Academics

Maija Harkonen, Ph.D.

WASHINGTON PROGRAM DIRECTOR AND PROFESSOR OF GOVERNMENT

Maija Harkonen has lectured at Georgetown University, John Hopkins University, CMC, St. Mary’s College of Maryland, Moscow State Institute for International Relations in Russia and Lahti University of Technology in Finland. Her courses have covered American government, comparative politics, and U.S. foreign policy. She has presented papers at national and international conferences and published articles.  During her employment in the private sector, Dr. Harkonen led multinational projects, including one in Estonia for which she secured funding from the U.S. Trade and Development Agency. In Finland, she managed a European Union funded project, helping Nordic companies establish their operations in China. While working as Director of Strategic Partnerships for FCG International, she focused on mobile healthcare technology and participated in numerous international trade delegations led by the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Employment. Prior to accepting her current position, she served as Executive Director of the Center for the Study of Democracy at St. Mary’s College of Maryland. There she organized numerous forums and public lectures and hosted members of Congress, scholars, policy experts, and international civil servants. Maija received her B.A. from the University of Texas at Austin and her doctoral and master’s degrees in Government from Georgetown University.

Zachary Courser, Ph.D.

DIRECTOR OF CMC’S POLICY LAB AND PROFESSOR OF GOVERNMENT

Zachary Courser is Director of CMC's Policy Lab and a visiting Assistant Professor of Government at Claremont McKenna College. His research agenda focuses on public policy, political parties, democracy and populism. He recently co-authored a report for the American Enterprise Institute on the need for reinstating congressional earmarking, entitled "Restoring the power of the purse: Earmarks and re-empowering legislators to deliver local benefits" (AEI, 2021). He is a contributor and editor of the volume Parchment Barriers: Political Polarization and the Limits of Constitutional Order (University Press of Kansas, 2018), the result of a year-long, multi-disciplinary research project examining the dynamics of polarization through an examination of conflicts over the American constitutional order. Prof. Courser has led several research partnerships for CMC’s Policy Lab with a variety of think tanks, including Bipartisan Policy Center, RAND Corporation, American Enterprise Institute, and the Brookings Institution. He’s a regular commentator on California and national politics on Southern California Public Radio, and has worked on Capitol Hill and for a London-based think tank. He holds a master’s and doctoral degree in government from the University of Virginia, and a bachelor’s in government from Claremont McKenna College.

Matt Glassman, Ph.D.

PROFESSOR OF GOVERNMENT

Matt Glassman is a Senior Fellow at the Government Affairs Institute at Georgetown University. He has taught courses on and off the Hill on American government, congressional process, congressional- presidential relations, and congressional leadership. He has worked in legislative politics in both Washington and New York State, and on local, state, and federal campaigns. Prior to joining GAI, Matt worked on the Hill at the Congressional Research Service for ten years. His portfolio included congressional operations, separation of powers, appropriations, judicial administration, agency design, and congressional history. He was detailed to the House Committee on Appropriations as professional staff for the Legislative Branch Subcommittee in FY2010 and FY2011. Prior to coming to Washington, Matt worked in the New York State Senate. Matt received both his doctoral and master's degrees in political science for Yale University. He also holds a bachelor's from Hamilton College.

John J. Pitney Jr., Ph.D.

ROY P. CROCKER PROFESSOR OF AMERICAN POLITICS

John J. Pitney Jr. is the Roy P. Crocker Professor of American Politics at Claremont McKenna College in Claremont, California. He received his B.A. in political science from Union College, where he was co-valedictorian. He earned his Ph.D. in political science at Yale, where he was a National Science Foundation Fellow. From 1978 to 1980, he worked in the New York State Senate. From 1983 to 1984, as a Congressional Fellow of the American Political Science Association, he worked for Senator Alfonse D'Amato of New York and the House Republican Policy Committee, chaired by Representative Dick Cheney of Wyoming. From 1984 to 1986, he was senior domestic policy analyst for the House Republican Research Committee. He joined the Claremont McKenna College faculty in 1986. From 1989 to 1991, during a leave of absence, he worked at the Research Department of the Republican National Committee, first as deputy director, then as acting director. He has written articles for The New Republic, The Weekly Standard, The Wall Street Journal, The Los Angeles Times, and Roll Call, among others. His scholarly works include The Art of Political Warfare, published in 2000 by the University of Oklahoma Press (with Joseph M. Bessette), American Government and Politics: Deliberation, Democracy, and Citizenship (Cengage), and After Reagan: Bush, Dukakis, and the 1988 Election, published in 2019 (the University Press of Kansas).

Paul Manuel, Ph.D.

VISITING PROFESSOR OF GOVERNMENT

Paul Manuel is a visiting professor of government at Claremont McKenna College’s Washington Program. He is also an affiliated professor at the McCourt School of Public Policy and the government department at Georgetown University. He previously served as the leadership program director and the IR Hurst Senior Professorial Lecturer at the School of Public Affairs at American University. Manuel founded and directed the Leadership Institute at Mount St. Mary’s University in Maryland, and, before that, he was a co-founder and executive director of the New Hampshire Institute of Politics and politics department chair at Saint Anselm College. Manuel was a tenured full professor of politics at both Mount St. Mary’s University and Saint Anselm College. He is an author or co-author of twelve books and numerous scholarly articles, with an interest in leadership, religion and politics, comparative democratization, and comparative public policy. He is a research fellow at the Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs at Georgetown and is a local affiliate at the Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies at Harvard University. He has served on the Executive Council of the New England Political Science Association. He holds a Ph.D. in government from Georgetown University and a B.A. /M.A. in political science from Boston University. He divides his time between Massachusetts and Washington, DC.