MPSA Council

Rikhil Bhavnani is a Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, where he serves as the Associate Chair and Director of Graduate Studies. He is also a Faculty Affiliate at the La Follette School of Public Affairs, the Data Science Institute, the Elections Research Center, and the Center for South Asia. Professor Bhavnani was previously the Director of the Center for South Asia.

Professor Bhavnani’s research focuses on the political economy of development and migration, and on inequalities in political representation, mainly in South Asia. He is currently working on a book, joint with Saumitra Jha, on the conditions under which mass, nonviolent mobilizations can succeed. Professor Bhavnani is the co-author, with Bethany Lacina, of a book on the backlash against within-country migration across the developing world, published by Cambridge University Press. His papers have been published in various journals, including the American Political Science Review, the American Journal of Political Science, and the Journal of Politics.

Prior to starting at UW–Madison, Professor Bhavnani was a visiting fellow at the Center for the Study of Democratic Politics at Princeton University. He has worked at the Center for Global Development and the International Monetary Fund, and received a PhD in political science and an MA in economics from Stanford University, and a BA in political science and economics from Yale University. Professor Bhavnani’s pronouns are he/him.

Jennifer L. Merolla is a Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of California, Riverside, and serves as Director of the Identity and Politics Lab. She was previously Chair of the Department of Political Science (2021-2024) and a field editor for the Journal of Politics (2015-2019). Merolla’s research focuses on how the political environment shapes individual attitudes and behavior across many domains such as candidate evaluations during elections, immigration policy attitudes, foreign policy attitudes, and support for democratic values and institutions. She is co-author of Democracy at Risk: How Terrorist Threats Affect the Public (University of Chicago Press 2009), Framing Immigrants: News Coverage, Public Opinion and Policy (Russell Sage Foundation 2016), and Change and Continuity in the 2020 and 2022 Elections (Rowman & Littlefield 2023). Merolla’s work has appeared in various journals, and her research has been supported by the National Science Foundation, the Russell Sage Foundation, and Time Sharing Experiments in the Social Sciences. She received a PhD in political science from Duke University, and a BA from Boston College.

Ted Brader is a Professor of Political Science at the University of Michigan, where he is also a Research Professor in the Center for Political Studies at the Institute for Social Research. From 2014 to 2022, he served as a Principal Investigator of the American National Election Studies. He also has served as an associate principal investigator for Time-sharing Experiments for the Social Sciences (TESS) since 2009. His research examines how public opinion and political behavior are shaped by emotions, partisanship, social identities, group attitudes, and media messaging; he also studies survey and experimental methods. Current projects focus on debates over immigration, claims of religious freedom, the perspectives of rural Americans, and partisan stereotyping. He is the author of numerous scientific papers and of Campaigning for Hearts and Minds (Chicago 2006), which has received awards for its lasting impact in the fields of political communication (2015) and elections, public opinion, and voting behavior (2022). He received his B.A. from Dartmouth College and his Ph.D. from Harvard University.

Christina Wolbrecht is professor of political science, director of the Rooney Center for the Study of American Democracy, and C. Robert and Margaret Hanley Family Director of the Notre Dame Washington Program. Her most recent book, A Century of Votes for Women: American Elections Since Suffrage (with J. Kevin Corder, Cambridge 2020), examines how women voted across the first 100 years since the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment. Wolbrecht also is the co-author of Counting Women's Ballots: Female Voters from Suffrage Through the New Deal (Cambridge 2016) and the author of The Politics of Women’s Rights: Parties, Positions, and Change (Princeton 2000), both of which were recognized with political science book awards. Wolbrecht has authored or co-authored articles on such topics as women as political role models, the representation of women, and partisan position-taking on education policy. She is co-editor, with Susan Franceschet, of the journal Politics & Gender, and a founding executive board member of WomenAlsoKnowStuff, an initiative to advance women experts in political science.

Meegan Isenhour, CAE joined MPSA in 2013 and has been serving in the role of Executive Director since 2022. She is responsible for the day-to-day operations of the MPSA including staff management and coordination, human resource management, policy and procedure development and implementation, project management, and governance committees.

A graduate of Indiana University, Meegan is a Certified Association Executive® with more than twenty years of non-profit association management experience.

