The Political Economy Workshop is a forum for theoretical and empirical research at the intersection of economics and political science. The workshop draws presenters from around the world and participants from around the University with a wide range of substantive interests.

The Political Economy Workshop meets on Thursdays from 12:30 p.m.-1:50 p.m. in Room 1022 at Harris Public Policy, Keller Center (1307 East 60th Street). The faculty organizers are Adam Zelizer and Martin Castillo Quintana.

2024-2025 Political Economy Workshops

Fall 2024

  • October 3       | Alastair Smith  (New York University) - "Political Life Cycles* by Justin Melnick, Alastair Smith and Bruce Bueno de Mesquita
  • October 10     | Jack Paine (Emory University) - "The Threat-Enhancing Effect of Authoritarian Power Sharing"
  • October 17     | Sean Westwood (Dartmouth University) - "What do we know about partisan animosity?"
  • October 24     | Michael Kistner (University of Houston) - "Ambition and Conflict in State Legislatures" by Chrisitan Fong and Michael Kistner
  • October 31     | Jesse Shapiro (Harvard University) - "Pitfalls of Demographic Forecasts of US Elections" by Richard Calvo, Vincent Pons, and Jesse M. Shapiro
  • November 7   | Gabriel Lopez-Moctezuma (CalTech) - "Money and Votes in Electoral Competition:  Evidence from the US Senate (joint with Matias Iaryczower and Ted Enamorado)"
  • November 14 | Mayya Komisarchik (University of Rochester) -"Backlash Against Repression:  Evidence from Refugees Fleeing the Former Soviet Bloc*" by Valentin Bolotnyy, Mayya Komisarchik and Brian Libgober
  • November 21 |Micaela Sviatschi (Princeton University) - "Breaking the Gang:  A Preventive Approach to Reduce Recruitment in Schools" by Elona Castro, Felipe Coy, Carlos Schmidt -Padilla, Maria Micaela Sviatschi
  • December 5   |David Nickerson (Temple University) -"Habituation of Mobilization:  The Declining Effectiveness of GOTV Tactics" by David Nickerson
  • December 12 | Gabriele Gratton (University of Illinois-Urbana-Champaign) - "Bad Democracy Traps" by Gabriele Gratton, Barton E Lee and Hasin Yousaf

Workshop Archive

Political Economy Lunches

The Political Economy Lunch meets on the first Friday of every month, and on additional Fridays as needed from 12:00 p.m.-1:20 p.m. in Room 2112 of Harris Public Policy, Keller Center (1307 East 60th Street. The lunch is an informal setting in which graduate students and faculty present and receive feedback on early stage and ongoing research. We welcome empirical or theoretical work linked in any way to politics or political economy. The PE lunch is also an excellent venue for practice job talks. Graduate students and faculty from any part of the University are welcome to attend, please contact Anthony Fowler at agfowler@uchicago.edu or May Woodard-Hickey at mwoodard@uchicago.edu in advance if you haven't been a regular at the PE Lunch.

Please note:  The PE Lunch is primarily for faculty, PhD students, post-docs and visiting researchers.