JSA

Joseph Siaw Akowuah

Ph.D. Candidate in Political Science · Washington State University

I am a Ph.D. candidate in Political Science at Washington State University’s School of Politics, Philosophy, and Public Affairs, where I am concurrently pursuing an M.S. in Statistics. My research examines political violence, civil resistance, and contentious politics, with a regional focus on African politics and elections.

My work combines large-N quantitative analysis with comparative case study methods. I am particularly interested in how armed and unarmed political actors relate to civilian populations, and in how those relationships shape violence during elections and the survival of resistance organizations over time. I work primarily in R and LaTeX, and my methodological training spans the statistical analysis of conflict event data, survival analysis, and selection models.

I serve as Data Extension Manager for the Electoral Contention and Violence (ECAV) project and as a research assistant on applied survey research. Prior to graduate study, I worked at the Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly in Ghana. I also direct Study Peak Consult, an educational consulting practice that supports students through the graduate application process.