I am Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Illinois.

In addition, I am the acting Director of the Illinois Global Institute. From 2020 and until 2024, I was the Director of the Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies.

I study political institutions with an emphasis on the strategic elements of separation of powers. My research demonstrates the value of taking a broader view when studying the division of decision-making authority: checks and balances create expectations between institutions that can be fully understood only by identifying their strategic interactions.

My first research program focused on how constitutional requirements for interbranch negotiations influence U.S. House members’ choices about how to organize their chamber, and who, in the House, has the authority to make policy decisions.  My work on constitutional requirements for interbranch negotiations has informed my research on institutional design in Latin America. I have examined several features of separation of power structures in Latin America including presidential fast-track authority in Brazil and Chile, legislative committees in Argentina, Brazil, and Chile, and presidential line-item vetoes in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Ecuador, and Peru. I also study political parties and electoral systems, addressing for example the question of whether the open-list proportional representation system in Brazil generates intraparty competition and conflict. Together with a colleague, I am writing the first book on Latin American politics that analyzes the effect of veto prerogatives on interbranch bargaining and legislative outcomes.