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Faculty Research

The 150-plus faculty members and roughly 800 graduate students are responsible for research that is influential and innovative.

Much of that research is conducted within the School’s research centers and institutes, but much is also completed by individuals working within their disciplines, toward purely scholarly ends. Similarly, much of Maxwell’s research is externally funded, and yet, much leads to the published books and articles that mark the progress of concepts and ideas in the academy.
In a typical year, Maxwell faculty members publish dozens of books and monographs and hundreds of book chapters and journal articles. Their work provides up-to-date material for the classroom.

It is one of the great distinctions of the Maxwell School that an institution so widely praised for its professional programs is, in fact, a home for esteemed research and scholarship across so a wide range of disciplines.
Research News

Abdelaaty examines disparities in refugee treatment
In her new book “Discrimination and Delegation: Explaining State Responses to Refugees” (Oxford University Press), Syracuse political science professor Lamis Abdelaaty examines the factors that shape states’ responses to refugees. She asks important questions about why some states welcome refugees while others exclude them, and why some states cede control of the asylum process and refugee camps to the United Nations.
12/27/2020

New study by Cleary examines regime dynamics in fragile democracies
"When Does Backsliding Lead to Breakdown? Uncertainty and Opposition Strategies in Democracies at Risk," co-authored by Matthew Cleary, was published in Perspectives on Politics. The authors develop an agency-based perspective to enhance the understanding of aggrandizement and to explain when it results in democratic breakdown. Relying on comparative case studies of five countries—Bolivia, Ecuador, Thailand, Turkey, and Venezuela—their analysis suggests that the contingent decisions of opposition actors during the process of aggrandizement have a significant effect on regime outcomes.
12/17/2020

Liu study on multi-function products, firm scope/boundaries published
"What’s the big idea? Multi-function products, firm scope and firm boundaries," co-authored by Assistant Professor of Economics Mengxiao Liu, was published in the Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization. The authors examine the implications that flow from the fact that some firms are so much better than others at the Big Idea, that is, at identifying and bundling clusters of functions. The authors also look at how firms decide whether to outsource functions or produce them in-house given the holdup problems associated with bringing ideas to market and coordinating multiple suppliers.
12/17/2020

Wiemers examines vulnerability to COVID-19 complications in new study
"Disparities in vulnerability to complications from COVID-19 arising from disparities in preexisting conditions in the United States," co-authored by Associate Professor of Public Administration and International Affairs Emily Wiemers, was published in Research in Social Stratification and Mobility. Using a model validated on COVID-19 hospitalizations, the authors show large disparities across education and income in the prevalence of conditions associated with adverse outcomes, and in the overall risk of severe complications. These disparities emerge early in life, prior to age 65.
12/14/2020

Landes study on COVID-19 impact on people with IDD in CA published
"COVID-19 outcomes among people with intellectual and developmental disability in California: The importance of type of residence and skilled nursing care needs," co-authored by Scott Landes and sociology student Ashlyn Wong, was published in Disability and Health Journal. The study shows that California residents who receive services for intellectual and development disabilities (IDD) have lower COVID-19 case rates but a higher case-fatality rate than the general population. The lower case rate is being driven by those with IDD who live in their own home or a family home, while those living in congregate settings are more likely to be diagnosed with, and die from the virus.
12/10/2020

New study examines age‐at‐death disparity, people with and without IDD
"Evidence of continued reduction in the age‐at‐death disparity between adults with and without intellectual and/or developmental disabilities," co-authored by sociologists Scott Landes and Janet Wilmoth, along with social science PhD student Erika Carter Grosso '10 MA (PSc), was published in the Journal of Applied Research in Intellectual Disabilities. Evidence from the study demonstrates that the age‐at‐death disparity between adults who did or did not have an intellectual and/or developmental disability reported on their death certificate continues to decrease, but the magnitude of the remaining disparity varied considerably by type of disability.
12/1/2020

Abdelaaty examines asylum admissions in International Interactions
Why would a country welcome some refugees and treat others poorly? More specifically, why do countries accept some asylum applications and reject others? In her study titled "Rivalry, ethnicity, and asylum admissions worldwide," Assistant Professor of Political Science Lamis Abdelaaty argues that states’ approaches to refugees are shaped by foreign policy and ethnic politics. The article was published in International Interactions.
11/16/2020

