicham. “The Lubrani Connection: Revisiting Israeli-Druze Relations in Lebanon’s 1983 War of the Mountain.” The Journal of the Middle East and Africa, vol 15, issue 2, 2024, pp. 119-149.
Abstract: This article ponders Israeli-Druze relations during Lebanon’s 1983 War of the Mountain in light of derestricted sources pertaining to the Robert C. McFarlane mission in Lebanon. After the assassination of the Lebanese President-elect Bashir Gemayel in September 1982 and the rise to the presidency of his brother Amine, Israel’s relations with Lebanon’s Christians soured. By contrast, Israel’s connections with the Lebanese Druze intensified, and the Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin threatened to establish a “Druze Canton/Israeli Protectorate” in the Shuf-Aley region. Ostensibly, Walid Jumblatt, the leader of the Druze community, allied himself during the Lebanese Civil War with the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and Syria. Untapped diplomatic documents show, however, that Jumblatt also courted Israel and developed ties with the Menachem Begin administration. Uri Lubrani, an Israeli official who recruited members of Israel’s Druze community to serve in the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) in the 1950s, played an important role in developing Israel’s ties with Jumblatt. In this paper, I flesh out the dynamics of Israel’s discrete relations with Lebanon’s Druze community and their implications on the trajectory of the Lebanese conflict.
Bou Nassif, Hicham. Review of Soldiers of Democracy? Military Legacies and the Arab Spring, by Sharan Grewal. The Middle East Journal, vol. 78, no. 1, 2024, pp. 123-124.
Bou Nassif, Hicham. “Where Will Syria Go From Here?” Washington Monthly, December 27, 2024.
Branch, Jordan. "Territory, Sovereignty and Boundaries in Digital Battlespace." Research Handbook on Cyberwarfare, edited by Tim Stevens and Joe Devanny. Edward Elgar Publishing, 2024, pp. 301-316.
Abstract: In today's digital world there are both tensions and overlaps between territorial sovereignty and the material and logical structure of the internet. By exploring how scholars and policymakers have addressed those complexities, this chapter aims to demonstrate several points. First, the threat or challenge posed by cyber operations to state sovereignty needs to be situated in the contested history of the concepts of sovereignty and territory themselves, rather than against an imagined pre-digital world of ideal-typical states. Second, the language and concepts used to discuss cyberwarfare and the internet more generally--among both policymakers and scholars--have shaped how sovereignty, territory, and borders are understood to be undermined, strengthened, or reconstituted by the internet. The tendency within a number of influential debates to frame the internet in spatial terms--including as 'cyberspace' within or through which actions occurs--sets particular bounds on those discussions and strengthens certain arguments over others. Finally, the chapter considers how to rethink some of these tensions by suggesting an adjustment in how we conceptualize institutions such as the state or borders.
Branch, Jordan. "Representing Territory Beyond the Map." Dialogues in Human Geography, May 8, 2024.
Abstract: This commentary engages with "Terrestrial Territories: From the Globe to Gaia, A New Ground for Territory," by Gonin et al., in terms of how their novel concept of terrestrial territory can be read through the importance of representations: visual, linguistic, and otherwise. This supports their effort to reframe and address the challenges of the Anthropocene.
External Grant: Branch, Jordan, Project Director. "Virtual Territories: War and the State in a Digital Age." National Endowment for the Humanities, 2024, $74,648.
Abstract: Research and writing of a scholarly monograph on the intersections of information technology, warfare, and state sovereignty with a focus on war planning, drone warfare, and digital mapping. Individual fellowship for funding work from June 2024 to July 2025.
Buccola, Nicholas. “‘Does It Matter...?’ Political Theory in the Archives of William F. Buckley Jr.” PS: Political Science & Politics, vol. 57, issue 1, 2024, pp. 94-96.
Buccola, Nicholas. “History is Present in All that We Do.” Review of Race and the American Story, by Stephanie Shonekan and Adam Seagrave. Political Science Reviewer, vol 48, no. 2, December 2024, pp. 337-342.
