My major areas of research are political violence, terrorism, and political development with an emphasis on Latin America, especially Colombia and Peru. In addition to numerous journal articles, I am the author or editor of seven books, including Guns, Drugs and Development in Colombia (University of Texas Press, 2008), Terrorism and Democratic Stability Revisited (Manchester University Press, 2008), Latin American Democracy: Emerging Reality or Endangered Species? (Routledge, 2008, 2015), and Immigration Judges and U.S. Asylum Policy (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2015). My ongoing research is focused on four areas: the landscape ecology of conflict and post-conflict, the protection of critical infrastructures, urban quality of life, and the creation of real time event data on political and social events in Latin America.
Active Grants
2020 NSF CSSI "Sustaining modern infrastructure for political and social event data" $588,032
2019 "UTD SFS Renewal: Enriching Technical Program Offerings for SFS Scholarship Program at UTD" $4,014,883