Meet Professor S.P. Harish
The William & Mary Government Department is excited to welcome Assistant Professor S.P. Harish! Professor Harish received his undergraduate degree in Mathematics from the National University of Singapore and his masters in International Relations from the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies at Nanyang Technological University, also in Singapore. He then completed his PhD in Political Science at New York University.
Professor Harish’s research focuses on state capacity, political violence, and energy access, especially in Southeast and South Asia. His work has been published in the American Political Science Review, the Economist, and the Atlantic, spanning topics from the socioeconomic effects of solar power in India to the political violence cycle. The latter article disagrees with the traditional view that democratic elections make the political process more peaceful, and rather suggests that the buildup and execution of elections creates a cycle of political violence while making society less violent overall.
Harish recently presented his work at the International Studies Association Conference in Baltimore and the Indian Institute of Management workshop on Political Economy. Before coming to William & Mary, Professor Harish was a Postdoctoral Fellow in Global Governance at McGill University in Montreal.
This fall, he is teaching GIS for Social Science and the Politics of Southeast Asia. He loves being at William & Mary so far and finds the students “very motivated and keen to learn”. One other thing you should know about him? He loves the “three Cs: chess, cricket, and Christopher Nolan”!
We are so glad to have you, Professor Harish!