Allport explores Great Britain’s WWII experience
In his new book, "Britain at Bay: The Epic Story of the Second World War: 1938-1941" (Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group), Maxwell history professor Alan Allport traces the history of Great Britain in the early years of the Second World War. The book was also reviewed in the New York Times, “Rethinking Winston Churchill and Neville Chamberlain.”
11/16/2020

Heflin, Lopoo study on collaboration across social programs published
"When States Align Social Welfare Programs: Considering the Child Support Income Exclusion for SNAP," co-authored by Professor Colleen Heflin, Professor Len Lopoo and PhD candidate Mattie Mackenzie‐Liu, was published in Social Science Quarterly. The authors investigated the state‐level conditions associated with the adoption of policies that benefit participants in multiple social welfare programs, focusing on the case of the child support income exclusion for SNAP benefit eligibility calculations. They found that collaboration across social programs is more likely as state income tax revenues increase and when administrative costs are lower.
11/11/2020

Abdelaaty piece on UNHCR refugee status determination published in FMR
"RSD by UNHCR: difficulties and dilemmas," written by Assistant Professor of Political Science Lamis Abdelaaty, was published in Forced Migration Review. Abdelaaty draws on archival research relating to Egypt, Kenya and Turkey to explore the potential consequences of the UNHCR's (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees) involvement in refugee status determination (RSD) procedures in a country’s territory.
11/10/2020

Monnat part of team recognized for research on rural America
A research team of 39 investigators from 28 colleges and universities from across the United States has been recognized by the Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities and the United States Department of Agriculture with its National Excellence in Multistate Research Award. Shannon Monnat, associate professor of sociology, currently chairs the research coalition and accepted the award on behalf of her colleagues in a virtual ceremony.
11/4/2020

Harrington Meyer discusses new book on Colgate University podcast
University Professor Madonna Harrington Meyer and alumna Ynesse Abdul-Malak ’13 MA (Soc)/’17 PhD (Soc) of Colgate University discuss their research related to grandparents caring for grandchildren with disabilities in an episode of 13, a bi-weekly podcast from Colgate University.
11/4/2020

Purser looks at teaching thrift in job readiness programs in new study
"Both sides of the Paycheck: Recommending Thrift to the Poor in Job Readiness Programs," co-authored by Gretchen Purser and Brian Hennigan, PhD student in geography, was published in Critical Sociology. The article documents how job readiness programs—as anchors of the devolved organizational landscape of neoliberal poverty governance in the United States—endeavor to instill within the poor not simply the virtue of work, but the virtue of thrift, and thus orient them to "both sides of the paycheck." Using a comparative ethnographic study of two community-based, government-funded nonprofit job readiness programs, Purser and Hennigan show that this pedagogic focus on budgeting is central to the overall goal of conditioning clients to embrace and endure a degraded labor market.
10/26/2020

Ma examines stigma of wearing masks for Chinese students in new study
"To mask or not to mask amid the COVID-19 pandemic: how Chinese students in America experience and cope with stigma," co-authored by Associate Professor of Sociology Yingyi Ma and sociology PhD candidate Ning Zhan, was published in Chinese Sociological Review. Drawing from stigma theory, Ma and Zhan argue that what Chinese students experience when it comes to mask wearing is an exemplar of how stigma is socially constructed by power.
10/23/2020

Montez study on population health, policy trends published in MQ
"US State Polarization, Policymaking Power, and Population Health," written by Gerald B. Cramer Faculty Scholar in Aging Studies Jennifer Karas Montez, was published in the Milbank Quarterly. The troubling trend in US life expectancy and the widening disparities in life expectancy across the United States have deep roots. In the article, Montez posits that both trends are grounded in the dynamic changes in the policy and political landscapes since the 1980s.
10/21/2020

Heflin article on the effect of material hardship on health published
"Material Hardship, Perceived Stress, and Health in Early Adulthood," co-authored by Professor Colleen Heflin, was published in the Annals of Epidemiology. The authors found the adjusted odds of fair or poor health status, depression, sleep problems, and suicidal thoughts were higher among individuals with material hardship than counterparts without. A considerable proportion of the association between material hardship and health outcomes was attributable to perceived stress.
10/19/2020

