President-Elect

BETH SIMMONS

Beth A. Simmons is the Andrea Mitchell University Professor of Law, Political Science, and Business Ethics and the Penn Integrates Knowledge University Professor at the University of Pennsylvania. She has served on the APSA Council, numerous APSA prize committees, and has been an active APSA member for more than 30 years. She researches and teaches international relations, international law and international political economy. She is best known for her research on international political economy during the interwar years, policy diffusion globally and her work demonstrating the influence that international law has on human rights outcomes around the world. Two of her books, Who Adjusts? Domestic Sources of Foreign Economic Policy During the Interwar Years (2004) and Mobilizing for Human Rights: International Law in Domestic Politics (2009) won the APSA’s Woodrow Wilson Award for the best book published in the United States on government, politics, or international affairs. The latter was also recognized by the American Society for International Law, the International Social Science Council and the International Studies association as the best book of the year in 2010. Simmons has spent a year working at the International Monetary Fund, directed the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs at Harvard, is a past president of the International Studies Association and has been elected to the National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Vice Presidents

CRISTINA BELTRÁN

Cristina Beltrán is an associate professor in New York University’s Department of Social & Cultural Analysis. She is a political theorist, with diverse interests in contemporary political and social theory as well as the history of political thought, and the author of Cruelty as Citizenship: How Migrant Suffering Sustains White Democracy (University of Minnesota Press, 2020), winner of the APSA Latino Caucus Best Book Award in Latino Politics/Latino Studies. She is also the author of The Trouble with Unity: Latino Politics and the Creation of Identity (Oxford University Press, 2010), which won two APSA honors—the Ralph Bunche Award for the best book in political science on ethnic and cultural pluralism and the Race, Ethnicity, and Politics Section’s award for the best book on racial and ethnic political identities, ideologies, and theories—as well as the Casa de las Américas award for best book in Latino studies published in the United States. Prior to NYU, Professor Beltrán was a faculty member in the Political Science Department at Haverford College. She was a resident member at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, NJ, in 2013–2014 and co-editor of the journal Theory & Event in 2019–2024.

JAMES MAHONEY

James Mahoney (PhD 1997, University of California-Berkeley) is the Gordon Fulcher Professor of Decision-Making in the Department of Political Science at Northwestern University. He is a comparative‐historical analyst who works on national development, political regimes, and methodology. He is known for his comparative research on Latin America, his theoretical contributions to the study of path dependence and institutional change, and his methodological work on small-N and qualitative research. Mahoney is the mentor of dozens of students, many of whom have become important researchers in the discipline. He has had the opportunity to serve APSA in various ways, including as a Council Member and as President of the Politics and History Section and the Qualitative and Multimethod Research Section. Mahoney has authored, coauthored, or coedited eight books. They include well-known titles such as Comparative Historical Analysis in the Social Sciences, Explaining Institutional Change, and A Tale of Two Cultures. Mahoney’s book Colonialism and Postcolonial Development: Spanish America in Comparative Perspective received six major prizes. Mahoney has received grants from the National Science Foundation, including a Career Award. He received two mid-career achievement awards for his work on methodology. Mahoney is a coeditor of the series Strategies of Social Inquiry at Cambridge University Press. He was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2022.

SHERRI L. WALLACE

Sherri L. Wallace is Professor of Political Science and Associate Dean of International, Engagement, and Equity Programs in the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Louisville. She teaches American Government and Politics, Black Politics and Democracy, State and Local Politics, Urban Politics, and community-based or experiential learning courses. Her research focuses on ways to improve diversity in college textbooks, political science education, the profession and academia, race and politics, and community economic development. She co-authors American Politics and the African American Quest for Universal Freedom (Routledge, 2021), a text used often for research and instruction. A collegial citizen, she actively engages in APSA via various roles, including serving as the program co-chair for the annual meeting (Montreal-Quebec) and program chair for the Teaching and Learning Conference (TLC), as a member of the APSA Executive Council, Presidential Task Force “Political Science in the 21st Century,” Presidential Task Force Diversity Hack-a-thon, and Presidential Funded Grant Project, “Rethinking the Undergraduate Political Science Major,” as a co-chair/member of the Standing Committee of Blacks in the Profession, chair of the Political Science Education section, and on respective award committees. Other opportunities include serving as a mentor in the APSA Mentor Program and program reviewer for political science academic programs. She collaborated with the Ralph Bunche Scholars Institute Advisory Committee on development and fundraising. She currently serves on the Editorial Board of the Journal of Political Science Education.