Shetreet, Shimon, and Hiram Chodosh, editors. Judicial Independence: Cornerstone of Democracy. Brill | Nijhoff, 2024.
Abstract: This volume offers studies by distinguished scholars and judges from different jurisdictions on the essential role of judicial independence in democracy. It includes analyses of basic constitutional principles and contemporary issues of judicial independence and judicial process in many jurisdictions and the development of international guidelines for judicial independence and judicial ethics.
Chodosh, Hiram E., and Eric Helland. “Measuring Justice and Judicial Independence: The Impractical Imperative.” Judicial Independence: Cornerstone of Democracy, edited by Shimon Shetreet and Hiram Chodosh. Brill | Nijhoff, 2024, pp. 97-108.
Courser, Zachary. Review of Splitsville USA: A Democratic Argument for Breaking Up the United States, by Christopher F. Zurn. The Review of Politics, vol. 86, issue 4, 2024, pp. 552-555.
Evrigenis, Ioannis D. "Sovereignty, Rebellion, and Golden Age: Hesiod's Legacy." Brill's Companion to the Legacy of Greek Political Thought, edited by David Carter, Rachel Foxley, and Liz Sawyer. Brill, 2024, pp. 19-44.
Abstract: At a minimum, the normative dimension of political thought involves a contrast between how things are and how they ought to be, yet it is quite common to see such inquiries also consider how things were. For the Greeks, it was Hesiod who set the language and conceptual framework for this practice in motion, when he asked how the world came to be and what our place in it is. His poems shaped the beliefs and political theories of the Greeks and Romans. As theorists of the state of nature would do later, those who deployed the golden age did so with a number of different goals in mind. While sometimes it marked the beginning of a tale of deterioration, at others it signified a promise or potential that could be attained once more. Hesiod’s legacy is revealed in his influence on thinkers who rejected his theology as fabulous or allegorical, but nevertheless used his stories of sovereignty, rebellion, and the golden age.
Evrigenis, Ioannis and Mark Somos. “Rhetorical Strategy and Legal Force in Pufendorf’s State of Nature.” Pufendorf's International Political and Legal Thought, edited by Peter Schröder. Oxford University Press, 2024, pp. 59-82.
Abstract: This chapter shows that Pufendorf cast the state of nature in an innovative form of legal fiction by extending and adapting, rather than refuting, Hobbes’s rhetorical agenda for formulating and deploying the state of nature theme. Pufendorf based his approach to Hobbes’s state of nature on his own conceptualization of legal fictions, the forms they can assume, and the roles that they can play, yielding a more technically legal and narrower conception of the state of nature. Having missed this aspect of Pufendorf’s approach, influential commentators have misrepresented both Pufendorf’s relationship to Hobbes and the significance of Pufendorf’s legal and international thought.
Evrigenis, Ioannis, Jack Miller Center Grant for MA Teacher Civic Education Training, 2024, $28,000.
Fortner, Michael Javen. “Race, Class, Bitter Fruit, and the Big Apple: A Short Story.” Polity, vol. 56, no. 2, 2024, pp. 285-296.
Fortner, Michael Javen and Cameron Stevens. “Crime, punishment, and urban criminal justice systems in the United States.” Handbook of Urban Politics, edited by Ronald K. Vogel. Edward Elgar Publishing, 2024, pp. 480-503.
Abstract: Public safety is a city interest, but when and how local governments employ their capacities to affect crime rates and social order is an under examined subject in urban politics. This chapter traces rates of urban crime and incarceration from the 1960s to 2020, assessing the explanatory power of scholarly literature on both subjects. In doing so, it finds that, while the literature on mass incarceration stresses the causal significance of federal and state-level policies and capacities, examining the political and organizational dynamics of urban criminal justice systems expands our understanding of crime and punishment in the United States. Further, consistent with pluralist predictions about urban democracy, it finds city politics impacts urban criminal justice policies. At the same time, it shows that this impact is mediated by the economic and political limits of cities and the organizational logics of local law enforcement agencies. It concludes by proposing an outline for future research on crime, punishment, and urban criminal justice systems in the United States.