Landes cited in HPR article on disability housing, COVID-19
A recent study led by Scott Landes found that the COVID-19 case rate for people living in New York’s residential group homes was disproportionately high. The fatality statistics reported for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities in congregate settings are even higher than those reported for Black Americans, Landes explains, which are already exposing some of the nation’s worst inequities. "If you look at those mortality rates that we report, those are worse than any that I’ve seen from any minority in this country," he says. "That just makes the point." Landes was cited in the Harvard Political Review article, "A Crisis Decades in the Making: Disability Housing Policy and COVID-19."
10/16/2020

Lasch-Quinn explores the meaning of life in new book
In her new book, “Ars Vitae: The Fate of Inwardness and the Return of the Ancient Arts of Living” (Notre Dame Press), Elisabeth Lasch-Quinn, professor of history in the Maxwell School, explores Americans’ stirring interest in ancient Greco-Roman philosophies including Cynicism, Platonism, Gnosticism, Stoicism and Epicureanism, and whether they can offer any alternatives to contemporary consumer culture as a means to happiness and well-being.
10/16/2020

Sultana participates in international event on climate research
On September 30, 2020, Farhana Sultana, associate professor of geography and the environment, participated in "Intersectionality and Climate justice: Towards an Emancipatory Climate Research Agenda," an event organized by the Centre for Climate Justice at Glasgow Caledonian University. The international webinar brought together critical scholars interested in climate justice and intersectionality with the aim of exploring common threads between the two concepts, developing key research needs and directions, exchanging learning and teaching experiences, and creating research collaboration capacity. Watch the video here.
10/8/2020

Singleton study on labor unions, workplace safety published
"Labor Unions and Workplace Safety," co-authored by Associate Professor of Economics Perry Singleton, Ling Li '17 MA (Econ)/'18 PhD (Econ), and Shawn Rohlin '06 MA (Econ)/'09 PhD (Econ), was published in the IRL Review. The study findings indicate that unionization had no detectable effect on accident case rates at the mean, but shifted downward the case-rate distribution below 2 cases per 100 full-time equivalent workers annually. The downward shift is most evident among larger bargaining units and manufacturing establishments
10/2/2020

Shifa paper on trade in high-skilled human capital published
"Trade in Human Capital: A Quantitative Theory of Economic Growth and the Import of Higher Education," written by Assistant Professor of Economics Abdulaziz Shifa, was published in Macroeconomic Dynamics. Shifa presents a stylized quantitative model of trade in high-skilled human capital, in which colleges in a developing country can hire high quality teachers from a developed country. In the model, the use of foreign teachers is proposed as a possible mechanism to build domestic capacity for advanced education.
9/28/2020

X Lab article on improving SNAP recertification published in JBPA
"Testing behavioral interventions designed to improve on-time SNAP recertification," co-authored by Len Lopoo, Colleen Heflin and Joe Boskovski, was published in the Journal of Behavioral Public Administration. Given the different levels of governance and the abundance of qualifying rules and processes that low-income households must negotiate to obtain and retain Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) food assistance benefits, many households fail to recertify for SNAP. The authors found that behaviorally-informed text message reminders are more effective than recorded phone messages in reducing learning costs for SNAP applicants.
9/24/2020

New study by Hammond examines the politics of commemoration in Turkey
"Making Memorial Publics: Media, Monuments, and the Politics of Commemoration Following Turkey’s July 2016 Coup Attempt," written by Assistant Professor of Geography and the Environment Timur Hammond, was published in Geographical Review. Hammond examines two distinct but interrelated forms of commemoration: websites that have been set up to tell the story of the resistance to the coup attempt and a new monument that commemorates the victim-heroes of that night’s fighting. He argues that these commemorative projects work together to create a memorial public in which President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s position is both naturalized and justified.
9/23/2020

Jackson wins Tenth Decade grant to study Black Americans, group threat
Jenn Jackson, assistant professor of political science, has been awarded $20,000 for their research project Race, Risks, and Responses: Mapping Black Americans’ Response to Group Threat. The grant is part of a special call to Maxwell faculty offering Tenth Decade Project funding to support research and initiatives that confront systemic racial inequality. Jackson’s project builds on and expands their inquiry into how young Black Americans of different social identities (across gender, class, sexual orientation, embodiment, etc.) experience threats, especially policing, differently based on variations in their social location and orientation to power.
9/21/2020

