Featured Faculty

Our faculty members are on the cutting edge of research in all of the sub-fields of political science. Their publications drive understandings of theory, define historical context, and set the stage for research done around the world. Here is a sample of our featured faculty members and the work and research they do.

Political Psychology

Christopher Federico

Professor Christopher Federico is a political psychologist. His research focuses on the nature of ideology and belief systems, the psychological foundations of political preferences, and intergroup attitudes.

His recent book, The Authoritarian Divide: Partisan Identity, Voting, and the Transformation of the American Electorate, identifies the factors that have shaped and conditioned the sorting of Americans into different belief patterns and partisan camps as a function of authoritarianism over the past 30 years. Professor Federico and his co-authors, Stanley Feldman and Christopher Weber, use nationally-representative samples, panel data, and experiments to show how authoritarianism has increasingly structured a wide range of attitudes and become a growing influence on vote choice and party identification.

Learn more about Christopher Federico's new book on authoritarianism.

Political Theory

Nancy Luxon

Professor Nancy Luxon spent the spring and summer of 2025 abroad as a Visiting Scholar in residence at the Centre for Humanities Research at the University of the Western Cape and participating in a Senior Fellowship with the Institute of Advanced Studies - Leuphana to further her research.

For several years, her research has been oriented to the connections between French political thought and anticolonial struggle in North Africa. She considers what it means to empower people for political agency in a hierarchical, racialized colonial context, where they are seen as "objects" of power, not "subjects" capable of acting in their own right. 

Professor Luxon's current research project looks at the institution of the psychiatric hospital and its instantiation in several different sites, such as Algeria, Tunisia, and French North Africa, across the 20th century. This project is an opportunity to take seriously the psychiatric hospital as an institution, and to rethink the place for social institutions and infrastructure in political life.

Learn more about Professor Luxon's opportunities abroad and current research.

Comparative Politics

August Nimtz

Professor August Nimtz is a scholar and teacher of Marxism, African politics, and ethnic politics. 

40 years ago, Professor Nimtz reviewed Black Marxism by Cedric Robinson. It was not until 2017 that the book gained traction and Nimtz discovered his review had nearly lost. In his new book, "Black Marxism": A Marxist Critique, Professor Nimtz utilizes autobiography and 40 years of his scholarly work to dispute Robinson's book.

Learn more about Professor Nimtz's new book, "Black Marxism": A Marxist Critique.

International Relations

Mark Bell

Professor Mark Bell is a scholar of nuclear weapons and proliferation, international relations theory, and U.S. and British foreign policy. He is drawn to extended nuclear deterrence in particular due to it being a difficult thing to make credible while many of the United States' important alliances include a nuclear dimension.

To support his current research, Professor Bell has been awarded the 2026-2028 Social Science Research Grant. This award will help Professor Bell conduct survey research and engage with governments and policymakers on this rapidly shifting policy area.

Learn more about Professor Bell's extended nuclear deterrence research.

American Politics

Tim Johnson

Professor Tim Johnson studies and teaches courses on Supreme Court decision making, civil liberties, constitutional law, and American politics. He is also interested in how AI can make the Supreme Court more accessible to the average American.

Following the success of the Brown v. Board of Education Revisited Project he served on the advisory board for, Professor Johnson worked on a new project. On the Docket brings to life opinion announcements using audio directly from the Court along with AI-created video of justices on the bench as they address some of the nation's most pressing legal issues.

Learn more about Professor Johnson's On the Docket project.

Applied Methodology

James Hollyer

Professor James Hollyer's research interests include transparency, democratization and democratic backsliding, patronage and corruption, and the effects of international institutions on domestic policies.

Professor Hollyer recently joined the Department of Political Science's peer advisors on an episode of the PoliSci Pod to discuss his research on economic transparency and how it translates to today's political environment.

Listen to the PoliSci Pod: Economic Transparency with James Hollyer.