Fortner, Michael Javen and Liann Bielicki. “Race, class, and urban politics in the United States.” Handbook of Urban Politics, edited by Ronald K. Vogel. Edward Elgar Publishing, 2024, pp. 156-179.
Abstract: This chapter studies the evolution of racial politics in cities in the United States, and its relationship to the historical interaction of racism and capitalism. First, it describes and explains the development of racial politics in industrial American cities before the early 1960s: a period supposedly characterized by ethnic pluralism and accommodation. Second, it examines the eruption of racial conflict in post-industrial American cities: a moment defined by the quest for “Black Power.” Third, it explores how immigration from Latin America and Asia has impacted the logic of urban political conflict and racial formation in the United States. Finally, it concludes by exploring the potential trajectories that the politics of race might take in the future.
Fortner, Michael. “Technocratic Liberalism Silences Those it Seeks to Help.” Fusion, October 24, 2024.
Koch, Lisa Langdon. “Punishment and blame: How core beliefs affect support for the use of force in a nuclear crisis.” Conflict Management and Peace Science, vol. 41, issue 6, pp. 649-669.
Abstract: How do Americans’ core beliefs about punishment, and their intuitions about which actors deserve blame, shape attitudes toward the use of force against a hostile state? I apply insights from recent work in social psychology to investigate the causal mechanisms linking punitive beliefs to support for a nuclear strike. In a large-N study, I find that the strength and ethical logic underlying beliefs about punishment affect attitudes regarding the use of nuclear weapons, and who to blame for the crisis, which mediates the causal pathway. Those who ground their support for severe punishment not in the logic of moral justice, but in societal benefit, are more likely to hold foreign citizens socially responsible for their state's actions.
Koch, Lisa Langdon. Review of Volatile States in International Politics, by Eleonora Mattiacci. H-Diplo: Robert Jervis International Security Studies Forum Roundtable Review, 16-2, 2024, 9-11.
Miller, Kenneth, et al. Kosmont-Rose Institute 2024 Cost of Doing Business Survey. Rose Institute of State and Local Government, 2024.
Abstract: Claremont McKenna College’s Rose Institute of State and Local Government is pleased to present the Kosmont-Rose Institute 2024 Cost of Doing Business Survey. The Survey presents comparative information on business costs, including taxes, fees, wages, and rents, in 216 cities. Most of this Survey’s cities are either in a four-county region in Southern California (Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, and San Bernardino Counties) or are top out-of-state destinations for businesses when they leave the state. The Survey tests the widely held perception that it is more expensive to do business in California than in other states and that some parts of California are more costly than others. Our findings generally confirm these beliefs. Overall, cities in Los Angeles County were more costly places to do business, with Santa Monica ranking as the Survey’s most expensive city. By contrast, most of the lowest cost cities were outside of California, with Boise, Idaho, ranking as the least costly.
Sinclair, J. Andrew, and Kenneth Miller. “CMC-Rose Institute Polling Report: October 2024.” Report of the Rose Institute of State and Local Government, October 2024.
Miller, Kenneth P., and Jemma Nazarali. “Overview of Statewide Ballot Measures.” Rose Institute of State and Local Government, November 2024.
Miller, Kenneth P., and Joan Hanson*, “Did the 2024 election signal a political shift in the Inland Empire and California?” The San Bernardino Sun, November 18, 2024.
Miller, Kenneth P., and Katherine Lanzalotto*. “How to get informed on California's 10 statewide ballot measures.” The San Bernardino Sun, October 10, 2024.
Miller, Kenneth P., and Quinten Carney*. “Inland Empire races will help determine how progressive the legislature will be.” The San Bernardino Sun, August 23, 2024.
Miller, Kenneth P., and Quinten Carney*. “These 2 Southern California swing districts could help determine control of Congress.” The San Bernardino Sun, August 9, 2024.
Miller, Kenneth P., and Chad McElroy*. “Businesses fleeing California's high costs should consider the Inland Empire.” The San Bernardino Sun, July 24, 2024.