Council

BARRY BURDEN

Barry Burden is Professor of Political Science, Director of the Elections Research Center, and the Lyons Family Chair in Electoral Politics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Burden’s research and teaching focus on US elections, political parties, public opinion, and representation. He is the author of Personal Roots of Representation, co-author with David Kimball of Why Americans Split Their Tickets, and co-author with Marjorie Hershey of the long-running textbook, Political Parties in America (19th edition). Burden has published articles in journals such as the American Political Science Review, American Journal of Political Science, British Journal of Political Science, and Public Opinion Quarterly. Burden earned his PhD at the Ohio State University and was a faculty member at Harvard University before moving to UW-Madison in 2006. He is affiliated with the La Follette School of Public Affairs and the School of Journalism and Mass Communication. He has been an expert witness in multiple court cases and is a frequent source for media coverage of US politics.

NICHOLAS CARNES

Nick Carnes is the Z. Smith Reynolds Professor of Public Policy, Professor of Political Science, and Chair of the Campus IRB at Duke University. He co-founded and chaired the APSA Organized Section on Class and Inequality and was the first political scientist to win the Alan Waterman Award (the National Science Foundation’s highest award for a scientist or engineer under age 40). His research focuses on the shortages of people from working-class jobs in elected offices in the US and in other democracies; he also studies climate change politics, the politics of foster care, and politics in popular culture. He has published numerous books and articles, including White-Collar Government: The Hidden Role of Class in Economic Policymaking (2013) and The Cash Ceiling: Why Only the Rich Run for Office and What We Can Do About It (2018); he has also co-edited two volumes on The Politics of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (2023, 2025). He is currently finishing a co-authored book on why so few working-class people hold office in democracies around the world and co-leading a large qualitative interview-based study aimed at understanding the sharp post-pandemic decline in licensed foster homes in the US.

PAUL CARRESE

Paul Carrese is Professor in the School of Civic & Economic Thought and Leadership at Arizona State University, serving as founding Director 2016-2023. He also has taught at Middlebury College, National University of Lesotho, University of Delhi, and the US Air Force Academy, where he co-founded the Academy’s honors program. He teaches and publishes on American constitutional and political thought, political philosophy, civics, and American grand strategy. He is author of The Cloaking of Power: Montesquieu, Blackstone, and the Rise of Judicial Activism (Chicago, 2003), Democracy in Moderation: Montesquieu, Tocqueville, and Sustainable Liberalism (Cambridge, 2016), and Teaching America: Reflective Patriotism in Schools, College, and Culture (Cambridge, forthcoming 2026). He has held fellowships at Oxford (Rhodes Scholar), Harvard, University of Delhi (Fulbright), and Princeton. He served on the advisory board of the Program for Public Discourse, UNC Chapel Hill; co-led a national study on K-12 civics, Educating for American Democracy (2021), with Danielle Allen (Harvard) and Peter Levine (Tufts), and others; is a fellow of the Civitas Institute, UT Austin; charter member of the Alliance for Civics in the Academy; and Senior Fellow for Civic Thought and Leadership, Jack Miller Center for Teaching America’s Founding Principles and History, also serving on its Academic Council.

THOMAS DOLAN

Tom Dolan is an Associate Professor in the School of Politics, Security, and International Affairs at the University of Central Florida where he studies international security, with particular interests in emotions, war, and intelligence. A first generation college graduate, Dr. Dolan received his BA at Sewanee and his PhD at Ohio State. He was the Principal Investigator for a five-year Intelligence Community Center of Academic Excellence (ICCAE) grant and continues to direct UCF’s ICCAE program; from 2017-22 he also directed UCF’s Security Studies PhD program. His publications include articles in International Organization, International Studies Quarterly, Security Studies, European Journal of International Relations, Foreign Policy Analysis, Journal of Conflict Resolution, and other journals. He has served APSA’s Foreign Policy Section as Section Program Chair, Section President, Section Secretary/Treasurer, and as a board member, and has been a reviewer for APSA’s Centennial Center Research Grants.

