Comparative Political Studies (2023) [Link to paper]

(with Mashail Malik)

Abstract: City residents in the Global South commonly encounter the police. Yet, outside of established democracies, we know little about how ethnicity shapes everyday policing in diverse urban contexts. Existing approaches generate competing expectations, with some arguing that officers are more rather than less discriminatory towards coethnics. We test these theories through a survey experiment conducted in Karachi, Pakistan—one of the world’s largest megacities. We find that civilians are only marginally less likely to expect procedural justice from non-coethnic officers, even in a context where ethnicity is highly salient. However, suggestive evidence indicates that this small effect is significantly magnified for respondents who perceive their group to be underrepresented in the police. Descriptive representation is therefore a powerful moderator of the relationship between ethnicity and expectations of police bias. These results have implications for the development of effective and legitimate police institutions in weakly institutionalized contexts.

Comparative Political Studies (2023) [Link to paper]

Abstract: Many socially conservative settings oppose pro-LGBT+ advocacy because of its perceived threat to “traditional values.” Can messaging on these issues from sources considered to have similar values be more effective than messaging from sources considered to have different values? This research uses the move towards legal protection of certain LGBT+ rights in Angola, Botswana, Mozambique, and South Africa to understand whether signals of changing social norms from African sources are better able to shift perspectives of those elsewhere on the continent than primes from Western sources. Using a survey experiment conducted in Uganda, I show that neither one-off messaging from African sources nor one-off messaging from Western sources shifts beliefs or behavior on LGBT+ issues. Rather, these messages produce backlash to both African and Western sources. This work highlights the challenges of attempting to rapidly change perspectives on LGBT+ issues in the most socially conservative settings.

Journal of Quantitative Description: Digital Media (2022) [Link to paper]

(with Shelby Grossman, Katie Johnson, and Lydia Sizer)

Abstract: In fragile contexts such as Libya where social media penetration is high, foreign social media outlets with political interests can use social media platforms to influence the country's politics. In this study, we assess how social media content varies by the country of the information producer. We create a dataset of Facebook posts about a strongman’s recent attack on Tripoli (N=16,662). We find that more than half of the posts originated from outside Libya and that posts from countries aligned with the Tripoli-based government are biased in that direction and posts from countries aligned with the eastern-based strongman are biased toward his forces. However, many Pages are not slanted: the correlations are instead driven by a smaller number of hyperpartisan Pages. Our findings have implications for our understanding of how social media content - especially from abroad - shapes citizen perceptions of the legitimacy of competing political actors.

Abstract: Contemporary urbanization in Africa is characterized by the growth of smaller urban centers. What are the prospects for interethnic toleration in small urban areas when compared to larger cities? Given the urban locus of interethnic contact and the potential negative consequences of local ethnic diversity, fostering social cohesion amidst diverse urban populations is a policy priority. Yet we know little about interethnic relations – and political behavior more broadly – in the smaller urban agglomerations of the region. In this pre-registered study, I construct an original sample of 1,568 Ugandans from a single ethnic group and common place of origin. I show, using both a conjoint experiment and observational measures, that rural-to-urban migrants who moved to different sizes of urban locations hold distinct attitudes towards interethnic relations. Compared to smaller urban centers, coethnicity is more important for trust-based interactions in metropolis and secondary city settings. Similarly, prejudice towards non-coethnics is highest in the metropolis and lowest in smaller urban areas. I find support for three mechanisms underpinning this relationship: (1) smaller urban areas engender familiarity between neighbors which allows for the fostering of more tolerant interethnic relations; (2) competition for jobs and housing in large cities is framed by ethnicity, which yields antagonistic social relations; and (3) the circular nature of migration intentions into the largest cities discourages investment in amicable relations with non-coethnics. These findings have implications for our understanding of how the current wave of urbanization in Africa – which is concentrated in smaller urban areas – influences social cohesion in highly diverse contexts.

Draft available upon request.

Status: under review.

Abstract: Ethnicity’s importance as a social and political cleavage in Africa is well documented, yet little attention has been given to individuals with multi-ethnic heritage in the region. Using original survey data from over 5,000 Kenyans and Ugandans, I investigate whether ethnic identification, interethnic relations, and the role of ethnicity in political representation differ between multi-ethnics and mono-ethnics. Multi-ethnics do not view ethnicity as being less important in their lives, are not more socially inclusive of non-coethnics, and do not place less importance on coethnicity in political representation. However, multi-ethnics place less importance on their ethnic language, are marginally more trusting of non-coethnics, and are much more trusting and inclusive of their non-coethnic parent’s ethnic group. There is evidence consistent with parental selection into mixed-ethnicity marriage and exposure to more ethnically diverse social networks as mechanisms underlying these results. This work highlights how multi-ethnics do and do not differ from mono-ethnics.

Draft available upon request.

Dissertation book project.

Status: data collected. [Pre-analysis plan]

Status: data collected. [Pre-analysis plan]

Status: data collected.