Miller, Kenneth P., and Nikhil Agarwal*. “Can Ontario airport count on cargo growth?” Inland Valley Daily Bulletin, February 22, 2024.
Murray, Jean-Pierre. “Contesting the Securitization of Migration: NGOs, IGOs, and the Security Backlash.” International Studies Quarterly, vol. 68, issue 4, December 2024.
Abstract: Studies of migration-related security concerns have focused on the emergence of these concerns through securitization or their potential dissolution through desecuritization. This paper challenges the conventional view of these processes—securitization and desecuritization—as oppositional and mutually exclusive. Instead, it argues that they are imbricated in complex ways in an arena of contestation where actors vie for legitimacy and justify their claims through ongoing actions and reactions. Focusing on the Global South case of securitized migration in the Dominican Republic, this paper conceptualizes desecuritization not as a discrete outcome measured by success or failure, but as a dynamic process evolving through interactions with securitization. By examining the role of non-state actors in contesting securitized policies, the paper reveals that such contestation can paradoxically intensify securitization through a “security backlash” that delegitimizes these actors and discredits their rights-based claims. This dynamic underscores the “resilience” of securitization amidst persistent contestation. Ultimately, the paper demonstrates desecuritization as iterative contestation rather than static outcomes, emphasizing the agency of non-state actors in shaping security narratives and practices while acknowledging their limitations against powerful state actors. These insights from a study of South–South migration extend the application of the securitization framework beyond convenient Western contexts and challenge perceived geographic boundaries.
Pears, Emily. Review of Demagogues in American Politics, by Charles Zug. American Political Thought, vol. 13, no. 3, 2024, pp. 407-441.
Pei, Minxin. The Sentinel State: Surveillance and the Survival of Dictatorship in China. Harvard University Press, 2024.
Abstract: For decades China watchers argued that economic liberalization and increasing prosperity would bring democracy to the world's most populous country. Instead, the Communist Party's grip on power has only strengthened. Why? The answer lies in the effectiveness of the Chinese surveillance state. And the source of that effectiveness is not just advanced technology like facial recognition AI and mobile phone tracking. These are important, but what matters more is China's vast, labor-intensive infrastructure of domestic spying. Central government data on Chinese surveillance is confidential, so Pei turned to local reports, police gazettes, leaked documents, and interviews with exiled dissidents to provide a detailed look at the evolution, organization, and tactics of the surveillance state. Following the 1989 Tiananmen uprising, the Chinese Communist Party invested immense resources in a coercive apparatus operated by a relatively small number of secret police officers capable of mobilizing millions of citizen informants to spy on those suspected of disloyalty. The CCP's Leninist bureaucratic structure—whereby officials and party activists penetrate every sector of society and the economy, from universities and village committees to delivery companies, telecommunication firms, and Tibetan monasteries—ensures that Beijing's eyes and ears are truly everywhere. While today's system is far more robust than that of years past, it is modeled after mass surveillance implemented under Mao Zedong and Chinese emperors centuries ago. This book contributes to our knowledge about coercion in the Chinese state and, more generally, the survival strategies of authoritarian regimes.
Pei, Minxin. "Do Chinese Leaders and Elites Think Their Best Days Are Behind Them?" China Leadership Monitor, August 30, 2024.
Abstract: Despite its current economic slump, official statements by senior Chinese leaders indicate that they remain optimistic about the country's economic future. They have responded critically to the "peak China" thesis, providing a lengthy list of favorable factors in support of their optimistic assessment of China's future trajectory, such as the country's advantages of scale, accumulated economic resources and technological capabilities, and its new development framework crafted to mitigate the effects of U.S.-led containment. Although Chinese leaders' optimism is partly grounded in reality, it may be premature because the country's immense potential will unlikely be realized without effective implementation of the necessary reforms. Examination of statements by senior Chinese leaders does not provide useful clues as to whether or when Chinese power will peak. However, it does show that Chinese leaders do not believe that their best days are behind them.
