The Maxwell School is pleased to welcome two new department chairs for the 2025-26 academic year: Yoonseok Lee and Junko Takeda. Lee succeeds Devashish Mitra as chair of the Economics Department, while Takeda follows Susan Branson as chair of the History Department.

Lee, professor of economics and Melvin A. Eggers Economics Faculty Scholar, joined Maxwell in 2013 and is director of graduate studies for the Economics Department and a senior research associate for the Center for Policy Research. He researches econometric theory, applied econometrics, panel data econometrics, nonparametric econometrics and machine learning. He has co-authored several recent journal articles, including “Identification and Estimation of Panel Semiparametric Conditional Heteroskedastic Frontiers with Dynamic Inefficiency” (Econometric Reviews, 2024) and "Testing for Homogeneous Thresholds in Threshold Regression Models" (Econometric Theory, 2024). This past spring he was named vice president of the Korea-America Economic Association. He has been recognized with accolades and funding for his work by Syracuse University and external organizations, including the National Research Foundation of Korea. Lee received a Ph.D. from Yale University in 2006.

Takeda, professor of history, headed the Citizenship and Civic Engagement (CCE) Undergraduate Program for two years, as interim chair and chair. Her research and teaching interests include the histories of citizenship, early modern globalization, revolutions, migration, displacement and disease. She has written two monographs, Between Crown and Commerce: Marseille and the Early Modern Mediterranean (Johns Hopkins, 2011), and Iran and a French Empire of Trade, 1700–1808: The Other Persian Letters (Liverpool University Press, Oxford University Studies in the Enlightenment, 2020). Her two books-in-progress explore migration, dispossession, and ethnic and religious violence in the early modern world. Takeda is the recipient of numerous fellowships and awards, including Syracuse’s Daniel Patrick Moynihan Award for Research and Teaching and the Excellence in Graduate Teaching Award. Takeda received a Ph.D. from Stanford University in 2006.

By Jessica Youngman