Welcome! I am a Postdoctoral Fellow at Harvard University's Weatherhead Center for International Affairs. Starting in fall 2025, I will be an Assistant Professor of Comparative Politics in the Department of International Affairs at the University of Georgia. I am a scholar of democracy, conflict, and migration, with a regional focus on Latin America. My research investigates the causes of political and criminal violence and their impact on democratic institutions and policy outcomes—from immigrants' integration into host societies and citizens' support for state repression to criminal governance, democratic accountability, and societal mobilization for transitional justice. My work leverages a range of research designs and data sources, including field and natural experiments, large-scale surveys, qualitative fieldwork, and administrative data.

My first book project examines how political elites legitimize human rights abuses against stigmatized groups—and how victims' organizations mobilize demands for justice to hold politicians accountable in Mexico's War on Drugs. My second book project (with Abby Córdova) explores the positive role of immigrants’ agency in countering misperceptions and promoting support for inclusionary policies.

My work has been published or accepted in Perspectives on Politics, Political Psychology, Party Politics, Legislative Studies Quarterly [2x], and Research and Politics, and is under advance contract with Cambridge University Press. It has been funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF), the American Political Science Association (APSA), Innovations for Poverty Action (IPA), Evidence in Governance and Politics (EGAP), and the Kellogg Institute, among others. I was also a 2023-2024 Harry Frank Guggenheim Emerging Scholar, a USIP-Minerva Peace and Security Scholar, and the 2023 APSA Political Psychology Distinguished Junior Scholar.

I received my PhD in Political Science in 2024 from the University of Notre Dame, where I am a research affiliate at the Kellogg Institute's Violence and Transitional Justice Lab and the Eliminating Violence Against Women Lab. I am also affiliated with Stanford University's Poverty, Violence, and Governance Lab.

Contact

nskigin@fas.harvard.edu