Pei, Minxin. “Piercing the Veil of Secrecy: The Surveillance Role of China's MSS and MPS.” China Leadership Monitor, February 29, 2024.
Abstract: China has two security services responsible for domestic surveillance. The "political security protection" bureau of the Ministry of Public Security and its local equivalents perform most of the duties of domestic political spying. The Ministry of State Security and its local outfits play a largely secondary role in domestic political spying, with a remit to target individuals suspected of external connections or being ethnic minorities. Not much is known about the organization, size, and operational tactics of these two secret police services due to the secrecy surrounding them. This analysis uses open-source materials to construct a basic profile of their organizational structure, missions, and activities.
Pei, Minxin. “Why China Can't Export Its Model of Surveillance: It's Not the Tech That Empowers Big Brother in Beijing – It's the Informants.” Foreign Affairs, February 6, 2024.
Abstract: China's effective mass surveillance program relies on both hi-tech equipment and labor-intensive organization. This makes it hard for other less well-organized autocracies to copy China's system. Although China can export its hardware to these dictatorships, it is unlikely that they can acquire the same degree of sophistication and effectiveness as China has.
Pei, Minxin. Review of The Rise and Fall of the EAST: How Exams, Autocracy, Stability, and Technology Brought China Success, and Why They Might Lead to Its Decline, by Yasheng Huang. The China Quarterly, vol. 258, 2024, pp. 562-564.
External Grant: Pei, Minxin, “China Leadership Monitor.” Smith Richardson Foundation, 2024, $281,166.
Pei, Minxin. “Xi May Be Facing a No Good, Very Bad 2025.” Bloomberg, December 25, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “Assad’s Fall Should Be a Teachable Moment for China.” Bloomberg, December 16, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “Trump Wants Hitler’s Generals? That’s Xi’s Problem.” Bloomberg, December 11, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “Trump Is a Golden Opportunity. China Will Waste It.” Bloomberg, December 3, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “Hey, Elon. You Know Who Else Was a Disruptor? Mao.” Bloomberg, November 27, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “Biden’s China Policy Deserves a Second Life.” Bloomberg, November 19, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “Trump’s Biggest China Problem Won’t Be Trade.” Bloomberg, November 11, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “China Could Regret Not Buying More Trump Insurance.” Bloomberg, October 31, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “To Win EV Battle With Europe, China Needs to Lose.” Bloomberg, October 23, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “The Middle East Is a Quagmire for China, Too.” Bloomberg, October 7, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “China Should Get Serious About Peace in Ukraine.” Bloomberg, October 1, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “China’s to Blame for Breakup With Japan.” Bloomberg, September 24, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “The Game Isn’t Over for China But It Is ‘Garbage Time.’” Bloomberg, September 22, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “China Wants More Than Minerals From the Global South.” Bloomberg, September 11, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “Harris Doesn’t Have Much to Say About China. That’s Good.” Bloomberg, September 4, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “Beijing Needs Carrots, Not Sticks in South China Sea.” Bloomberg, August 25, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “China’s New Internet ID Shows Xi’s Insecurities.” Bloomberg, August 12, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “US-China Rivalry Is Destabilizing the Middle East.” Bloomberg, August 6, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “China’s Problem Isn’t Its Potential But Its Politics.” Bloomberg, July 31, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “What Trump and Vance Get Wrong About China.” Bloomberg, July 24, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “Why China Can’t Keep Its Cooking Oil Clean.” Bloomberg, July 17, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “US and China Aren’t in Another Cold War. It’s Worse.” Bloomberg, July 10, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “How Likely Is War Over Taiwan? Watch These Three Numbers.” Bloomberg, July 3, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “The US Is Learning the Wrong Cold War Lessons on China.” Bloomberg, June 24, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “US and China Are