Governance

FSI's research on the origins, character and consequences of government institutions spans continents and academic disciplines. The institute’s senior fellows and their colleagues across Stanford examine the principles of public administration and implementation. Their work focuses on how maternal health care is delivered in rural China, how public action can create wealth and eliminate poverty, and why U.S. immigration reform keeps stalling. 

FSI’s work includes comparative studies of how institutions help resolve policy and societal issues. Scholars aim to clearly define and make sense of the rule of law, examining how it is invoked and applied around the world. 

FSI researchers also investigate government services – trying to understand and measure how they work, whom they serve and how good they are. They assess energy services aimed at helping the poorest people around the world and explore public opinion on torture policies. The Children in Crisis project addresses how child health interventions interact with political reform. Specific research on governance, organizations and security capitalizes on FSI's longstanding interests and looks at how governance and organizational issues affect a nation’s ability to address security and international cooperation.

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To mark five years since the onset of the January 25 Revolution, five Egypt scholars examined the evolving political landscape in Egypt as part of a panel titled “The Containment of Politics in Egypt,” organized by the Program on Arab Reform and Democracy (ARD). The panel featured Stanford Historian Joel Beinin, Associate Professor of Political Science at Stanford Lisa Blaydes, ARD Visiting Scholar Amr Hamzawy, Executive Director of the Tahrir Institute on Middle East Policy Nancy Okail, and ARD Associate Director Hesham Sallam. The discussion revolved around a number of key issues, including the recent legislative elections, the cohesion of the ruling coalition, the regime’s responses to various economic challenges, and the impact of state repression on spaces for political contestation and resistance.

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Abstract: Technological and social forces are allowing the growth of science outside a professionalized context.  The Internet, mobile devices, and public availability of big data are technological facilitators of “citizen science”, in part through enabling data sharing, analysis, and communication.  These technological changes now allow the entire scientific process, from funding and development of a research agenda, to conduct, analysis and dissemination and application of findings, to take place without the involvement of any science professionals or research-related institutions.  However, most ethical and regulatory frameworks for biomedical science arose from concepts of obligations of professionals and (largely not-for-profit) institutions.  We will discuss current examples of “citizen science” in biology and clinical research, and the ethical and policy implications.

About the Speaker: Mildred Cho is a Professor in the Division of Medical Genetics of the Department of Pediatrics at Stanford University, Associate Director of the Stanford Center for Biomedical Ethics, and Director of the Center for Integration of Research on Genetics and Ethics. She received her B.S. in Biology in 1984 from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and her Ph.D. in 1992 from the Stanford University Department of Pharmacology.  Her post-doctoral training was in Health Policy as a Pew Fellow at the Institute for Health Policy Studies at the University of California, San Francisco and at the Palo Alto VA Center for Health Care Evaluation.  She is a member of international and national advisory boards, including for Genome Canada, the March of Dimes, and the Board of Reviewing Editors of Science magazine.  Her current research projects examine ethical and social issues in research on the human genome and microbiome, synthetic biology and genome editing, and the ethics at the intersection of clinical practice and research.  

 

 

Mildred Cho Professor in the Division of Medical Genetics of the Department of Pediatrics and Associate Director of the Stanford Center for Biomedical Ethics Stanford University
Seminars
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This event is open to Stanford undergraduate students only. 

The Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law (CDDRL) is currently accepting applications from eligible juniors due February 12, 2016 who are interested in writing their senior thesis on a subject touching upon democracy, economic development, and rule of law (DDRL) from any university department. CDDRL faculty and current honors students will be present to discuss the program and answer any questions.

For more information on the CDDRL Senior Honors Program, please click here.

 


 

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CDDRL
Encina Hall, C152
616 Jane Stanford Way
Stanford, CA 94305-6055

(650) 725-2705 (650) 724-2996
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Senior Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies
Professor, by courtesy, of Political Science
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Stephen Stedman is a Senior Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI) and the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law (CDDRL), an affiliated faculty member at CISAC, and professor of political science (by courtesy) at Stanford University. He is director of CDDRL's Fisher Family Honors Program in Democracy, Development and Rule of Law, and will be faculty director of the Program on International Relations in the School of Humanities and Sciences effective Fall 2025.

In 2011-12 Professor Stedman served as the Director for the Global Commission on Elections, Democracy, and Security, a body of eminent persons tasked with developing recommendations on promoting and protecting the integrity of elections and international electoral assistance. The Commission is a joint project of the Kofi Annan Foundation and International IDEA, an intergovernmental organization that works on international democracy and electoral assistance.

