I am a PhD candidate in the Department of Political Science at the University of Chicago, where I study American and comparative politics. 

I study how institutional design shapes political participation, collective action, and authority across generations. My research examines how governments create, modify, or dismantle governing agreements that structure the administration of land, resources, and opportunities—and how individuals and communities adapt and redirect under these constraints.

My three-paper dissertation addresses intergovernmental dynamics, including Indigenous-state relations in the United States, with extensions in other longstanding democracies in the Arctic and Oceania. Using causal inference, archival research, and field-based case studies, I examine how democratic governance develops through delegated authority and contested control over land and resources. My findings show that policies designed to assimilate individuals and centralize or reorganize governance often produce durable institutional limits on central government power, which are visible in arrangements such as land settlements, resource regimes, and systems of environmental co-management.

My work is published in the Journal of Political Institutions and Political Economy and has been generously supported by sources such as the Pearson Institute for the Study and Resolution of Global Conflicts, the Association of Polar Early Career Scientists, and the Pozen Center for Human Rights, as well as by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and the American Political Science Association. I hold a Master’s in Political Science from the University of Chicago, a Master’s in Politics and Education from Columbia University, and a Bachelor’s in English Literature from the University of Wisconsin – Madison.