COLIN ELMAN

Colin Elman is Professor of Political Science at Syracuse University’s Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs. He previously directed Maxwell’s Center for Qualitative and Multi-Method Inquiry, and co-founded and co-directed the annual Institute for Qualitative and Multi-Method Research (IQMR), the Qualitative Data Repository (QDR), and the Data-PASS Journal Editors’ Discussion Interface (JEDI). Elman has published in the American Political Science Review, the Annual Review of Political Science, Comparative Political Studies, the International History Review, International Organization, International Security, International Studies Quarterly, Millennium, Perspectives on Politics, Sociological Methods & Research, Political Science & Politics, and Security Studies.

JANE GINGRICH

Jane Gingrich received her PhD in political science from the University of California, Berkeley. She has held positions at the University of Minnesota and the University of Oxford, where she is currently Professor of Comparative Social Policy. Her research interests broadly cover comparative political economy, social policy, education, and political parties. She is presently completing two book projects. The first examines the interconnection between policy and party support in Europe, focusing on the decline of social democratic parties. The second analyzes the politics of primary and secondary education reform from the post-war period to the present in twenty advanced democracies. She also has an active interest in innovation and technology, serving as co-director of a Canadian Institute for Advanced Research (CIFAR) group on inclusive forms of innovation. In the UK, she has collaborated with the British Academy and the Institute for Public Policy Research on public-facing work related to industrial and social policy. She has served as section chair for both the APSA European Politics and Education Politics sections, participated in the Public Policy section, and has served on various APSA and section prize committees.

BETINA WILKINSON

Betina Cutaia Wilkinson is Associate Professor and Associate Chair of the Politics and International Affairs department at Wake Forest University. Her research and teaching centers on questions of race, inequality, and public opinion. Her book project Partners or Rivals? Power and Latino, Black and White Relations in the 21st Century (University of Virginia Press, 2015) won the APSA REP Section’s Best Book Award on Inter-Race Relations in the United States. In 2015, Wilkinson was awarded an Early Career Award by the Midwest Political Science Association’s Latina/o Caucus. She has served as the President of the Midwest Political Science Association’s Latina/o Caucus, editorial board member of the PS: Political Science & Politics journal, executive council member of the Midwest Political Science Association and as an advisory board member of the Southern Regional Education Board (SREB) Center for Innovative Faculty Development. In addition to founding the Race, Inequality and Policy Initiative (RIPI), she currently serves as co-editor of the PS: Political Science & Politics journal. Wilkinson’s research has been published in several political science and multidisciplinary journals including Political Research Quarterly, Social Science Quarterly, American Politics Research, PS: Political Science and Politics, Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Minority Psychology, and Race and Social Problems. Wilkinson’s research has been highlighted by numerous media sources including NPR, Al-Jazeera, Los Angeles Times, NBC News Latino, Enlace Latino NC, WPTF/North Carolina News Network, Spectrum News Triad, and “This Morning” show in Seoul, South Korea.

DEBORAH J. YASHAR

Deborah J. Yashar is Director of the Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies (PIIRS) and the Donald E. Stokes Professor of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University. Her scholarship addresses democracy and authoritarianism; violence; states in the developing world; citizenship rights; social movements; ethnic politics; and immigration politics. Yashar is author of three books, including Homicidal Ecologies: Illicit Economies and Complicit States in Latin America (Cambridge University Press, 2018; Best Book Award from APSA’s Comparative Democratization section); Contesting Citizenship in Latin America: The Rise of Indigenous Movements and the Postliberal Challenge (Cambridge University Press, 2005, Best Book Award by the New England Council on Latin American Studies); Demanding Democracy: Reform and Reaction in Costa Rica and Guatemala (Stanford University Press, 1997). She is also co-editor of four volumes, including The Inclusionary Turn in Latin American Democracies (Cambridge University Press, 2021, coedited with Diana Kapizewski and Steve Levitsky); States in the Developing World (Cambridge University Press, 2017, coedited with Miguel A. Centeno and Atul Kohli); Parties Movements and Democracy in the Developing World (Cambridge University Press, 2016, coedited with Nancy Bermeo); and Routledge Handbook of Latin American Politics (Routledge, 2012, coedited with Peter Kingstone). At APSA, she has served as the President of APSA’s Politics & History Section; a member of APSA’s ethics committee; a member of the Steering Committee for APSA’s Qualitative Transparency Deliberations; among other committees. In addition, she is the former lead editor of World Politics and has served on various editorial committees, including APSR and Perspectives on Politics. She also co-chaired the Advisory Committee for the Anxieties of Democracy project at the Social Science Research Council. Yashar is an elected member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She received her doctorate in political science from the University of California, Berkeley.