Abdelaaty examines attitudes towards refugees in Europe in new study
"Explaining Attitudes Toward Refugees and Immigrants in Europe," co-authored by Assistant Professor of Political Science Lamis Abdelaaty, was published in Political Studies. The study shows that individuals hold different views of refugees and immigrants and are, at times, more receptive to one group than the other. By and large, they found that attitudes toward refugees are more often related to macro-level factors while immigrants are more frequently associated with micro-level economic concerns.
9/17/2020

Study by Ali, Shifa on colonial power, corruption in Africa published
"European colonization and the corruption of local elites: The case of chiefs in Africa," co-authored by Merima Ali and Abdulaziz Shifa, both assistant professors of economics, was published in the Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization. Using microdata from nationally representative surveys in anglophone and francophone countries in Africa, Ali and Shifa found that corruption among anglophone chiefs is significantly higher than that of francophone chiefs. They also found that anglophone chiefs command a significantly lower level of public trust.
9/16/2020

Maxwell sociologists examine grandparenting children with disabilities
In their new book, Grandparenting Children with Disabilities (Springer Publishing, 2020), professors Madonna Harrington Meyer of Syracuse University’s Maxwell School and alumna Ynesse Abdul-Malak ’13 MA (Soc)/’17 PhD (Soc) of Colgate University explore the complex dynamics of how U.S. grandparents, though often invisible, play a vital role in caring for children with disabilities, often placing their physical and financial well-being at increased risk.
9/16/2020

Monnat study on rural COVID-19 mortality rates published in JRH
"COVID‐19 Death Rates Are Higher in Rural Counties With Larger Shares of Blacks and Hispanics," co-authored by Shannon Monnat and Maxwell PhD students Kent Jason Cheng and Yue Sun, was published in the Journal of Rural Health. They found that the COVID‐19 mortality risk is not distributed equally across the rural United States, and the COVID‐19 race penalty is not restricted to cities. Among rural counties, the average daily increase in COVID‐19 mortality rates has been significantly higher in counties with the largest shares of Black and Hispanic residents.
9/14/2020

Li study on receipt of home health care among older adults published
"Assessment of Receipt of the First Home Health Care Visit After Hospital Discharge Among Older Adults," co-authored by Jun Li, assistant professor of public administration and international affairs, was published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. The study shows that in the period from October 2015 to September 2016 before the Affordable Care Act, a substantial portion of Medicare patients referred to home health care after hospitalization did not receive that care. "Recent health care reform efforts increasingly rely on home health care as a substitute for institutional care. With this knowledge, policymakers should implement a system that ensures all patients receive the home health care that has been recommended by their physicians," says Li.
9/11/2020

Mitra, Karakas paper on the political economy of populism published
"Inequality, redistribution and the rise of outsider candidates," co-authored by Professor Devashish Mitra and Leyla Karakas, assistant professor of economics, was published in Games and Economic Behavior. In their paper, Mitra and Karakas study the growth in voters' support for outsider candidates with a focus on understanding the potential role of increasing income inequality.
8/27/2020

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Upcoming Events

Due to public health concerns around COVID-19, all in-person public events are postponed or canceled until further notice.

Apr

15

Conversations in Conflict Studies featuring Neal Powless, University Ombuds

Virtual event via Zoom

Apr

15

The All India Radio Urdu Service’s Letters of Longing

Virtual

Watch Stream

Apr

15

Arabic Culture and Conversation Table

Virtual

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Apr

16

VIRTUAL: CAPS Seminar - Lena Dahlberg

Apr

16

Focus Groups & Best Practices

Virtual

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Apr

16

State of Democracy Lecture: Driving While Black

VIRTUAL

Apr

16

Persian Culture and Conversation Table

Virtual

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Apr

19

Discrimination and Delegation: Explaining State Responses to Refugees

Virtual

Watch Stream

Apr

22

Turkish Culture and Conversation Table

Virtual

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Apr

22

Conversations in Conflict Studies featuring Harry Lambright

Virtual event via Zoom

View all Maxwell events.