In 2003-04 Professor Stedman was Research Director of the United Nations High-level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change and was a principal drafter of the Panel’s report, A More Secure World: Our Shared Responsibility.

In 2005 he served as Assistant Secretary-General and Special Advisor to the Secretary- General of the United Nations, with responsibility for working with governments to adopt the Panel’s recommendations for strengthening collective security and for implementing changes within the United Nations Secretariat, including the creation of a Peacebuilding Support Office, a Counter Terrorism Task Force, and a Policy Committee to act as a cabinet to the Secretary-General.

His most recent book, with Bruce Jones and Carlos Pascual, is Power and Responsibility: Creating International Order in an Era of Transnational Threats (Washington DC: Brookings Institution, 2009).

Director, Fisher Family Honors Program in Democracy, Development and Rule of Law
Director, Program in International Relations
Affiliated faculty at the Center for International Security and Cooperation
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Encina Hall, C148
616 Jane Stanford Way
Stanford, CA 94305

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Olivier Nomellini Senior Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies
Director of the Ford Dorsey Master's in International Policy
Research Affiliate at The Europe Center
Professor by Courtesy, Department of Political Science
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Francis Fukuyama is the Olivier Nomellini Senior Fellow at Stanford University's Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI), and a faculty member of FSI's Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law (CDDRL). He is also Director of Stanford's Ford Dorsey Master's in International Policy, and a professor (by courtesy) of Political Science.

Dr. Fukuyama has written widely on issues in development and international politics. His 1992 book, The End of History and the Last Man, has appeared in over twenty foreign editions. His book In the Realm of the Last Man: A Memoir will be published in fall 2026.

Francis Fukuyama received his B.A. from Cornell University in classics, and his Ph.D. from Harvard in Political Science. He was a member of the Political Science Department of the RAND Corporation, and of the Policy Planning Staff of the US Department of State. From 1996-2000 he was Omer L. and Nancy Hirst Professor of Public Policy at the School of Public Policy at George Mason University, and from 2001-2010 he was Bernard L. Schwartz Professor of International Political Economy at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University. He served as a member of the President’s Council on Bioethics from 2001-2004. He is editor-in-chief of American Purpose, an online journal.

Dr. Fukuyama holds honorary doctorates from Connecticut College, Doane College, Doshisha University (Japan), Kansai University (Japan), Aarhus University (Denmark), the Pardee Rand Graduate School, and Adam Mickiewicz University (Poland). He is a non-resident fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Rand Corporation, the Board of Trustees of Freedom House, and the Board of the Volcker Alliance. He is a fellow of the National Academy for Public Administration, a member of the American Political Science Association, and of the Council on Foreign Relations. He is married to Laura Holmgren and has three children.

(October 2025)

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Brett Carter is an Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science and International Relations at the University of Southern California, a Hoover Fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution, and a Faculty Affiliate at Stanford's Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law. He received a Ph.D. from Harvard University, where he was a fellow at the Harvard Academy for International and Area Studies.

Carter studies politics in the world's autocracies. His first book, Propaganda in Autocracies: Institutions, Information, and the Politics of Belief (Cambridge University Press), draws on the largest archive of state propaganda ever assembled — encompassing over eight million newspaper articles in six languages from nearly 60 countries around the world — to show how political institutions shape the propaganda strategies of repressive governments. It received the William Riker Prize for the Best Book in Political Economy, the International Journal of Press/Politics Hazel Gaudet-Erskine Best Book Award, Honorable Mention for the Gregory Luebbert Award for the Best Book in Comparative Politics, and Honorable Mention for the APSA Democracy & Autocracy Section's Best Book Award.

His second book, in progress, shows how politics in Africa’s autocracies changed after the fall of the Berlin Wall and how a new era of geopolitical competition — marked by the rise of China and the resurgence of Russia — is changing them again.

Carter’s other work has appeared in the Journal of Politics, British Journal of Political Science, Perspectives on Politics, Journal of Conflict Resolution, Security Studies, China Quarterly, Journal of Democracy, and Foreign Affairs, among others. His work has been featured by The New York Times, The Economist, The National Interest, and NPR’s Radiolab.

Hoover Fellow
CDDRL Affiliated Scholar
CDDRL Visiting Scholar, 2020-2021
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Encina Hall, C150
616 Jane Stanford Way
Stanford, CA 94305

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Center Fellow, Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies
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Didi Kuo is a Center Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI) at Stanford University. She is a scholar of comparative politics with a focus on democratization, corruption and clientelism, political parties and institutions, and political reform. She is the author of The Great Retreat: How Political Parties Should Behave and Why They Don’t (Oxford University Press) and Clientelism, Capitalism, and Democracy: the rise of programmatic politics in the United States and Britain (Cambridge University Press, 2018).