In her spare time, Meegan enjoys reading, hiking, traveling, and spending time with her husband, daughter, and dogs.

Kathleen Dolan is Distinguished Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee and Co-Editor in Chief of American Journal of Political Science. She received her Ph.D from the University of Maryland. Her research focuses on gender politics, public opinion, elections, and voting behavior, with a specific focus on how the public evaluates women candidates. Dolan is the author of two books: When Does Gender Matter? Women Candidates and Gender Stereotypes in American Elections (Oxford University Press, 2014) and Voting for Women: How the Public Evaluates Women Candidates (Westview Press, 2004). Her work has also appeared in numerous peer-reviewed journals. She has served as co-editor of the journal Politics & Gender and as a member of the board of the American National Election Studies.

Jennifer L. Lawless is the Leone Reaves and George W. Spicer Professor of Politics at the University of Virginia, where she’s also the Department Chair. Lawless’ research focuses on political ambition, campaigns and elections, and media and politics. She is the author or co-author of seven books, including Women on the Run: Gender, Media, and Political Campaigns in a Polarized Era (with Danny Hayes) and It Still Takes a Candidate: Why Women Don't Run for Office (with Richard L. Fox). Her research, which has been supported by the National Science Foundation, has appeared in numerous academic journals, and is regularly cited in the popular press. She has served as editor of Politics & Gender and as a member of the board of the American National Election Studies. She graduated from Union College with a B.A. in political science, and Stanford University with an M.A. and Ph.D. in political science.

Bethany Lacina is an associate professor at the University of Rochester Department of Political Science. Her research interests are migration, conflict and ethnic identities. Her forthcoming book, Strangers and Settlers, compares international and domestic anti-migration movements.

Dr. Cecilia Hyunjung Mo (Ph.D. Political Economics and M.A. Political Science from Stanford University; MPA in International Development from Harvard University; M.A. Education from Loyola Marymount University; and B.A. in Interdisciplinary Studies and Mathematics from the University of Southern California) is the Judith E.Gruber Associate Professor of Political Science and Public Policy at University of California, Berkeley. She is also a Nonresident Scholar of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, a Scientific Advisor for Innovations for Poverty Action, and the Faculty Director of UC Berkeley’s Master of Computational Social Science program.

Dr. Mo conducts basic research in behavioral political economy and aspirations-based models of politics, alongside applied work on democratic citizenship, human trafficking, immigration, inequality, and prejudice. She specializes in experimental methods, impact evaluations, and survey research. Her work has appeared in leading journals including American Political Science Review, American Journal of Political Science, Journal of Politics, and PNAS. She has received multiple awards from the American Political Science Association, including the Franklin L. Burdette/Pi Sigma Alpha Award and the Emerging Scholar in Elections, Public Opinion, and Voting Behavior Award.

Her research has appeared in journals including the American Political Science Review, the American Journal of Political Science, the Journal of Politics, International Organization, and World Politics. Her book, Dictators at War and Peace, explores the domestic politics of international conflict in dictatorships, and was published in 2014 in the Cornell Studies in Security Affairs Series at Cornell University Press. Weeks is the 2018 recipient of the International Studies Association Karl Deutsch Award, recognizing the scholar under 40 who has made the most significant contribution to the study of international relations. Professor Weeks received her B.A. in political science from The Ohio State University in 2001, a Master’s degree in international history from the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in 2003, and a PhD in political science from Stanford University in 2009. Prior to joining the Wisconsin faculty, Professor Weeks was an Assistant Professor of Government at Cornell University.

Candis Watts Smith is Professor of Political Science at Duke University, where she also received her B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. in Political Science. Her research expertise highlights the role race, racism, and structural inequality play in shaping the American political landscape. She the author or co-author of Black Mosaic: The Politics of Black Pan-Ethnic Identity (NYU Press, 2014), Stay Woke: A People’s Guide to Making Black Lives Matter (NYU Press, 2019); Racial Stasis: The Millennial Generation and the Stagnation of Racial Attitudes in American Politics (University of Chicago Press, 2020); and The History of Race and Politics in America, 1968-Present (Audible Original, 2022). Candis is a co-host of the Democracy Works podcast, and she has given a TED talk on three myths about racism in America that has been viewed over 2 million times.

