APSA 2021

The 2021 Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association will take place September 28 – October 3, 2021 in Seattle, Washington.

The meeting will use a hybrid format, with some panels being held in-person in Seattle and others being held online. APSA’s official online program is available here.

This page contains up-to-date information about the formal theory panels at APSA, including participants, dates, times and locations.

Disclaimer: This information is being provided by panelists, panel chairs and discussants on an ongoing basis, and is not guaranteed to be accurate.

All dates and times listed below are U.S. Pacific times.

Tuesday
September 28

Grassroots Politics
2:00 PM to 3:30 PM
Virtual Format (link)

Chair: Keith Schnakenberg (Washington University)
Discussant: Thomas Choate (George Washington University)

  • “Robust Theories of Political Polarization” by Asya Magazinnik (MIT) and Dan Alexander (Rochester)
  • “A Formal Model of Co-Ethnic Voting” by Fan Lu (UC Davis) and Gento Kato (Nazarbayev University)
  • “Strategic Uncertainty and Social Identity” by Dominik Duell (University of Innsbruck), Catherine Hafer (NYU) and Dimitri Landa (NYU)
  • “Partisan Misconception Drives Self-Segregation in Cooperative Dilemmas” by Jung Chen (UC Merced), Matthew Hibbing (UC Merced) and Brad LeVeck (UC Merced)

Wednesday
September 29

Government Accountability to Citizens
2:00 PM to 3:30 PM
Virtual Format (link)

Chair: Benjamin Ogden (Texas A&M)
Discussant: Ian Turner (Yale)

  • “Civil-Police Relations: The Effects of Police Power on Electoral Accountability” by Alexander Stephenson (UC Berkeley)
  • “Inefficient Stereotyping in Prosecutions” by Ryan Hübert (UC Davis)
  • “Private Security and Public Policing” by Anna Maria Wilke (Columbia)
  • “Oversight, Capacity, and Inequality” by Tara Slough (NYU)

Thursday
September 30

Causes of War
8:00 AM to 9:30 AM
Fully Pre-Recorded (link)

Chair: Brenton Kenkel (Vanderbilt)
Discussant: Noam Reich (Princeton)

Formal Models of Alliance and Rivalry in Conflict
2:00 PM to 3:30 PM
Virtual Format (link)

Chair: Scott Wolford (UT Austin)
Discussant: Jack Paine (Rochester)

  • “Tug of War: The Heterogeneous Effects of Outbidding between Terrorist Groups” by Casey Crisman-Cox (Texas A&M) and Michael Gibilisco (Cal Tech)
  • “Uncertainty, Incentives, and Alliance Contracting” by Bradley Smith (Vanderbilt)
  • “In Defense of a General Approach (In Three Strata)” by Robert Carroll (University of Illinois at Champaign)
  • “Competitive Intervention and Sabotage in Civil Wars” by Katherine Ingram (Princeton)

Friday
October 1

Multi-Dimensionality in Policy Problems
8:00 AM to 9:30 AM
In-Person Format (Room: WSCC 607)

Chair: Peter Bils (Vanderbilt)
Discussant: David Foster (UC Berkeley)

  • “Breadth in Judicial Opinions” by Amna Salam (Rochester)
  • “Experimentation Multidimensional Policy Experimentation” by Jesse Crosson (Trinity University), Federica Izzo (UC San Diego) and Gleason Judd (Princeton)
  • “Monitoring Policy Bundling and Costly Monitoring” by Gregory Sasso (Emory)
  • “Two Problems Can Be Better than One” by Zuheir Desai (IE University) and Gleason Judd (Princeton)

Formal Theory iPoster Session
10:30 AM to 11:00 AM
Virtual Format (link)

Chair: Giovanna Invernizzi (Columbia)
Discussant: Scott Tyson (Rochester)

  • “Conditional Aid as a Risk-Sharing Agreement” by Boris Brekhov (Freie Universität Berlin)
  • “Division and Connection: How Does Networking Sway Mobilization in Autocracy?” by Yuequan Guo (Michigan)
  • “How Does Violence Deter? Functional and Informational Effects of Repression” by Dogus Aktan
  • “Similes Cum Similibus: How Shared Traits Shape Election and Policy Outcomes” by Francesco Bromo (Texas A&M) and Benjamin Ogden (Texas A&M)
  • “Whale of a Deal: A Bargaining Model of Treaty Exit” by Taylor Dalton (University of Southern California)

Domestic Origins of Conflict
12:00 PM to 1:30 PM
In-Person Format (Room: WSCC 3A)

Chair: Jack Paine (Rochester)
Discussant: Katherine Ingram (Princeton)