Forgetting What Red Lines Are For.” Bloomberg, June 12, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “Russia’s Gain Is Turning Out to Be China’s Pain.” Bloomberg, June 6, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “To Beat China, US Should Stop Acting Like China.” Bloomberg, May 30, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “Taiwan’s New Leader Can’t Talk His Way Out of Trouble.” Bloomberg, May 16, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “Putin Can’t Offer Enough for China’s Help in Ukraine.” Bloomberg, May 12, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “Xi’s European Tour Is a Salvage Mission.” Bloomberg, May 2, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “China’s Hands Are Tied Against Tangle of US Alliances.” Bloomberg, April 16, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “What Did Yellen Get Out of China? Enough.” Bloomberg, April 8, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “China’s Economy Needs a Strategy, Not a Buzzword.” Bloomberg, April 4, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “Hong Kong Is Becoming China in More Ways Than One.” Bloomberg, March 28, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “A US TikTok Ban May Not Be a Huge Loss for China.” Bloomberg, March 19, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “Beijing’s Pain Could Be Washington’s Gain.” Bloomberg, March 10, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “This Party Is Lame. China Should Spike the Punchbowl.” Bloomberg, February 28, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “Russia Might Win in Ukraine. China Can’t.” Bloomberg, February 21, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “What China Really Needs Is More Bad News.” Bloomberg, February 8, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “China’s 1% Is Watching the Other 99%.” Bloomberg, February 4, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “China Had Better Start Buying Some Trump Insurance.” Bloomberg, January 24, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “Whoever Wins in the Red Sea, China Can’t Lose.” Bloomberg, January 17, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “Taiwan Isn’t What’s Dividing the US and China.” Bloomberg, January 10, 2024.
Pei, Minxin. “China Is Taking Legal Secrecy to Uninvestible Levels.” Bloomberg, January 4, 2024.
Pitney, Jr., John J. “Thirty Years After the House GOP Takeover. Public Discourse, July 30, 2024.
Shields, Jon. “How Universities Die.” The Chronicle of Higher Education, September 4, 2024.
Shields, Jon. “JD Vance, Former Cultural Conservative.” Discourse, September 3, 2024.
Sinclair, J. Andrew, R. Michael Alvarez, Betsy Sinclair, and Christian R. Grose. “Electoral Innovation and the Alaska System: Partisanship and Populism Are Associated With Support for Top-4/Ranked-Choice Voting Rules.” Political Research Quarterly, vol. 77, issue 4, 2024, pp. 1196-1211.
Abstract: In 2020, Alaskans voted to adopt a nonpartisan top-4 primary followed by a ranked-choice general election. Proposals for “final four” and “final five” election systems are being considered in other states, as well as ranked-choice voting. The initial use of Alaska’s procedure in 2022 serves as a test case for examining whether such reforms may help moderate candidates avoid being “primaried.” In 2022, incumbent Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski held her seat against a Trump-endorsed Republican, Kelly Tshibaka. We use data from the 2022 election in Alaska, along with a mixed-mode survey of Alaskan voters before the general election, to test hypotheses about how voters behave in these kinds of elections, finding: (1) the moderate Republican candidate, Murkowski, likely would have lost a closed partisan primary; (2) some Democrats and independents favored the moderate Republican over the candidate of their own party, and the new rules allowed them to support her at all stages of the election, along with others who voted for her to stop the more conservative Republican candidate; and (3) that Alaskan voters are largely favorable toward the new rules, but that certain kinds of populist voters are likely to both support Trump and oppose the rules.
Sinclair, J. Andrew. “The Surprisingly Popular Bureaucracy: New survey shows wide support for the political independence of the federal government.” 3Streams, November 24, 2024.
Sinclair, J. Andrew, and Kenneth Miller. “CMC-Rose Institute Polling Report: October 2024.” Report of the Rose Institute of State and Local Government, October 2024.
Echeverri-Gent, John, Aseema Sinha, and Andrew Wyatt. “Modi's Mixed Record as an Economic Reformer.” The Troubling State of India’s Democracy, edited by Dinsha Mistree, Šumit Ganguly, and Larry Diamond. University of Michigan Press, 2024, pp. 230-258.
