Peer-Reviewed Publications

​​​​​

“International Financial Institutions and the Promotion of Autocratic Resilience” with Christina J. Schneider. Forthcoming at International Organization (Open Access)

Despite their significant influence on the development trajectories of recipient nations, we know little about the lending strategies of international financial institutions (IFIs) dominated by authoritarian regimes. In this paper, we provide new evidence that autocratic IFIs are not merely neutral economic actors. Our findings suggest that these institutions provide financial support to authoritarian governments facing acute threats to their survival. We introduce an original dataset tracking the lending behavior of 18 autocratic IFIs across 143 recipient countries from 1967 to 2021. Our findings uncover that aid flows from autocratic IFIs increase precisely when authoritarian regimes are most vulnerable. By situating these insights within the broader aid allocation literature, we provide a fresh perspective on the political calculus of international development lending, with profound implications for understanding global power dynamics.​

​

"Illiberal Regimes and International Organizations"  with Emilie Hafner-Burton, Stephan Haggard, Lauren Prather, and Christina J. Schneider. The Review of International Organizations. Special Issue 2025. (Open access)

Illiberal regimes have become central players in international organizations. In this introduction to the special issue, we provide a unified framework for understanding their effects. We start by outlining the theoretical foundations of this work, focusing first on why regime type matters for international cooperation. We then show how differing memberships and decision-making processes within international organizations affect the influence illiberal regimes can wield, the activities they undertake, and the impact that they have on domestic political outcomes. Collectively and individually, the contributions to this special issue broaden the theoretical literature on illiberal regimes in international organizations and produce novel data about how they are implicated in the politics and operations of multilateral and regional IOs. This research has important implications for how democracies can and should cope with the challenges to global governance that arise from illiberal regimes. 

​

“Zombies Ahead: Explaining the Rise of Low-Quality Election Monitoring” with Sarah S. Bush and Lauren Prather. The Review of International Organizations. Special Issue 2025. (Open access)

The international election monitoring regime has become considerably more complex in the 21st century. Although the number of organizations engaged in high-quality election monitoring has plateaued, the number of low-quality monitors—commonly known as zombie monitors—has continued to grow. Low-quality election monitors threaten democracy because they validate flawed elections and undermine the legitimacy of the international election monitoring regime. This article argues that international politics have played a crucial role in the diffusion of low-quality election monitors. It hypothesizes that ties with autocratic powers that promote low-quality observers and membership in authoritarian regional organizations significantly increase the likelihood that a country will host low-quality monitors at its elections. To test the hypotheses, the article draws on original data on international election observation between 2000 and 2020 that identifies the most comprehensive set of groups of election monitors to date. A statistical analysis of the dataset supports the argument.

​

"Protection for Hire: Cooperation through Regional Organizations"  International Studies Quarterly. 67:4 December 2023 (pdf)

There is growing evidence that leaders cooperate through regional intergovernmental organizations (RIOs) to address domestic security challenges. What sustains this collaboration? I present a theory of regional cooperation driven by mutual interest in stability and protection for heads of state. RIOs support the development of rules and norms around contributing to regional security and can legitimize pro-government military interventions. Leaders concerned that they may need external support—particularly against members of their own military—cooperate to remain in good standing with co-members. Using original security personnel deployment data for members of four Africa-based RIOs with mutual defense pacts between 1990 and 2017, I show that leaders facing higher coup risk were more likely to deploy personnel to support co-members. I also find evidence for the underlying mechanism—that these leaders contribute because they expect RIO members to reciprocate support in the future. Leaders who contributed more personnel to support co-members, and leaders who contributed more often, were more likely to receive military support from co-members in the future. These findings shed light on the dynamics sustaining regional security cooperation.​

​

"Stabilizing Authoritarian Rule: The Role of International Institutions" with Stephan Haggard. International Studies Quarterly. 67:2 June 2023 (pdf)

Research has demonstrated how membership in more democratic regional intergovernmental organizations (ROs) can strengthen the prospects for democracy. However, a significant number of ROs are dominated by autocratic members who have quite different preferences: to limit democratic contagion and consolidate authoritarian rule against democratic challengers. We outline a menu of mechanisms through which ROs with authoritarian memberships might have pernicious effects on the prospects for democratic rule. We use cross-national quantitative analyses to demonstrate that membership in more deeply authoritarian international organizations is associated with autocratization. We supplement the quantitative results with an analysis of twenty-nine of the most authoritarian ROs and illustrative case studies. The multi-method approach strengthens inference by showing that authoritarian international organizations do in fact engage in behaviors inimical to democratic rule.

​​

"Taking the Cloth: Social Norms and Elite Cues Increase Support for Masks among White Evangelical Americans" with Claire L. Adida, Leonardo Falabella, Isabel Gotti, ShahBano Ijaz, Gregoire Phillips, and Michael Seese. Journal of Experimental Political Science. 10:3 Winter 2023

​

“War of words: the impact of Russian state television on the Russian Internet” with Katherine Kucharski, Evgenia Olimpieva, and Robert W. Orttung, Nationalities Papers. 43:4 July 2015

​

Papers Under Review

​

"To Defend or Disown? Reciprocity and Biased Regional Interventions in West Africa" 

​

"After Zombies Attack: How Low-Quality Monitors Affect Credible International Election Observers" with Sarah S. Bush and Lauren Prather (r&r ISQ)

​

"International Collaboration Among Authoritarian Regimes"

​​​​​​​​​

Books​​​​​​​​​​​​​

​

​

​

​

​

​​

​

​

​

​

 

Protective Clubs: How Leaders Cooperate in African Regional Organizations

(Forthcoming with Cambridge University Press in 2026)​​

​

How do African leaders cooperate through regional intergovernmental organizations (RIOs) to manage political and security threats? Do the particular interests of heads of state really matter for explaining how these organizations address crises and intervene in their members' domestic affairs? Protective Clubs reveals how presidents across Africa cooperate in RIOs to protect themselves from threats, such as military coups. Cottiero argues that heads of state concerned with their personal survival often treat RIOs as bases for organizing, in essence, mutual protection clubs based on reciprocity. Leaders who cooperate and maintain 'good standing' with co-members are more likely to receive back-up during crises, while leaders who destabilized co-members are more likely to be abandoned or punished. Employing original datasets on security interventions and leader exile, interviews, and Nigerian presidential archive records, Protective Clubs shows how collusion among leaders matters not just for particular leaders, but for regional stability and democracy.

• Introduces a fresh theory of mutual aid among African leaders, revealing how regional cooperation is often driven by elite collusion for regime survival-challenging conventional, institution-focused explanations

• Offers the most comprehensive analysis to date of how African leaders shape regional cooperation, combining deep theoretical insight with richly contextualized African case studies

• Demonstrates accessible, multi-method research using novel data-including never-before-cited Nigerian archival sources-making it a valuable model for scholars across disciplines

 

Book 2:​​

​

International Organizations and Autocratic Resilience​​

​

In progress with Stephan Haggard and Christina J. Schneider​​

​​

​

Papers in Progress​​​

​

“Borrower-Led International Organizations and High-Profile Development Projects”

Autocratic Assassinations project with Sheena Chesnut Greitens, Lee Morgenbesser, and Tore Wig

​​

Policy Pieces

​

"Understanding and Interrupting Modern Day Authoritarian Collaboration"
Concept paper for the International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES), 2024

​​

​​

​

​​

​