Biography

Shubha Kamala Prasad is a political scientist with specializations in international relations, foreign policy, and South Asian politics. She received her Ph.D. in Political Science from the Department of Government, Georgetown University, in 2020. She was awarded her M.Phil. and M.A. in International Relations by Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.

In her research, Shubha examines domestic sources of foreign policy, spanning substate conflict to diaspora mobilization. Her dissertation focuses on the impact of insurgencies on economic integration. As a Max Weber Fellow, she will work on a book project based on her dissertation, which examines why we witness divergent levels of economic integration around the world. She argues that a state dealing with a domestic insurgency is less likely to be party to deep economic integration agreements. A multi-method approach provides evidence of this negative relationship between insurgencies and economic integration. Regression analyses of cross-national data with different measures of integration depth show lower levels of economic integration for insurgency-ridden states. The causal mechanism is traced with a context-rich case study of India that includes original archival and interview data.

The second research project, which she is working on simultaneously, explores the determinants of diaspora mobilization for foreign policy lobbying in a comparative context. The research involves conducting case studies of the creation of diaspora lobby groups in Western democratic countries.

Expertise for Teaching and Mentoring of Ph.D. Researchers
Shubha has taught IR theory, nuclear politics, and US foreign policy at the undergraduate level. She is the recipient of Georgetown University’s Best Graduate Student Teaching Award (2020).