She has been at Stanford since 2013 as the manager of the Program on American Democracy in Comparative Perspective and is co-director of the Fisher Family Honors Program at CDDRL. She was an Eric and Wendy Schmidt Fellow at New America and is a non-resident fellow with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. She received a PhD in political science from Harvard University, an MSc in Economic and Social History from Oxford University, where she studied as a Marshall Scholar, and a BA from Emory University.

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Stanford Summer Juku on Japanese Political Economy (SSJ-JPE)

August 10-13, 2015

Oksenberg Conference Room

Stanford Japan Program at Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center

The Japan Program at the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (S-APARC) at Stanford University started Stanford Summer Juku (SSJ) in 2013.  In SSJ, researchers on Japanese politics and Japanese economy get together and discuss their research in a relaxed setting. The third annual meeting is held at Stanford on August 10-13, 2015.  The first two days again focus on research in political science/political economy and international relations, and the latter two days focus on research in economics and business.

Takeo Hoshi, Kenji E. Kushida, Phillip Lipscy

 

Report - Stanford Summer Juku 2015

 

Program

8/10/2015

8:30-9:00    Breakfast

9:00-10:15  Session I:

"Positioning Under Alternative Electoral Systems: Evidence from 7,497 Japanese Candidate Election Manifestos", Amy Catalinac (Harvard University)

Discussants:
Gary Cox (Stanford University)
Harukata Takenaka (National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies)
 

10:15-10:45  Break

10:45-12:00  Session II:

"Identifying Multidimensional Policy Preferences of Voters in Representative Democracies: A Cojoint Field Experiment in Japan", Yusaku Horiuchi (Dartmouth College), Daniel Smith (Harvard University), and Teppei Yamamoto (Massachusetts Institute of Technology)

Discussants:
Kay Shimizu (Columbia University)
Karen Jusko (Stanford University)
 

12:00-1:00  Lunch

1:00-2:15    Session III:

"Changes in Power of Japanese Prime Minister: Still Away from a Westminster Model", Harukata Takenaka (National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies)

Discussants:
Tsuneo Akaha (Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterery)
Kenji Kushida (Stanford University)
 

2:15- 3:30   Session IV:

"Territorial Issues and Support for the Prime Minister: A Survey Experiment on Rally-‘Round-the Flag Effect in Japan", Tetsuro Kobayashi (National Institute of Informatics, Japan), Azusa Katagiri (Stanford University)

Discussants:
Tsuneo Akaha (Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterery)
Daniel Smith (Harvard University)

 

8/11/2015

8:30-9:00   Breakfast

9:00-10:15 Session I:

"Institutions and central bank norm diffusion: The Bank of Japan's delayed break with the monetary orthodoxy", Gene Park (Loyola Marymount University), Saori Katada (University of Southern California), Giacomo Chiozza (Vanderbilt University)

Discussants:
Azusa Katagiri (Stanford University)
Ayako Saiki (De Netherlandsche Bank)
 

10:15-10:45  Break

10:45-12:00  Session II:

"The Political Economy of the Trans-Pacific Parternship: Implications beyond Economics", Hiroki Takeuchi (Southern Methodist University)

Discussants:
Kay Shimizu (Columbia University)
Gene Park (Loyola Marymount University)
 

12:00-1:00  Lunch

1:00-2:15    Session III:

"Lead Markets, Vertical Specialization, and Standards Competition in Electric Vehicles", Llewelyn Hughes (George Washington University)

Discussants:
Kenji Kushida (Stanford University)
Phillip Lipscy (Stanford University)
 

2:15-3:30    Session IV:

"Renegotiating the World Order: Institutional Change in International Relations (select chapters from book manuscript)", Phillip Lipscy (Stanford University)

Discussants:
Amy Catalinac (Harvard University)
Llewelyn Hughes (George Washington University)
 

6:30        Group Dinner at Gravity Bistro and Wine Bar (544 Emerson St, Palo Alto, CA 94301)
 

 

8/12/2015

8:30-9:00    Breakfast

9:00-10:15  Session I:

"Medical spending and health care utilization in Japan, 2010-2040: Projections from a Future Elderly microsimulation", Hawre Jajal (Stanford University), Brian K. Chen (University of Southern California), Karen Eggleston (Stanford University), Hideki Hashimoto (University of Tokyo), Toshiaki Iizuka (University of Tokyo), Lena Shoemaker (Stanford University), and Jay Bhattacharya (Stanford University)

Discussants:
Yong Suk Lee (Stanford University)
TBD

10:15-10:45  Break

10:45-12:00  Session II:

