Section 3: Young-sponsored Faculty Research

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young-sponsored faculty research

With support from the Young Initiative, professors in the DWA Department were able to pursue innovative research, organize events, and lead students in powerful projects. Even without international travel, the research funded by the Young Initiative shows fruitful engagement with the Global Political Economy.

The following pages provide a review of faculty research enabled by Young Initiative support during the 2020-21 academic year.

Faculty Research

Phillip Ayoub

The Young Initiative supported Phillip Ayoub’s research and professional activities while he was on sabbatical at the Hertie School’s Centre for International Security in 2020-21. The funding was directed in a number of ways, including research support from two student assistants, and help with several ongoing research projects on LGBT rights and resistance in Europe and globally. In particular, a recent study published in the American Political Science Review looked at the effect of a first Pride march on attitudes in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The Young Initiative funded part of both the quantitative survey and qualitative interview research. Further research support included a piece on the status of LGBT scholarship in the field of political science and a pedagogical piece on research design. Finally, it also partially supported Ayoub’s work editing a special issue on gender policy during the Angela Merkel era.

Madeline Baer

The John Parke Young Initiative on the Global Political Economy supported Professor Madeline Baer’s research and teaching in a number of ways during the 2020-21 academic year. Baer presented her paper “Contesting Rights: Champions and Challengers of Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights” at the International Studies Association annual meeting. She used Young funds to support both her ongoing research on economic and social rights, and her new project on the implementation of global norms at the city level. This new research draws on her work with Oxy students and the Los Angeles Mayor’s Office to localize the UN Sustainable Development Goals in Los Angeles. Baer is also researching the pedagogical value of experiential learning partnerships with local city governments for undergraduate international relations courses.

Lan Chu

This past academic year, the Young Initiative supported Professor Lan Chu’s continued research on religion and international relations. With the continuation of COVID, in-person research talks and conferences were canceled. Fortunately, however, all of the talks hosted by the Berkley Center for Religion, Peace & World Affairs at Georgetown University were conducted over Zoom. This allowed Chu to attend many more talks than if they had been in person, putting her in touch with scholars whose work parallels her own. From these talks, she used her Young Initiative funds to purchase research materials focusing on the study of religious actors within the constructivist framework of international relations. As a result, Chu was able to contextualize the case studies she researched last year within international relations theory literature.

Thanks to the John Parke Young Initiative on the Global Political Economy’s faculty funding, Professor Sophal Ear was thrilled to sign a contract with Routledge for his third book, Viral Sovereignty and the Political Economy of Pandemics: What Explains How Countries Handle Outbreaks? The manuscript would not have been possible without support from the Young Initiative, which funded a private editor and research assistant. Having received very favorable external reviews, the book will come out by the end of 2021.

Viral Sovereignty and the Political Economy of Pandemics explores and critiques the responses of developing countries to emerging infectious diseases (EIDs) in the past, such as H5N1 avian influenza, artemisinin-resistant malaria, A/H1N1 swine flu, and Ebola. In analyzing the lessons learned over the years, the book proposes a deceptively simple solution: Meaningful viral sovereignty must be established worldwide. Under meaningful viral sovereignty, a country is able to successfully manage diseases that emerge within its own borders. For this to succeed, developed countries have an obligation to developing countries to help build up their health and surveillance capacity to create a strong global network of protection to keep future pandemics at bay. Donating medical equipment and lump sums of aid alone are not sufficient in building up health capacity in these nations. Quite often, volunteers and donors from the developed world do not have a grasp on local politics and culture. This leaves them unable to communicate effectively at best and causes deep local distrust at the worst. COVID-19 demonstrates clearly that just one broken link in the international chain of defense is enough to throw the entire world into a pandemic. Based on intensive fieldwork conducted in Indonesia, Cambodia, Thailand, the Greater Mekong Sub-Region, West Africa, Kenya and the East African Community, and Mexico, Viral Sovereignty and the Political Economy of Pandemics closely examines the sociopolitical factors behind disease containment and sheds light on how the global community can prevent pandemics like COVID-19 from wreaking havoc again.

In spite of the pandemic, support from the Young Initiative has enabled Ear to give video conference talks at Soka University of America, Northbridge International School Cambodia, Frankfurt International School, Chulalongkorn University, Nordic Institute of Asian Studies/New York Southeast Asia Network, and the U.S. Embassy Jakarta/Centre for Strategic and International Studies Indonesia/Pacific Forum.

Ear also gratefully acknowledges support from the Young Initiative for the following publications: “Chapter 9: Ethnicity in Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam,” (with Gaea Morales), book chapter, edited by Michael Weiner (Soka University of America and San Diego State University), Handbook on Race and Ethnicity in Asia, Routledge, forthcoming August 17, 2021; and “Cambodia: Economy,” (with Gaea Morales), book chapter, edited by Juliet Love, The Far East and Australasia, 52nd edition, Routledge/ Europa World, November 5, 2020.

Laura Hebert

The Young Initiative supported Hebert’s teaching, research, and professional activities in 2020-21 in a number of ways, most importantly by providing funds to hire two students as research assistants to help compile databases tracking U.S. government funding allocations for domestic and international anti-human trafficking activities. The data gathered allowed for the completion of her book manuscript, Gender & Human Rights in a Global, Mobile Era, during her fall sabbatical. This database project is ongoing and will ultimately document the government’s anti-trafficking funding decisions from 2003 to the present, serving as the foundation for Hebert’s post-book research agenda. In addition, the Young Initiative allowed for the purchase of books, materials, and office supplies related to her teaching and research. It also provided funds for virtual conference participation and annual memberships to the American Political Science Association, International Studies Association, Western Political Science Association, and Association of Women’s Rights in Development.

Igor Logvinenko

The Young Initiative provided significant support for Logvinenko’s professional endeavors in 202021. It made it possible to hire research assistants who collected materials used for the publication of two policy papers in Just Security (December 2020 and February 2021). Additionally, the support offered by Young allowed Logvinenko to complete the manuscript of his forthcoming book, Global Finance, Local Control: Corruption and Wealth in Contemporary Russia (Cornell Studies in Money, Cornell University Press, October 2021). Finally, funding from Young allowed Logvinenko to hire production support for a podcast series (jointly with journalist Casey Michel) to be released ahead of a workshop titled “Global Kleptocracy as an American Problem,” which the Young Initiative hopes to host in academic year 2021-22.

Movindri Reddy

During the 2020-21 academic year all conferences were online. On August 23, 2020, Reddy presented a paper titled “India’s Political Influence in South Africa” at the virtual Indian Diaspora Conference. The original location for this conference was Trinidad; because of the pandemic, it was rescheduled virtually. The edited paper titled “India and South Africa: ‘Guptagate’ and Indentured Indian Identity” was accepted for publication by the National Council of Indian Culture (NCIC) associated with the University of West Indies. The International Studies Association (ISA) also had a virtual conference in April 2021. Professor Reddy was a discussant on two panels: Social Movements, Civil Resistance, and New Transnationalism, and Diplomacy and Conflict Resolution: New Forms of Diplomacy. Besides teaching a full schedule, Reddy spent the year working toward completing her book manuscript tentatively titled Power, Stability, and Survival in Southern Africa, due to the publisher in late 2021.