I am an assistant professor of political science at the University of California, Riverside. My research and teaching focuses on communal violence, informal institutions, civil wars, policing and gangs, and the political economy of development.  I employ fieldwork, observational and experimental statistical methods, and applied formal modeling in my work.

I am currently completing a book manuscript entitled The Institutional Origins of Communal Violence: Indonesia's Transition from Authoritarian Rule (under contract with Cambridge University Press), which provides an explanation for the spike in communal violence during the transition from authoritarian rule in Indonesia. My second major project on the political economy of peacebuilding examines how, following the end of the separatist war in Aceh, Indonesia in 2005, the economy was restructured by former combatants. In my other ongoing projects, I examine gangs and other armed groups both in Indonesia and the United States.

Prior to my appointment at UC Riverside, I was a fellow at Yale University in the Order, Conflict, and Violence Program. I have been a consultant for the World Bank and United Nations Development Program and have worked at the Federal Reserve Board of Governors. I received a Ph.D. (2009) and MPA in International Development (2003) from Harvard University and a B.A. in physics from Swarthmore College (1999).