Oksan Bayulgen, Lyle Scruggs, and two co-authors published an article in the December 2021 issue of Energy Politics entitled “Tilting at Windmills? Electoral Repercussions of Wind Turbine Projects in Minnesota.” The same cohort published a piece in the Washington Post’s Monkey Cage on October 20, 2021,titled “Biden wants more wind energy. Those projects should help local politicians, our research finds.”

Christine Sylvester’s article, “National War Heritage at the Australian War Memorial and Hiroshima Peace Park”, appeared in the September 12, 2021 edition of Millennium: Journal of International Studies.

Elva Orozco-Mendoza recorded a podcast with Cuerpa Politica, which is funded by the Institute of Latin American Studies. The podcast  addresses issues through accessible conversations with a diverse range of activists, scholars and cultural producers. The podcast will be available in December.

Jeremy Pressman published an article entitled “The False Promise of the Abraham Accords” in the September 15 issue of Foreign Affairs.  On October 28, Professor Pressman spoke to the Tucson Great Decisions Association about his Foreign Affairs piece. Additionally, he appeared on The New Arab Voice podcast in an episode titled “Abraham Actually: One year on from the normalisation agreements and the betrayal of Palestine.”  

Dr. Pressman was also named outstanding professor of the week (in early October) by the UConn Marching Band. 

Matthew Singer’s article entitled “Fiddling while Democracy Burns: Partisan Reactions to Weak Democracy in Latin America” was accepted for publication at Perspectives on Politics.

Frank Griggs hosted an on-line forum on October 20.  The forum, entitled “Ask Me Anything With Frank Griggs”, gave Dr. Griggs the opportunity to answer student questions on such pressing topics as “Why is the ‘Big Lie’ dangerous?” and “What’s going on politically to address climate change?” 

At the upcoming virtual Northeastern Political Science Association conference, Beth Ginsberg will present her research (co-authored with Dr. Sarah Perez of the University of Texas at Rio Grande Valley) entitled “Trends in Cuban American Voting.”  Additionally, Dr. Ginsberg advises the Stamford campus’ Politics Club, which hosted two events with the leading Stamford mayoral candidates prior to the recent election.

Talbot Andrews’ article entitled “Climate change literacy in Africa” was recently published in the October 7, 2021 issue of Nature Climate Change.  She also published an article in the popular website The Conversation entitled “Africa’s first continent-wide survey of climate change literacy finds education is key.” And she presented a paper entitled “Close to home: How local media shapes climate change attitudes” at Harvard University’s Climate Pipeline Project conference last month.

Dr. Andrews’ research was highlighted in the October 7th edition of UConn Today.  The article entitled “Climate change literacy lessons from Africa” featured a study examining the magnitude of the climate crisis by looking at the rate of climate change literacy in Africa. UConn’s interim president, Andrew Agwunobi, wrote a letter to Dr. Andrews praising her for her research, which he believes will prove to be “an invaluable set of data in laying the groundwork to a more informed and climate conscious global society.”

Paul Herrnson has co-edited a book, Under the Iron Dome: Congress from the Inside (Routledge, 2021).  The chapters within were written by current and former members of Congress and their aides.  He also presented two conference papers: (1) “Super PACs: A New Source of Gender Inequality in Campaign Financing,” with Jennifer A. Heerwig, presented virtually at the State of the Parties Conference in Akron, Ohio; and (2) “The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Election Administration, Voting Options, and Turnout in the 2020 US Election,” with Michael J. Hanmer, Matthew Weil, and Rachel Orey, presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, in Seattle in September.

Zehra F.K. Arat was invited by the editors of the Georgetown Journal of Foreign Affairs to write an assessment of the protests that took place at Bogazici University in Turkey. Her contribution entitled “Contextualizing Erdogan’s Attacks on Bogazici University” was published last month. Dr. Arat also participated at the Annual Convention of the American Political Science Association, where she presented two papers: (1) “Problems with Tolerance” and (2) “Rights Beyond Words: Mapping Human Rights Scholar-Organization Partnerships” (co-authored with Shareen Hertel),  Dr. Arat also joined a roundtable at the convention titled “Innovations in Teaching Human Rights: Roundtable Honoring Dr. Bethany Barratt.” 

Dr. Arat was invited by the Philippine-Middle East Studies Association and the Asian Center at the University of the Philippines to deliver a webinar talk on October 20, 2021 entitled “A Century of Struggle: Women’s Movements and Rights in Turkey,”   On September 28, 2021, she was featured on the ISA’s Global Conversations Series panel, “Women and Girls’ Security, Agency and Right Beyond the Current Afghan Crisis,”  

Shareen Hertel and her colleagues in the Engineering for Human Rights Initiative hosted a public webinar on October 14, 2021 on “Climate Change Research & Policy Updates in Connecticut: Strategies for Promoting Equity in Inclusion.”  As part of the webinar, panelists explored ways to increase equitable public engagement with both the Governor’s Council on Climate Change and the Long Island Sound Study.  The webinar featured faculty from UConn’s departments of Political Science, Geography, Engineering, and Marine Sciences, along with a UConn alumna (Denise M. Savageau ‘85 (CLAS)) who has been active in related policy efforts.

Additionally, Dr. Hertel and Prakash Kashwan (co-directors of the Economic & Social Rights Program at UConn’s Human Rights Institute) will host the 2021 Annual Economic & Social Rights Public Lecture on November 18, 2021.  The lecture features Harvard University Kennedy School of Government Professor Sushma Raman addressing themes related to “Safeguarding Human Rights Amidst Technological Change: Promises and Risk.”

In the wake of President Biden’s visit to UConn, Prakash Kashwan was quoted in an October 15 UConn Today article entitled “Biden Visit Emphasizes Intersection of Human Rights Scholarship, Activism, and Policy Making.”  According to Dr. Kashwan, the president’s visit highlighted numerous important challenges, and universities like UConn are “an important bridge between the research and education of the next generation of leaders and scholars.”

Dr. Kashwan also led an international research collaborative on “Fossil Nationalism or Climate Nationalism” which was awarded a $35,000 grant from the Climate Social Science Network of Brown University.  He was quoted in Yahoo News concerning the ongoing debates on global climate negotiations. And Dr. Kashwan gave talks and interacted with faculty and students in Ithaca, New York, last month.  At Ithaca College, he participated in a Webinar Conversation with Jake Brenner, Chair of Environmental Studies and Sciences on October 26, 2021; at Cornell University, he addressed the Perspectives in Global Development Seminar Series on October 27, 2021 where he discussed “Pathways to an anti-racist and regenerative environmentalism in an age of intersecting crises.”

Finally, Dr. Kashwan has published an article with Jesse Ribot entitled “Violent Silence: The Erasure of History and Justice in Global Climate Policy” in Current History; and with several co-authors he published an article on “The Dangers of Mainstreaming Solar Geoengineering: A Critique of the National Academies Report. Environmental Politics” in Environmental Politics.