Zeynep Somer-Topcu is an Associate Professor in the Department of Government at the University of Texas at Austin. She received a PhD in political science from the University of California, Davis, and a BA from Bogazici University (Istanbul, Turkey). Her research is on the comparative analysis of political parties, elections, and electoral behavior with a focus on advanced parliamentary democracies. In her various publications and projects, she examines political parties' campaign and organizational strategies and their perceptual and behavioral consequences for voters. Somer-Topcu is co-author of Glass Ceilings, Glass Cliffs, and Quicksands: Gendered Party Leadership in Parliamentary Systems (Cambridge University Press 2025), and author or co-author of over twenty academic articles in various journals. She currently serves as one of the chief editors of the British Journal of Political Science and Research & Politics, and is the Chair of the Diversity Committee of the European Political Science Association.

Lawrence Ezrow is a Professor of Government at the University of Essex. He also served as the Chair for the Department of Government from 2016-2019, and as Section Chair for the “Representation and Electoral Systems” Section of the American Political Science Association from 2015-2017. His research interests include elections, political representation, parties’ election strategies, policy diffusion, and European Politics. He has published articles in the American Journal of Political Science, American Political Science Review, British Journal of Political Science, Comparative Political Studies, European Journal of Political Research, International Studies Quarterly, Journal of Politics, Journal of Public Policy, Party Politics, Political Science Research and Methods, Research and Politics, West European Politics, and World Politics.

AWARD-WINNING SCHOLAR. AUTHOR. ADVOCATE. FOUNDER. FILMMAKER.
I am a professor (tenure-track) at Northwestern University. Previously, I held appointments at Duke University, the University of Pennsylvania, Harvard University and Princeton University.
My research sits at the intersections of race, gender, public institutions and political behavior. My newest book, Closed for Democracy, is on how public school closures undermine the citizenship of Black Americans (Cambridge University Press). Research from this book was recently published in the American Political Science Review and Perspectives on Politics.

My newest research is focused on the punishment of Black women and girls and its political consequences. An article based on this work was named the “Best Paper on Intersectionality” from the American Political Science Association (APSA), and awarded the Rodney Higgins “Best Faculty Paper” from the National Conference of Black Political Scientists (NCOBPS).

My first book, How Girls Achieve (2019) highlights how the biased educational experiences of Black girls in the U.S. and Africa limit their ability to achieve democratic equity. It received the 2020 Prose Award in Education Practice and Social Science by the American Publishers Association; the 2020 Critics’ Choice Book Award from the American Educational Studies Association, and the 2021 Jackie Kirk Outstanding Book Award from the Comparative International Education Society.

In addition to research, I advocate for Black girls. I am the founder of Herstory: the TWII Foundation Girls Scholarship. I have an award winning film titled, HerStory, based on this work. Recently, I was named one of Forbes Magazine “30 Under 30” in education, awarded the Andrew Carnegie Fellowship, aka “the Brainy Award,” and named a recipient of the Marilyn Gittell Award for Scholarship and Activism.

Follow me on twitter @sally_nuamah

Cameron G. Thies is dean of James Madison College and MSU Foundation Professor. Thies is a scholar of international relations who has published broadly in foreign policy analysis, conflict processes, international political economy, and international relations theory. He is currently a co-investigator on a Department of Defense Minerva Research Initiative project entitled “Chinese Economic Power and the Effects of U.S. Economic Interdependence.” He has previously served as Editor of Political Science Research & Methods and Foreign Policy Analysis, and now serves as the Deputy Lead Editor of the Journal of Politics. He was named the Distinguished Scholar of Foreign Policy Analysis (2016), the Quincy Wright Distinguished Scholar (2017), and the Ole R. Holsti Distinguished Scholar (2020) of the International Studies Association. Thies also served as the President of the International Studies Association (2019-2020).