Thomas, George. “Popular Understandings and the Limits of Popular Democracy.” Critical Review, vol. 36, no. 3, 2024, pp. 311-322.
Abstract: This essay focuses on how more democratic processes and more democratic participation are not in themselves good measures for a successful democratic order. Rather, whether more democratic participation is good depends on the type of knowledge the people actually bring to the political order. Increases in democratic participation are, thus, a misleading measure of democratic success. The crucial point is what sort of knowledge the people bring to democratic discourse. Furthermore, political and civic institutions play a key role in fostering and shaping public understandings. Here, I suggest that American institutions, while designed to help educate popular understandings by requiring the building of complex democratic majorities, have in many instances enabled the worst aspects of popular government, often empowering minority rule, rather than refining popular sentiment. Thus, American political institutions could engage in constitutional reform to recapture the balance between popular understandings and the constitutional institutions that help articulate, educate, and refine those understandings.
Thomas, George. “The Constitution at War with Itself: Race, Citizenship, and the Forging of American Constitutional Identity.” Deciphering the Genome of Constitutionalism: The Foundations and Future of Constitutional Identity, edited by in Ran Hirschl and Yaniv Roznai. Cambridge University Press, 2024, pp. 204-215.
Thomas, George. “Justice O'Connor's Pragmatic Jurisprudence.” Real Clear Public Affairs, October 21, 2024.
Jiménez, Tomás R., and César Vargas Nuñez. “Going Local: Public Attitudes toward Municipal Offices of Immigration Affairs." American Political Science Review, vol. 118, issue 3, 2024, pp. 1533 - 1540.
Abstract: Local governments have been increasingly active in immigration policy by cooperating with federal immigration enforcement or creating local offices of immigrant affairs (OIA) charged with integrating immigrants. How do these policies shape perceptions of locales following these policy routes? Using a set of pre-registered survey experiments, we find that compared to local cooperation with federal immigration enforcement, creating an OIA produces more favorable public attitudes, with minimal differences when undocumented immigrants also receive access to services. Democrats, especially white Democrats, have the most favorable views of cities with an OIA. While Republicans prefer cooperation with ICE, their attitudes toward cities with OIAs remain positive. Our findings suggest that despite partisan polarizing immigration policy debates, establishing OIAs does not attract the negative political attention common in an era of hyperpolarization. OIAs could be a rare immigration policy that may be effective and supported.
Flores-Macías, Gustavo, and Jessica Zarkin “The Consequences of Militarized Policing for Human Rights: Evidence from Mexico.” Comparative Political Studies, vol. 57, issue 3, pp. 387-418.
Abstract: What are the consequences of the militarization of public safety? Governments increasingly rely on militaries for policing, but the systematic study of this phenomenon's consequences for human rights has been neglected. NGO and journalistic accounts point to widespread violations by the military, but these snapshots do not necessarily present evidence of systematic abuse. Based on unique data on military deployments and human rights complaints in Mexico, we conduct a systematic, country-wide study of the consequences of constabularization for human rights. Following matching and difference-in-difference strategies, we find that it leads to a 150% increase in complaints against federal security forces. We also leverage deployments for disaster-relief operations and complaints against non-security institutions to show that the increase is not due to underlying conditions or higher reporting in the military's presence. The findings have important implications for our understanding of quality of democracy and the democratic ideals of civilian policing.
Shetreet, Shimon, and Hiram Chodosh, editors. Judicial Independence: Cornerstone of Democracy. Brill | Nijhoff, 2024.
Abstract: This volume offers studies by distinguished scholars and judges from different jurisdictions on the essential role of judicial independence in democracy. It includes analyses of basic constitutional principles and contemporary issues of judicial independence and judicial process in many jurisdictions and the development of international guidelines for judicial independence and judicial ethics.
Chodosh, Hiram E., and Eric Helland. “Measuring Justice and Judicial Independence: The Impractical Imperative.” Judicial Independence: Cornerstone of Democracy, edited by Shimon Shetreet and Hiram Chodosh. Brill | Nijhoff, 2024, pp. 97-108.