Research Statement

1. Research Statement Motivating Your Research in Five Sentences

2. General Structure • First sentence: Interesting observation about reality • Second sentence: Your research question that follows from this observation • Third sentence: Your method and methodology • Fourth sentence: Research setting, population, approach, etc. • Fifth sentence: Why this research question is important, and who should care

3. Sample Interpretive Design (Interview) Economic formalization is generally seen as a process driven by regulatory reform, yet we know little about how informal participants transition between formal and informal sectors. My research aims to explore this issue by investigating the impact of continued economic formalization on bazaar sellers’ adjustment to the changing economic and regulatory landscape. I will be using semi-structured interviews with both current sellers and former bazaar participants who have or are making a transition to the formal sector to investigate where the boundary between these sectors lies and how individual entrepreneurs transition between the two. My target population will be a group of approximately 50 bazaar sellers and former bazaar sellers identified through snowballing. This research helps researchers and policy makers better understand how entrepreneurs cope with this transition, and betters our understanding of how macro policy changes affect individuals operating in the informal sector.

4. Sample Research Statement (Ethnography) In ‘top down’ conceptualizations of globalization, people often enter the analytical picture merely as resisters to globalization or as receivers of corporate produced goods, messages and ideas. This article, in contrast, focuses on a process in which ‘ordinary’ people are the active makers of global processes and meanings. I describe the transnational trade network between post-Soviet countries and Turkey, in which Western fashions and images get circulated and transformed through the activities of informal entrepreneurs. I thus challenge accounts of globalization in which the dissemination of images is depicted as a top down process originating in corporations located in metropolitan countries. Based on ethnographic evidence collected in Istanbul and Moscow on the informal ‘shuttle trade’, I demonstrate that the mobility of ‘ordinary’ people across borders facilitates the flows of signs and images. Moreover, Western images and fashions get remoulded and acquire new meanings in the process of circulation.

5. Sample Positivist Design (Survey) Few dispute that secure property rights are critical to economic development. But if secure property rights are so beneficial, then why are they so rare? More precisely, what factors promote secure property rights? Do rightholders view private or state agents as a greater threat to property? Do they value bureaucratic commitment or discretion? I use evidence from two original surveys of company managers in Russia to assess the institutional, social, and political determinants of secure property rights. Most managers said state arbitration courts did not work badly in disputes with other private businesses, but few expected these courts to protect their rights in disputes with state officials. More importantly, managers who expressed confidence that state arbitration courts could constrain state officials invested at higher rates, even controlling for the perceived effectiveness of state institutions. Ironically, increasing constraints on state agents can increase the security of property and bolster state capacity. These results generate insights into debates on the role of state in the economy, the origins of secure property rights, the nature of state capacity, the importance of informal institutions, and the process of legal reform.

6. Sample Positivist Design (Network Tracing and Regression) Former Soviet countries share a similar institutional history and scientific research network structure that has diverged in radically different directions following the collapse of the USSR. How has the structure of these collaborative networks evolved in the face of privatization and institutional divergence across this set of countries? By taking the complete set of patent data from 1980-2012 for all 15 countries, I am able to trace inventor citations and collaboration using a unique network algorithm to identify multi-group inclusion. This measure enables me to identify several distinct effects of privatization and institutional reform on scientific network structure and collaboration across different types of organizations. This research helps researchers and policy makers understand the effects of institutional reform and privatization on other similar environments, such as China.