  • “On the Peaceful Transition of Power” by Scott Tyson (Rochester)
  • “Targeting Livelihoods in Civil Conflict” by Jessica Sun (Emory)
  • “Violence, Peace, and Intervention in Illicit Drug Markets” by Martin Castillo Quintana (NYU)
  • “Strategic Reporting: A Formal Model of Biases in Conflict Events” by Jessica Steinberg (Indiana University)

Money and Special Interest Influence in Politics
4:00 PM to 5:30 PM
In-Person Format (Room: WSCC 619)

Chair: Federica Izzo (UC San Diego)
Discussant: Umberto Mignozzetti (Emory)

  • “Dark Money and Voter Information” by Keith Schnakenberg (Washington University), Collin Thomas Schumock (Yale) and Ian Turner (Yale)
  • “The Business Cycle Dynamics of Clientelism” by Benjamin Ogden (Texas A&M)
  • “Checks and Balances and Vote Buying in Legislatures” by Marcos Yamada Nakaguma (Sao Paulo School of Economics)
  • “Office-Holding Premia and Representative Democracy” by Jan Auerbach (University of Exeter Business School)

Informal Formal Theory Social Gathering
6:00 PM to whenever
In-Person at Redhook Brewlab
Note: proof of vaccination required

Saturday
October 2

Coordination and Information
6:00 AM to 7:30 AM
Virtual Format (link)

Chair: Scott Tyson (Rochester)
Discussant: Jason Sanwalka Davis (UC San Diego)

  • “Consolidation of Precise Media Coverage” by Myunghoon Kang (Bilkent University) and Greg Chih-Hsin Sheen (NYU Abu Dhabi)
  • “Fact-Checking, Media Competition and Political Accountability” by Antoni-Italo de Moragas (CUNEF)
  • “Inspiring Regime Change” by Mehdi Shadmehr (UNC-Chapel Hill) and Stephen Morris (Princeton)
  • “International Coordination and the Informational Rationale of Delegation” by Emiel Awad (LSE)

Political Competition and Conflict
10:00 AM to 11:30 AM
Virtual Format (link)

Chair: Asya Magazinnik (MIT)
Discussant: Korhan Koçak (NYU Abu Dhabi)

  • “Does Electoral Volatility Beget Strong Allies? A Model of Multiparty Competition” by Giovanna Invernizzi (Columbia)
  • “Policy Conflict and the Distribution of Government Capacity” by Thomas Choate (George Washington University)
  • “Ideological Competition” by Federica Izzo (UC San Diego)
  • “To Fight or to Govern? Political Capital and Electoral Competition” by Congyi Zhou (NYU)

Sunday
October 3

Emotions, Beliefs, and Political Behavior in Pluralistic Societies
8:00 AM to 9:30 AM
In-Person Format (Room: WSCC 609)

Chair: Ryan Hübert (UC Davis)
Discussant: Andrew Little (UC Berkeley)

Special Note: Because this panel has been designated by APSA as an official “Theme Panel,” it is not listed as a Formal Theory panel on the program.

  • “Anger and Political Conflict Dynamics” by Keith Schnakenberg (Washington University) and Carly Nicole Wayne (Washington University)
  • “How to Keep Citizens Disengaged: Propaganda and Causal Misperceptions” by Korhan Koçak (NYU Abu Dhabi) and Carlo Horz (Texas A&M)
  • “Sincere versus Strategic Voting: Is Irrationality Contagious?” by Gilles Serra (CIDE)
  • “How Data Comes to Be” by Christopher Fariss (Michigan) and Scott Tyson (Rochester)

Accountability, Crisis and Excuse-Making
8:00 AM to 9:30 AM
In-Person Format (Room: Sheraton Ballard)

Chair: Gregory Sasso (Emory)
Discussant: Gleason Judd (Princeton)

  • “Electoral Systems, Competition, and Incentives for Corruption” by Umberto Mignozzetti (Emory)
  • “External Shocks and Anticipatory Pandering” by Saba Devdariani (Cal Tech)
  • “Policy Making in Times of Crisis” by Peter Bils (Vanderbilt) and Federica Izzo (UC San Diego)
  • “Under the Cover of Crisis: Electoral Accountability and Policy License” by Daniel Goldstein (Yale)

Formal Models of Diplomacy and Conflict
10:00 AM to 11:30 AM
In-Person Format (Room: WSCC 609)

Chair: Robert Trager (UCLA)
Discussant: Scott Abramson (Rochester)

  • “Conflict and Conservation” by Kristopher Ramsay (Princeton) and Noam Reich (Princeton)
  • “Uncertainty in Crisis Bargaining with Multiple Policy Options” by Peter Schram and Brenton Kenkel (Vanderbilt)
  • “Stability, Attribution, and Third Parties in Cyberspace” by Richard Pell Jordan (Baylor) and Robert Trager (UCLA)
  • “Negotiations as a Dynamic Screening Process” by Noam Reich (Princeton)