Welcome! I’m a comparative political scientist, an Assistant Professor in the Department of Government at Georgetown University, and an Academy Scholar at the Harvard Academy for International and Area Studies.
My research investigates the causes and consequences of protest mobilization, with a focus on unpacking interactions between states and social movements. My book project, “The Logics of Concession: Protest Economies and Public Authority in the Maghreb,” examines the conditions under which protests movements can provoke distributive concessions and social policy interventions. I ask in particular how revolutions and regime transitions can shift the logics of state response to mobilization and the dynamics of state-movement interaction. I also write about political economy and redistribution, political violence and policing, the influence of mass protests over processes of political transition, and the long-term effects of conflict on mobilization. My research has been supported by the Social Science Research Council, the National Science Foundation, and the American Institute for Maghreb Studies, and has received honors from the International Studies Association and the American Political Science Association.
At Georgetown, I teach classes about social movements, authoritarianism, and comparative politics. I am affiliated with the Government Department’s MA Program in Conflict Resolution. I also run “Writing Activism,” a series of informal conversations between students and scholars of comparative social movements studies.
I’m fluent in French and I have been learning Arabic for ten years. I have studied and worked in Syria, Lebanon, Morocco, Egypt, and Tunisia. I’m also a former journalist and videographer. I worked as a video production fellow at Democracy Now! and before that as a producer at Radio Open Source for NPR. Outside of work, I have also served as a volunteer citizenship tutor at the Arab American Association in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, where I helped candidates for naturalization prepare for the U.S. citizenship exam.
I’m a French/American New Jersey native (hence, “Chantal”). I live in Northeast Washington D.C. with my husband, baby, cat, and dog.