Jonathan Blake
Graduate School of Arts and Sciences
Political Science
As an AC4 fellow, Jonathan traveled to Northern Ireland to study how religion, nationalism, and politics interact in Protestant Orange parades. His dissertation sought to understand how cultural performances such as these parades are sites for political contestation.
Joseph Matthew Brown
Graduate School of Arts and Sciences
Political Science
As an AC4 fellow, Joseph developed a theory of communication and cooperation between non-state belligerents and “target” states. He offered an explanation as to why non-state belligerents offer advance warnings of their attacks, when such warnings increase states’ chances of thwarting attacks and allow states to limit the damage from attacks that succeed.
Karishma Desai
Teachers College
International Educational Development
As an AC4 fellow, Karishma’s research explored the critical intersection of Adivasi (indigenous/tribal) socio-political movements and K-12 education through a case study in Madhya Pradesh, India. She strove to understand this uncommon, but promising phenomenon in India that underscores the role and potential of people’s movements in promoting education that cultivates justice and peace.
Scott Freeman
Teachers College
Applied Anthropology
As an AC4 fellow, Scott’s research, based in Haiti, examined how environmental NGOs and their target populations understand each other, and how this affects unfolding development projects. This research project was designed to engage critical issues of the environment and development, and provided potentially transformative ways of thinking about how these projects unfold.
Meha Jain
Graduate School of Arts and Sciences
Evolution & Environmental Biology
As an AC4 fellow, Meha studied how smallholder farmers adapt to changes in climate in northwest India using both remote sensing and structured household surveys. By understanding how farmers are autonomously adapting to short-term weather variability, she argued we can better identify policies to bolster food security in the face of longer-term changes in climate.
James McGee
Graduate School of Arts and Sciences
Quantitative Methods in the Social Sciences
As an AC4 fellow, Jim’s project examined factors that influence judgments of moral transgressions during conflict. In particular, the project examined the effects of social power on moral judgment and the possible moderating effects of a transgression’s complexity.
María Paula Saffon
Graduate School of Arts and Sciences
Political Science
As an AC4 fellow, María’s research focused on the causes of land conflict in Latin America, she hopes to gain an understanding of youth’s conceptualization of, and experiences with, poverty and violence, as well as mechanisms for change.
Peter van der Windt
Graduate School of Arts and Sciences
Political Science
As an AC4 fellow, Peter’s dissertation research examined local governance structure and public good underprovision in Sub-Saharan Africa. In addition, he worked on a study of a major community-driven development program in Eastern Congo and on a project that aimed to develop new measures of conflict events using cell phone technologies in South Kivu.
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Naomi Woods
Teachers College
Social-Organizational Psychology
As an AC4 fellow, Naomi’s study compared the predictive validity of early modeling work of Benjamin (1974) and Gottman (1992) about relational conflict to the new Dynamic Network Theory paradigm (Westaby, 2012). The research incorporated both parties’ personal sentiments in addition to overt assessments of their observable behavior in order to enhance the work third-parties play in facilitating conflict resolution in social systems.
Nadia Hasham, Kermit Jones, and Saira Qureshi
School of International and Public Affairs
As AC4 fellows, Nadia, Kermit, and Saira first investigated the process of crisis mapping during the 2010 Pakistan floods, determined the uses of this information in the provision of humanitarian assistance during the floods particularly by UN OCHA, investigated the impact of localized violence and larger conflicts on aid provision and therefore on the effectiveness of the crisis mapping deployment, and discerned the strengths and weaknesses of this method. This interdisciplinary project related to conflict, violence, and sustainable development, as the larger question it addressed was how contexts with conflict and violence affect sustainable development following crises. In investigating the role of this model of “crowdsourcing” local information by those outside the crisis, the researchers considered: a) aid delivery relating to sustainable development, b) technology and its role in aid delivery, and c) contexts wrought with conflict and violence.