Biography

My primary research focuses on the Political Economy of Global Commodity Markets, modeling how interstate conflict occurrence and global commodity market dynamics intersect and interact. In my dissertation, I argue that existing theories about the economic causes of war are insufficient and inconsistent, demonstrating that the complexity of the modern economy renders traditional quantitative models lacking in predictive power. I develop novel mixture distributions for standard regression models to account for the unknown and unmeasurable complexity, finding results that break new ground in how the commodity trade can finance interstate disputes and conflicts.

My secondary research focuses on developing new methods in stochastic modeling and Monte Carlo simulations to ascertain potential sociopolitical cascade effects of economic and public policy. This line of research extends known Monte Carlo simulations of risk in finance into the field of politics and economic public policy. Given that politics and economic public policy are deeply intertwined, with consequences that extend into finance, it is a natural step to explore how existing Monte Carlo simulations can give a longer time perspective in international political economy.

Education

B.S. Statistics (UCLA); M.A. Political Science (UCLA)

Research Interests

International Relations, Comparative Politics, Political Methodology

Courses & Presentations

Political Science:
POL SCI 167D – Political Institutions and Economic Development
POL SCI 137A – International Relations Theory
POL SCI 129 – Diplomacy and War

Statistics:
STATS 404 – Statistical Programming and Computing
STATS 184 – Societal Impacts of Data
STATS 147 – Data Technologies for Data Scientists

Global Studies:
GLBL ST 110A – Strategic Business Communication
GLBL ST 110B – Business Leadership: Global Perspectives

Public Affairs:
PUB AFF 60 – Introduction to Empirical Research and Statistics

Graduate Advisors

Arthur Stein, Margaret Peters, Eric Min, Deborah Larson