"The adverse effects of value-based purchasing in health care: dynamics quantile regression with endogeneity", Galina Besstremyannaya (Visiting Scholar, Stanford University)

Discussants:
Jay Battacharya (Stanford University)
Takeo Hoshi (Stanford University)

12:00-1:00  Lunch

1:00-2:15    Session III:

How Do Agricultural Markets Respond to Radiation Risk? Evidence from the 2011 Disaster in Japan", Kayo Tajima (Rikkyo University), Masashi Yamamoto (University of Toyama), and Daisuke Ichinose (Rikkyo University)

Discussants:
Satoshi Koibuchi (Chuo University and Visiting Scholar, Stanford University)
Yong Suk Lee (Stanford University)

2:15-3:30    Session IV:

"Shocks and Shock Absorbers in Japanese Bonds and Banks During the Global Financial Crisis", Hyonok Kim (Tokyo Keizai University), Yukihiro Yasuda (Hitotsubashi University), and James A. Wilcox (University of California, Berkeley)

Discussants:
Sabrina Howell (New York University)
Suparna Chakraborty (University of San Francisco)

 

8/13/2015

8:30-9:00    Breakfast

9:00-10:15  Session I:

"Impact of Financial Intermediary's Information Production on Market Value of Firm: Case Studies on the DBJ's Liquidity Providing During the Financial Crisis and the Environmental Rating of Firm", Hiroaki Suzuoka (Development Bank of Japan), Atsushi Motohashi (Development Bank of Japan), Shinya Nakamura (Development Bank of Japan), Tomoya Maruoka (Development Bank of Japan), and Takamasa Uesugi (Development Bank of Japan)

Discussants:
Jess Diamond (Hitotsubashi University)
Masami Imai (Wesleyan University)

10:15-10:45  Break

10:45-12:00  Session II:

"Selective Disclosure: The Case of Nikkei Preview Articles", William N. Goetzmann (Yale School of Management), Yasushi Hamao (University of Southern California), and Hidenori Takahashi (Kobe University)

Discussants:
Eiichiro Kazumori (University of Buffalo)
TBD

12:00-1:00  Lunch

 

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Reset of U.S. Nuclear Waste Management Strategy and Policy

Meeting 3: Consent-Based Siting

The Reset Project’s third meeting, March 9-10, 2016, will focus on another key issue: consent-based siting. In 2012, the Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future recommended a new, consent-based approach to siting future nuclear waste-management facilities. As a near-term action, the Commission recommended that future siting efforts be informed by past experience, drawing on experience gained in siting nuclear waste facilities in the U.S. and abroad. In 2013, the Secretary of Energy released the Administration’s Strategy for the Management and Disposal of Used Nuclear Fuel and High-level Radioactive Waste, which endorsed the principles underlying the BRC recommendations (adaptive, phased implementation).  Recently, the Department of Energy has invited public comment on the design of a consent-based siting process.

Critical to the success of any consent-based approach in the U.S. is that the implementer sustain public trust and confidence over decades and that there be a resolution of how power is distributed between the federal government on the one-hand and state/local governments on the other.

The Reset Project’s third meeting seeks to advance the understanding of how a consent-based siting process might be designed in the U.S.:

  1. What insights are provided from the U.S. experience for building local, Tribe and State confidence, and for initiating and sustaining consent-based siting?
  2. How can consent-based siting be informed by the experience by other nuclear projects in the U.S or internationally? 
  3. How is “consent” sought, demonstrated and sustained?
  4. What are priority areas for preparing the policy and regulatory foundations for consent-based siting?

These topics will be addressed over a two-day meeting, through presentations and panel discussions. Invited speakers will share their experience, drawing on their first-hand experience with consent-based siting – from those with direct experience at the levels of local government, Tribe and State governments, to implementers and regulatory authorities involved. Scholars and other experts will be invited to address some important ethical and legal dimensions of consent-based siting. Considerable time will be set aside for discussion and audience participation.  

Reset Conference Documents for meeting no. 3 can be accessed through this link. 

 

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For information related to the first meeting in this series, and relevant materials, please click here.

For information related to the second meeting in this series, and relevant materials, please click here.

Steering committee members
Sponsors: Precourt Institute for Energy, Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, Center for International Security & Cooperation
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This conference aims to further our understanding of the institutional cultures, funding schemes and power structures underlying transnational institutions, with a particular focus on heritage bureaucracies. We bring together scholars working at the intersection of archaeology, anthropology, sociology and law to offer a broader understanding of the intricacies of multilateral institutions and global civic society in shaping contemporary heritage governance. Speakers will provide ethnographic perspectives on the study of international organizations, such as the UN and EU, in an effort to show the entanglement of political and technical decision-making.

