research team
Margaret Boittin
Co-Director
Margaret Boittin (Ph.D, UC Berkeley, JD, Stanford) is an Assistant Professor at Osgoode Hall Law School, York University, Canada. Her research focuses on criminal, comparative and international law. She uses ethnographic, experimental and survey methods to study issues of sex work, human trafficking, and migration. She is an expert in law and politics in China, and has also carried out extensive research in Nepal. Her research has been supported by Humanity United, the US Department of Labor, the US Agency for International Development, and the National Science Foundation. Her book, Regulating Prostitution in China, is forthcoming with Cambridge University Press. Her work has also been published in Law & Society Review and Law & Policy.
Cecilia Hyunjung Mo
Co-Director
Cecilia Hyunjung Mo (Ph.D. from Stanford University; MPA/ID from Harvard University) is the Judith E. Gruber Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of California, Berkeley and an Associate Professor of Public Policy at UC Berkeley’s Goldman School of Public Policy. She currently serves as a scientific advisor for IPA's Human Trafficking Research Initiative. Professor Mo specializes in behavioral political economy, comparative political behavior, the political economy of development, and social policy research. Her applied work focuses on understanding and addressing important social problems related to human trafficking, immigration, migration, inequality, and prejudice. Dr. Mo has significant experience with experimental methods, impact evaluations, quantitative methods, and survey methods. She has carried out field studies in several developing countries, in collaboration with various international agencies, including the International Organization for Migration (IOM), the US Agency for International Development (USAID), US Department of Labor (USDOL), and the World Bank, as well as with national and local governments and local civil society organizations.
Her research has been published in numerous outlets, including the American Journal of Political Science, the American Political Science Review, the Journal of Politics, the Journal of Experimental Political Science, the Journal of Theoretical Politics, Political Behavior, the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, and World Development. She is the recipient of the American Political Science Association (APSA)’s 2020 Emerging Scholar in Elections, Public Opinion and Voting Behavior Award, APSA’s 2015 Franklin L. Burdette/Pi Sigma Alpha Award for the best paper presented at the annual meeting, and the 2018 Roberta Sigel Early Career Scholar Best Paper Award from the International Society of Political Psychology (ISPP). She was also awarded the 2018 Best Paper Award from APSA’s Elections, Public Opinion and Voting Behavior Section, and both the 2019 and the 2016 Best Article Published in Political Behavior Award.
Sarah Rich-Zendel
Postdoctoral Fellow
Sarah Rich-Zendel is a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council Postdoctoral Fellow at Osgoode Hall Law School at York University. She holds a Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Toronto. She specializes in the comparative translation of human rights norms in South and East Asia. Her interdisciplinary research interests draw from political science, sociology, and critical development studies to understand the local translation of sexual and gender rights, and the relationship between gender, sex, and migration. Dr. Rich-Zendel’s research involves numerous partnerships in collaborative large-scale and cutting-edge mixed methods projects that are community-based and prioritize knowledge engagement through public reports and grassroots activities. This includes research collaborations with non-profit and community organizations such as Prisoner Assistance Nepal, HIV Community Link Calgary, and Circle of Health International as well as international agencies, including the US Agency for International Development (USAID), and the US Department of Labor (USDOL).
Biz herman
Predoctoral Fellow
Biz Herman is a Ph.D. Candidate in Political Science at University of California, Berkeley and an Emmy-nominated visual journalist based in New York City. Her work focuses on the politics of history, conflict, and group belonging; her dissertation research examines the ways in which trauma impacts intergroup dynamics and community conflict. Since 2016, she has been an Innovation Fellow at Beyond Conflict’s Innovation Lab, which works to apply research from cognitive and behavioral science to reduce social conflict and foster reconciliation. A regular contributor to The New York Times, she was previously a Fulbright Fellow to Bangladesh and has had her photography and research published in national and international outlets. She pitched, co-photographed, and wrote the “The Women of the 116th Congress,” a special project for The New York Times that featured portraits of 130 women of the 116th Congress, photographed in the style of historical portrait paintings, which project was recently published as a book with ABRAMS Books, with a foreword by Roxane Gay.
Soo sun Yoo
Ph.D. Student
Soo Sun You is pursuing a Ph.D. in Political Science at UC Berkeley, with a focus on comparative politics and political behavior. Her research examines how South-South migration and increasing economic inequality within countries affect perceptions about inequality and attitudes toward immigrants. Regionally, she focuses on sub-Saharan Africa and Asia. Prior to pursuing her Ph.D., Soo Sun worked as a Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL) research fellow in Ethiopia, implementing and analyzing the impact of women’s empowerment programs. She also worked as a journalist in Seoul, South Korea, focusing on issues of minority rights and education. She holds a Master of Public Policy from Seoul National University and a B.A. in Economics from UC Berkeley.