The City as Data Machine: Local Governance in the Age of Big Data

Burcu Baykurt, a PhD candidate in communications at Columbia University, studies the social and cultural implications of digital technology, particularly the use of big data in urban development and local governance. Her work draws on and contributes to cultural sociology, public policy, and social studies of science.

The Effect of Participation in Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program on Health and Healthcare Expenditure

Andrew Breck is a PhD candidate at New York University’s Graduate School of Public Service and a pre-doctoral fellow at the School of Medicine. His research interests are at the intersection of social policy and health behavior, with the goal of understanding how policies can influence nutrition and nutrition related diseases.

Paying to Stay: Why Medicare's Payment System for Home Health Care leads to Inefficiency and Waste

Special Award: Eli Ginzberg Award  

Vicki Chen is a PhD candidate in University of Pennsylvania’s Department of Health Care Management and Economics. Her research concentrates on health care provider competition and organization and its influence on social welfare. Formerly, she worked at the Urban Institute and holds a BA from Princeton University.

Policy Demand and the Rights to Organize: Emergence of Cooperative Fishery Governance

As an interdisciplinary social scientist at Duke University’s Nicholas School of the Environment, Elizabeth Clark studies cooperation to confront challenges in natural resource use and conservation. She integrates approaches from economics, political ecology, and institutional scholarship.

Blurring the Thin Blue Line: The Rise of the "Military Model" in American Policing

Special Award: Donald R. Cressey Award

Ellen Dinsmore is a PhD candidate in sociology at the Center for Demography and Ecology at the University of Wisconsin - Madison. Her research explores how criminal justice systems both reflect and exacerbate inequalities within populations. She has worked at the Vera Institute of Justice and collaborated with the Madison Police Department.

The Geography of Profit: How Landlord Decisions Impact the Supply and Location of Subsidized Housing

Philip Garboden is a doctoral student in sociology and applied math at Johns Hopkins University. He holds a Master of Public Policy from the same institution. His work focuses on the ways housing policies intersect with the decisions of private landlords, developers, and tenants to impact low-income communities.

Maternal and Infant Health Impacts of Public Health Insurance Expansions

Special Award: Martinus Nijhoff Award

​Ausmita Ghosh is a PhD candidate in economics with a concentration in health economics and public economics. Her research focuses on the role of government programs and economic conditions on health, healthcare use, and the economic well-being of vulnerable populations.

Meta-Modeling Assertive Community Treatment

Sebastian Lemire has over ten years of experience managing research and evaluation in the fields of education, market development, and social welfare. His professional areas of interest revolve around alternative approaches to impact evaluation and research syntheses.

Game of Drones: The Effect of Technology on Conflict Onset and Initiation

Special Award: Irving Louis Horowitz Award

Erik Lin-Greenberg is a PhD candidate in political science at Columbia University where he studies international relations. His current research examines the effect of technology on armed conflict. Prior to attending Columbia, he served as an officer in the United States Air Force.

Pacifying the Peacekeepers: How Involvement in UN Peacekeeping Reduces the Domestic Threat of the Military

Special Award: Harold D. Lasswell Award    

Timothy Passmore is a PhD candidate in political science at the University of Colorado - Boulder. His research focuses on conflict and peace studies. His research interests include peacekeeping, terrorism and political violence, religion and conflict, and the politics of Africa and the Middle East.

When Regulations Fail: Setting Standards Under Asymmetric Information

Rebecca Perlman is a PhD candidate in political science at Stanford University. Her research focuses on how governments regulate risk in a globalized economy. She received her BA from Princeton University and also holds a master’s degree from the Fletcher School at Tufts University.

Distributional and Welfare Effects of Gentrification

Davin Reed is a PhD candidate in public policy at New York University. His research addresses questions in urban and labor economics. He is currently studying the effects of eviction and the causes and consequences of gentrification.

From Informal Work to Decent Work? Integrating Waste Pickers into Formal Waste Management in Brazil and Colombia

Manuel Rosaldo is a PhD candidate in sociology at the University of California - Berkeley. His work analyzes efforts to improve the incomes, conditions, and political voice of informal recyclers in Brazil and Colombia.

The Inconvenient Truth of the Political Pollution Cycle: Theory and Evidence from China

Shiran is a PhD candidate in political science at Stanford University. Her research explores the influence of local political tenure cycles on air pollution control in China, the US, and Mexico. She holds an MS in civil and environmental engineering from Stanford and graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Swarthmore College.

Working Algorithms: Software Automation and the Future of Work

Benjamin Shestakofsky is a PhD candidate in the Department of Sociology at the University of California-Berkeley. His research examines how innovations in computing are changing work and employment, organizations, and economic exchange. He is also a 2016-2017 Scholars Strategy Network Graduate Fellow.

"Framing the Case": Bureaucratic Efficiency Pressures in the Humanitarian Politicization, Legitimation, and Adjudication of Refugee Claims

Talia Shiff is a JD-PhD candidate in law and sociology at Northwestern University. Her research examines the processes through which norms and institutions inform legal categories. Her dissertation focuses on questions of categorization and evaluation through an examination of the ways adjudicators translate applicant testimonies into cognizable narratives for asylum.

Catalytic Politics: When do International Monetary Fund (IMF) Programs Trigger Private Capital into the Borrowing Country?”

Sujeong Shim is a PhD candidate in political science at University of Wisconsin - Madison. Her research interests include international finance, international organizations, economic crisis, and public opinion. Her latest work examines how public opinion affects the IMF program’s design and efficacy.

Is Bilateral Environmental Aid Effective? A Cross-National Analysis of Forest Loss

Jamie Sommer is a PhD candidate in the Department of Sociology at Stony Brook University (SUNY). She received her Master’s in sociology from Stony Brook University and BA from Montclair State University. Her research interests include global political economy, environmental sociology, and development and health.

Borrowed Dreams: Household Debt and the Social Policy Mismatch in Germany, Denmark, and the United States

Andreas Wiedemann is a PhD candidate in political science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, studying political economy, comparative politics, and political behavior. His research explores how and in what ways families across advanced democracies borrow money to address the mismatch between their financial needs and social policies’ financial support.

Circles of Solidarity: Diversity and Welfare Policies in Developed Democracies

Special Award: Robert K. Merton Award

Alon Yakter is a PhD candidate in political science at the University of Michigan - Ann Arbor. His research interests include comparative political economy, social policy, identity politics, and political parties. His work examines how the economic and geographic contexts of ethnic, linguistic, and religious cleavages shape solidarity and welfare policies.