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Adrienne LeBas Associate Professor Government

Degrees
PhD, Columbia University

BA, University of Florida

Bio
Adrienne LeBas (PhD, Columbia University) joined the Department of Government in the fall of 2009. Prior to joining AU, LeBas was a Prize Research Fellow at Nuffield College, University of Oxford, and Assistant Professor of Political Science and African Studies at Michigan State University. Her research interests include democratic institutions, political violence, and the rule of law. She is the author of the award-winning From Protest to Parties: Party-Building and Democratization in Africa (Oxford University Press, 2011) and articles in the American Political Science Review, the British Journal of Political Science, Comparative Political Studies, the Journal of Democracy, and elsewhere. LeBas also worked as a consultant for Human Rights Watch in Zimbabwe, where she lived from 2002 to 2003.

Dr. LeBas's research has been supported by grants from the EGAP Metaketa program, the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL), the Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation, and the Department for International Development (UK), among others. During the 2015-2016 academic year, LeBas was a residential fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, DC. She is currently working on her second solo-authored book, which investigates the reasons for persistent election violence in some democratizing countries. With Jessica Gottlieb of the University of Houston, she is also writing a book on taxation and contradictory logics of state-building in Lagos, Nigeria. In spring 2024, she is a visiting professor at Sciences Po's Centre de recherches internationales in Paris.

Twitter Profile

See Also
SPA Department of Government
For the Media
To request an interview for a news story, call AU Communications at 202-885-5950 or submit a request.

Teaching

Fall 2024

  • GOVT-130 Comparative Politics

  • GOVT-730 Sem in Comparative Politics

  • GOVT-899 Doctoral Dissertation

Spring 2025

  • GOVT-130 Comparative Politics

  • GOVT-130 Comparative Politics

  • SPA-300 SPA Honors Colloquium: Power and Protest

Scholarly, Creative & Professional Activities

Honors, Awards, and Fellowships

Prior to joining AU, LeBas was a Prize Research Fellow at Nuffield College, University of Oxford.

Honors, Awards, and Fellowships

LeBas' book From Protest to Parties: Party-Building and Democratization in Africa was awarded the 2011 Best Book Award from the African Politics Conference Group. Read more »

LeBas recognized as a "New Voice" in the social sciences by the Social Science Research Council and by Edmond Keller, Distinguished Professor of Political Science at the University of California - Los Angeles.

AU Experts

Area of Expertise

social movements, democratization, political violence, Africa, Nigeria, Kenya, Zimbabwe

Additional Information

Adrienne LeBas prior to joining AU was a Prize Research Fellow at Nuffield College, University of Oxford, and assistant professor of Political Science and African Studies at Michigan State University. Her research interests include social movements, democratization, and political violence. She is the author of From Protest to Parties: Party-Building and Democratization in Africa (Oxford University Press, 2011), which was named Best Book by the African Politics Conference Group. Her research on party organization and violence has appeared in Comparative Politics, Studies in Comparative International Development, and elsewhere. LeBas also worked as a consultant for Human Rights Watch in Zimbabwe, where she lived from 2002 to 2003. Her most recent work looks at attitudes toward taxation in urban Nigeria.

For the Media

To request an interview for a news story, call AU Communications at 202-885-5950 or submit a request.

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