C. Danielle Vinson is a Professor of Politics and International Affairs at Furman University. After completing her PhD in political science at Duke University, she joined the faculty at Furman in 1995 and served as the Chair of the Political Science Department from 2009-2015. Her teaching and research interests focus on institutions in American government with a particular emphasis on Congress and the media. She teaches courses on Congress, the Presidency, Media and Politics, Humor and Politics, and American Government and regularly directs the Department’s Washington internship program. She also teaches a course on Native American Politics. She is the author of the books Local Media Coverage of Congress and Its Members and Congress and the Media: Beyond Institutional Power. She has written articles and chapters on Congress and the media, political parties and the media, religion and politics in the media, and communication and spending in political campaigns. She won the University’s Meritorious Advising Award in 2001 and a teaching award from the South Carolina Independent Colleges and Universities. As a native South Carolinian, she is often called upon by local, national, and even international press, especially during presidential primaries, to make sense of South Carolina politics (not quite as impossible as it sounds). She has served as Furman's Faculty Athletics Representative since 2019.

Olga V. Chyzh is an Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Toronto. She earned her PhD in Political Science from the University of Iowa in 2013. Her research areas are political methodology and international relations. She has published on such topics as human rights, international trade, autocratic regimes, and network analysis. Her articles have appeared in the American Journal of Political Science, Journal of Politics, Political Analysis, and Canadian Journal of Political Science, among others.

Julie Dolan is Professor of Political Science at Macalester College. Her research and teaching interests include gender and politics and bureaucratic politics. She is lead author on Women and Politics: Paths to Power and Influence (5th edition) and co-author of Representative Bureaucracy: Classic Readings and Continuing Controversies (with David Rosenbloom) and a series of government simulation-based texts (with Marni Ezra). Her scholarship appears in numerous journals including Political Research Quarterly, PS: Political Science and Politics, Public Administration Review, Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, Women & Politics, and the Harvard International Journal of Press/Politics. She received her BA from St Olaf College and her PhD from American University.

Dr. Nazita Lajevardi is an Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science at Michigan State University. She researches issues related to public opinion and political behavior through the lens of religious and racial identity, and evaluates how stigmatized groups fare in American democracy. Broadly, her scholarship is related to race and ethnic politics, political behavior, voting rights, and immigration politics. Her scholarship has been published in numerous venues, including American Political Science Review, The Journal of Politics, Political Behavior, and Cambridge University Press, among others.

Kim Twist is Associate Professor of Political Science. She earned her Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley and her B.A. from New York University.

Professor Twist's research focuses on far-right extremism in Western Europe and the United States, and her book, Partnering with Extremists (University of Michigan Press, 2019), explains why mainstream-right parties in Western Europe often invite far-right parties to join them in government. Her research has been supported by a number of grants, including from the National Science Foundation.

She teaches a variety of courses in comparative politics and research methods, including statistics, European politics, British politics, and political parties. Professor Twist was the 2020-21 recipient of the College of Arts & Letters Teaching Excellence Award for tenured / tenure-track faculty. She served as Faculty-in-Residence from 2017-20 for University Towers and M@College.

Karen Denice Sebold is an assistant professor at the University of Arkansas. Her research interests focus on the election administration, the campaign finance system, and presidential primaries. Her research has appeared in journals including The Review of International Organizations, P.S.: Political Science and Politics., Party Politics, and Election Law. Her two previous co-authored books, published with Palgrave Macmillan, explore the networks and political geography of presidential donors. Lexington Books published her recent 2024 solo-authored book on partisan asymmetry and campaign finance oversight at the Federal Election Commission.

Tasha Philpot has spent over 20 years in academia as an award-winning author, advisor, and educator. She holds a Bachelor’s degree in Political Science from Marquette University, and a Master of Public Policy and PhD in Political Science from the University of Michigan. Currently, Dr. Philpot is a Professor of Government at the University of Texas at Austin, where she is also affiliated with the Center for African and African American Studies, the Institute for Urban Policy Research & Analysis, and the Center for Women’s and Gender Studies. Dr. Philpot’s research focuses on the conditions that enable marginalized groups in American society to function in a more democratic system. Her work has been supported by the National Science Foundation and published in her discipline’s top peer-reviewed journals. She has also authored 3 books, the most recent of which is Conservative But Not Republican: The Paradox of Party Identification and Ideology among African Americans (2017, Cambridge University Press).