A 2-day international conference organized by Claudia Liuzza and Gertjan Plets.

Speakers:

Brigitta Hauser-Shäublin (Institute of Ethnology, Göttingen University)
Ellen Hertz (Institute of Ethnology, University of Neuchâtel)
Miyako Inoue (Department of Anthropology, Stanford University)
Claudia Liuzza (Department of Anthropology, Stanford University)
Brigit Müller (Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, Paris)
Elisabeth Niklason (Department of Archeaology, Stockholm University)
Gertjan Plets (Stanford Archaeology Center, Stanford University)
Cris Shore (Department of Anthropology, The University of Auckland)
Ana Vrdoljak (Department of Law, University of Technology, Sydney)

Co-sponsored by Stanford Archaeology Center, Cantor Arts Center, Department of Anthropology, Center for Russian, East European & Eurasian Studies, Stanford Humanities Center, The Europe Center, France-Stanford Center for Interdisciplinary Studies, The Mediterranean Studies Forum.

Contact: heritagebur@gmail.com

Heritage Bureaucracies Conference Flyer
Download pdf

Stanford Archaeology Center (BLDG 500)
488 Escondido Mall
Stanford Universit

Workshops
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Henry S. Rowen, a Stanford economist and professor emeritus of public policy and management, died in Palo Alto on Nov. 12, 2015. He was 90. Rowen, known affectionately as “Harry” to colleagues and friends, led a long, notable career in academia and public service. Having served in three U.S. administrations, he shaped the construction of American policy on a range of issues from entrepreneurship to intelligence. He was the Edward B. Rust Professor of Public Policy and Management, emeritus, at Stanford’s Graduate School of Business, a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, a senior fellow, emeritus, at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI), and a director emeritus of the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (APARC).

Over the course of his career, Rowen twice held positions at the RAND Corporation, first as an economist, and later as its president for five years from 1967 to 1972.

In Washington, he held several prominent positions in the Kennedy, Reagan and George H. W. Bush administrations. From 1981 to 1983, he was the chairman of the U.S. National Intelligence Council (NIC), and the assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs from 1989 to 1991.

Rowen’s interdisciplinary experiences yielded a deep knowledge of the social and political factors in nations struggling with a sustainable peace, weighing nuclear proliferation issues, and considering new forms of governance.

 

Please join us for a special celebration of Professor Rowen’s life with remarks and memories shared by a distinguished group of Harry’s professional colleagues and personal friends, including:

William Perry, 19th U.S. Secretary of Defense, Director of the Preventive Defense Project,CISAC, Stanford University

Francis Fukuyama, Director, Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law, Senior Fellow FSI, Stanford University

Thomas Fingar, Shorenstein APARC Distinguished Fellow, Stanford University

Alain Enthoven, Professor of Public and Private Management, Emeritus, Graduate School of Business, Stanford University

William Miller, Professor of Public and Private Management, Emeritus, Professor of Computer Science, Emeritus, School of Engineering, Senior Fellow Emeritus, FSI, Stanford University

Kenneth Arrow, Professor of Economics and Professor of Operations Research, Emeritus

Michael Armacost, (moderator) Shorenstein APARC Distinguished Fellow, Stanford University

A reception will follow in the Encina Hall Lobby

Conferences
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**This event has been cancelled**

 

Torben Iversen is Harold Hitchings Burbank Professor of Political Economy at Harvard. His research and teaching interests include comparative political economy, electoral politics, and applied formal theory. He is the author of Capitalism, Democracy, and Welfare (Cambridge UP 2005), Contested Economic Institutions (Cambridge UP 1999), and co-author (with Frances Rosenbluth) of Women, Work, and Power: The Political Economy of Gender Inequality (Yale UP, 2010). He is also the co-editor of Unions, Employers and Central Bankers (Cambridge UP 2000) and has published more than three dozen articles in leading journals and edited volumes. His work has won numerous American Political Science Association prizes including the Victoria Schuck Award, Best Book on European Politics and Society Award, the Luebbert Best Article Award, and the Gabriel Almond Best Dissertation Award. He is a former Guggenheim Fellow and National Fellow at the Hoover Institution. He is currently completing a book-length project with David Soskice on the political representation of economic interests in historical perspective.

 

This seminar is part of the Comparative Politics Workshop in the Department of Political Science and is co-sponsored by The Europe Center.

Torben Iversen Harold Hitchings Burbank Professor of Political Economy Speaker Harvard University
Lectures
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