Research

Throughout history, countries have relied on external finance as a means of facilitating human and economic development. Both grants (aid) and loans can be provided by multilateral, official bilateral, or private actors, all of whom seek to achieve different objectives. For recipients, both grants and loans allow sovereign governments to raise resources without the political repercussions of taxes; they can also come with unintended economic and political consequences. My work addresses these debates by focusing on foreign aid, sovereign debt and international financial institutions in several distinct pipelines.

sovereign debt

The first part of my research agenda focuses on sovereign debt. Governments rely on banks, bondholders, other countries, and international institutions to provide external sources of credit. Today, sovereign debt makes up more than 20% of global financial assets and has risen to 200% of global GDP. Parallel to the rise in global finance is the perennial nature of debt distress. For this reason, research in political science and economics has centered on explaining when and how sovereigns borrow, default, and recover from financial crises. At the heart of all these research agendas is a distributional question about who is ultimately responsible for sovereign claims in an anarchic world.

GETTING TO YES: THE ROLE OF CREDITOR COORDINATION IN DEBT RESTRUCTURING NEGOTIATIONS. 2023. International Interactions 49(1): 31-58. doi: 10.1080/03050629.2023.2156996

Article | Creditor committee data | Replication data

DEFAULTING DIFFERENTLY: THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF SOVEREIGN DEBT RESTRUCTURING NEGOTIATIONS. 2023. International Studies Quarterly 67(4). doi: 10.1093/isq/sqad086

Article | Replication data

THE POWER OF POWERFUL FRIENDS: EVIDENCE FROM A NEW DATASET OF IMF NEGOTIATING MISSIONS, 1985-2020 (with Alexandra O. Zeitz). 2024. The Review of International Organizations. 19: 411-442. doi: 10.1007/s11558-024-09537-4

Article | Replication data

CHINA, THE IMF, AND SOVEREIGN DEBT CRISES (with Alexandra O. Zeitz). 2024. International Studies Quarterly. doi: 10.1093/isq/sqae119

Article | Replication data | Clauses & Controversies Podcast (Episode 118)

Additional works in progress:

  • DEFAULT AND HIERARCHY: CRISES AND CONSEQUENCES IN INTERNATIONAL CAPITAL MARKETS (with Patrick Shea) (Revise & Resubmit)

  • POLITICAL RISK, SUSTAINABILITY AND SOVEREIGN CREDIT: PRICING HIGH-FREQUENCY POLITICAL, ENVIRONMENTAL, SOCIAL AND GOVERNANCE NEWS (with Anne Jamison and Witold Henisz) (Revise & Resubmit)

  • COMPARING COMPARABILITY: SUPPORT FOR THE HIPC INITIATIVE BY NON-PARIS CLUB CREDITORS

  • BONDHOLDER RESIDENCY AND FINANCIAL CRISES (with Alexandra Zeitz and Ben Cormier)

  • THE SIGNAL OF A SWAP: BONDHOLDER PERCEPTIONS OF THE GLOBAL FINANCIAL SAFETY NET (with Aditi Sahasrabuddhe)

foreign aid

My second research agenda centers on foreign aid. States and multilateral institutions give billions of dollars in foreign aid each year with the goal of fueling economic growth and eradicating poverty in developing countries. However, foreign aid is not entirely selfless. It can provide donor states with strategic benefits and abet recipient incumbents (particularly the corrupt ones) in fulfilling their office-seeking motivations. It is for this reason that there is significant debate about the role foreign aid should play in development. A caveat to this conversation is that who allocates aid and how they allocate it should matter for aid effectiveness. As I highlight in my research, the who and how of foreign aid also have unintended political and economic consequences for developing countries.

CATCH ME IF YOU CARE: WHEN INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT ORGANIZATIONS PUNISH NATIONAL CORRUPTION (with Emilie Hafner-Burton and Christina Schneider). 2020. The Review of International Organizations. 15(4): 767-792. doi: 10.1007/s11558-019-09371-z

Article | Replication Data

BYPASSING THE INCUMBENT: LEADERSHIP TENURE AND FOREIGN AID CHANNELS (with Susan Allen and Obaida Shammama). 2023. Global Studies Quarterly 3(1): 1-12. doi: 10.1093/isagsq/ksad007

Article | Replication data

EFFECTIVENESS OR AFFINITY?: DONORS’ PREFERENCES FOR BYPASS AID (with Susan Allen and Obaida Shammama). 2024. International Interactions. 50(2): 243-272. doi:10.1080/03050629.2024.2311736

Article | Replication data

POSSIBILITIES AND LIMITATIONS ON INTERNATIONAL STATUS: EVIDENCE FROM FOREIGN AID AND PUBLIC OPINION (with Cleo O’Brien-Udry). 2024. The Review of International Organizations. doi: 10.1007/s11558-024-09543-6

Article | Replication data

Additional works in progress:

international organizations

In the last decade, the rise of populist nationalism in many areas of the world has raised questions about the future of multilateralism. Despite these misgivings, some forms of multilateral integration are still occurring. How constituents understand IO enlargement impacts both organizational legitimacy and the perceptions of individual member states.

Works in progress: