Mortara Research Seminar

The Mortara Research Seminar is a forum for sharing and discussing new research on topics of Comparative Politics and International Relations. The seminar hosts visiting scholars, as well as scholars from Georgetown, who present works-in-progress and receive feedback from the audience. It combines what was formerly the CRITICS and GUITARS seminar series. The seminar meets regularly in the Mortara Center Conference Room. Speakers present their work for approximately 30 minutes, with the remainder of the time devoted to discussant comments and Q&A. The seminar is intended for faculty, researchers, and graduate students from the Government Department and the School of Foreign Service. You may email Keeheon Lee at kl1055@georgetown.edu with questions or to be added to the email list.

Spring 2026 Schedule

•  January 26: postponed due to winter storm and University closure
• February 2: Danny Choi , Brown University: “Severed Connections: How Intraparty Politics Erodes Representation in Democratic Africa.”
• February 9: Yifan Flora He , Georgetown University: “Deforestation as Patronage: Political Alignment and Forest Law Enforcement in Bolivia.”
• February 23 – Sarah Khan, American University:  “Putting Women’s Concerns on the Agenda in Gender Unequal Settings: Evidence from Community Policing in Pakistan.”
• March 9 – Jeff Colgan, Brown
• March 16 – Gabriele Magni, Loyola Marymount
• March 30 – Nicholas Kerr, University of Florida
• April 13 – Fiona Shen-Bayh, UMD
• April 20 – Daniel Mattingly, Yale
• April 27 – Despina Alexiadou, Glasgow

Past Speakers

Fall 2025 Schedule

• September 8 – Jonathan Slapin, University of Zurich: “How Descriptive Over- and Under-Representation Impacts Citizens Evaluations of Decision-making across Policy Domains”
• September 15 – No talk – APSA
• September 22 – Shannon Carcelli , University of Maryland: “Public Goods Provision and the Foreign Aid-Immigration Connection.”
• September 29 – TBA
• October 6 – October 6: Liesbet Hooghe  and Gary Marks , University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill: “Why Women and Men Vote Differently: The Gender Gap on the Socio-cultural Cleavage.” 
• October 20: Allison Carnegie , Columbia University: “Global Governance Under Fire: Reform and Resilience in the Age of Populism.”
• October 27: Eun A Jo  , William and Mary: “Democratic Origins of Postcolonial Narratives in South Korea and Taiwan.”
• November 3:  Ellen Lust , Cornell University: “Encompassing Authority in Election Campaign Mobilization.”
• November 10:  Nicholas Kuipers, Princeton University: “Forging Social Cohesion Through Mass Education: Evidence from a Nationwide Policy Reform in India.”
• November 17: Volha Charnysh , Massachusetts Institute of Technology: “Razing the Church: The Enduring Effect of Nazi Repression in Poland.”
• November 24 – No talk – Thanksgiving
• December 1: Burcu Savun  , University of Pittsburgh: “Liberal Refugee Policies and Political Violence.” 

Spring 2025 Schedule

• January 13 – Ning Leng, Georgetown University, “Why Don’t Chinese Loans Challenge Multilateral Creditors? Foreign Borrowing, Sovereignty, and Public Opinion in the Global South”
• January 27 – Susanna Campbell, American University, “Who is the IO? IOs as Intermediaries in Aid Networks”
• February 3 – Margit Tavits, Washington University in St. Louis, “Exploiting Extremism: Strategic Responses of Radical Right Parties to Right-Wing Violence in Europe” 
• February 10 – Iain Osgood, University of Michigan, “Trade Lobbying Works (For Big Firms): Evidence from the China Trade War”
• March 10 – Swati Srivastava, Purdue University, “Platform Power as a Governance Racket”
• March 17 – Ashutosh Varshney, Brown University, “Democratic Theory and India”
• March 31 – Alicia Cooperman, George Washington University, “Platform Power as a Governance Racket”
• April 7 – Aram Hur, Tufts University, “How Nationalist Polarization Threatens Democracy: Lessons from South Korea” 
• April 14 – Tiago Ventura, Georgetown University, “Reducing Social Media Usage During Elections: Evidence from a WhatsApp Multi-Country Deactivation Experiment”
• April 28 – Connor Huff, World Bank/University of California Los Angeles

Mortara Research Seminar 2023-2024

• Marina Henke, December 2, 2024
• Saad Gulzar, November 19, 2024
• Jialu Li & Shea Minter, November 11, 2024
• Janet Lewis, November 4, 2024
• Kerim Can Kevakli, October 28, 2024
• Niccolò Bonifai, October 21, 2024
• Andreas Wiedemann, October 7, 2024
• Stathis Kalyvas, September 30, 2024
• Page Fortna, September 23, 2024
• Yuri Zhukov, September 16, 2024
• Monika Nalepa, September 9, 2024
• Laia Balcells, April 29, 2024
• Lizhi Liu, April 22, 2024
• Claire Brunel, March 25, 2024
• Daniela Donno Panayides, March 18, 2024
• Anna Grzymala-Busse, March 11, 2024
• Guadalupe Tunon, February 26, 2024
• Jae-Jae Spoon, February 12, 2024
• Tim Bartley, February 5, 2024
• Ashley Jardina, January 29, 2024
• Naima Green-Riley, January 22, 2024
• Alexandra Siegel, November 27, 2023
• Matias Spektor, November 6, 2023
• Graeme Robertson, October 30, 2023
• Joseph Wright, October 23, 2023
• Daniel Keleman, October16, 2023
• Michael Barnett, October 2, 2023
• Erik Voeten, September 18, 2023
• Sarah Bush, September 11, 2023

Seminars 2017-2023