Faculty

Keally McBride is a professor of politics at the University of San Francisco and is interested in issues of power and social change. Her recent research has focused on the dynamics of information technology within contemporary capitalism, but she has published books on punishment and policing, movements of decolonization, and colonialism and the rule of law. She teaches a broad array of courses that investigate local public policy, European politics, political economy, peace and conflict, and...

Professor Rachel Brahinsky teaches in the Urban and Public Affairs graduate program, the undergraduate Urban Studies program, and the Politics Department. She earned a PhD in geography from UC Berkeley, where she focused on the human and social geography of cities, with an emphasis on the politics of race and place. Her research and teaching center around the challenges of race and inequality in the context of rapidly changing American cities, with a longtime focus on the San Francisco Bay Area...

Kathleen Coll is a cultural anthropologist whose research and teaching focuses on immigration politics and policies, cultural citizenship, and grassroots community organizing in the U.S., with special emphasis on the San Francisco Bay Area. Her books include Remaking Citizenship: Latina Immigrants and New American Politics (Stanford University Press, 2010) an ethnography of Mujeres Unidas y Activas and immigrant women’s activism in San Francisco, a co-authored book Disputing Citizenship (Policy...

Marco Durazo is a political scientist whose research and teaching focuses on race, immigration, the military, war, and U.S. Foreign Policy. He is currently working on a book manuscript that examines the experiences of deported U.S. service members. His courses include: Latino Politics, Chicanx/Latinx Cultural & Society, Security & Terrorism, and the department’s non-profit Internship course.

Ken Goldstein is a professor of Politics at the University of San Francisco and Faculty Director of the USF in DC program.

Before joining the University of San Francisco, Goldstein was a professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison where he won the University of Wisconsin's Kellet Award for his career research accomplishments and the Chancellor's Award for excellence in teaching. Goldstein is one of the country's premier experts on the use and impact of political advertising. He has...

Elisabeth Jay Friedman was awarded her BA by Barnard College (1988) and her MA/PhD by Stanford University (1997). She is the author of Unfinished Transitions: Women and the Gendered Development of Democracy in Venezuela, 1936-1996 (Penn State Press, 2000), the co-author of Sovereignty, Democracy, and Global Civil Society: State-Society Relations at UN World Conferences (SUNY Press, 2005) and the author of Interpreting the Internet: Feminist and Queer Counterpublics in Latin America (University...

Kouslaa Kessler-Mata (yak tityu tityu Chumash and Yokut) has taught at USF since 2007. She completed her BA in American Studies, with a minor in American Indian Studies, at San Francisco State University, and her PhD in Political Science from the University of Chicago. She is a graduate of the Institute for Recruitment of Teachers program at Phillips Academy and the Coro Fellows Program in Public Affairs in San Francisco. Her book, American Indians and the Trouble with Sovereignty (Cambridge...

Patrick Murphy is the faculty director for the Urban and Public Affairs program. Patrick is particularly interested in public budgets and tax policy, with an eye toward fairness and sustainability. As a policy researcher, he has led a number of different applied projects for organizations such as the RAND Corporation, the University of Washington, and the Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC). He also served as Research Director for PPIC as well as the Director of Resource Equity and...

Jeffrey Paller specializes in African politics and sustainable urban development. His current research examines 1) the contentious politics of African urbanization, 2) the building of sustainable neighborhoods in African cities, and 3) political change and local governance in emerging cities. His first book Democracy in Ghana: Everyday Politics in Urban Africa (Cambridge University Press) was published in 2019. He also curates the weekly news bulletin “This Week in Africa.”

Professor James Lance Taylor is from Glen Cove, Long Island. He is author of the book Black Nationalism in the United States: From Malcolm X to Barack Obama, which earned 2012 "Outstanding Academic Title" - Choice: Current Reviews for Academic Libraries. (Ranked top 2 percent of 25,000 books submitted and top 8 percent of 7,300 actually accepted for review by the American Library Association). Rated “Best of the Best.” The hardback version sold out in the U.S. and the paperback version was...

Brian Weiner received his BA from Princeton University, and his MA and PhD from the University of California at Berkeley. He specializes in political theory (from the ancients to contemporary theory), American political theory, and public law. He teaches courses in the areas of political theory, law, and American politics. Professor Weiner also teaches Literature and Political Thought and Democratic Theory and Democratic Transitions. He is a member of the Honors Program in the Humanities, where...

Stephen Zunes has been at USF since 1995, teaching courses on the politics of the Middle East and other regions, nonviolence, conflict resolution, U.S. foreign policy, globalization, and the politics of war and peace. He is the founding director of the Middle Eastern Studies Program.

A prominent specialist on U.S. Middle East policy, Professor Zunes has presented hundreds of public lectures and conference papers in both the United States and over a dozen foreign countries. He has traveled...

Joaquin Jay Gonzalez III teaches international politics, Asian and Asian American social justice, migration, soft power, and public policy.

Dr. Gonzalez is the author of Filipino American Faith in Action: Immigration, Religion, and Civic Engagement (New York University Press) and co-author of Religion at the Corner of Bliss and Nirvana: Politics, Identity, Faith in New Migrant Communities (Duke University Press).

Filip Kovacevic is an adjunct professor in the Departments of Politics and International Studies. As a Montenegrin author, social justice activist, and geopolitical analyst, Prof. Kovacevic has lectured and taught across Europe, the Balkans, the former USSR, and the U.S., including two years at Smolny College, the first liberal arts college in Russia, operating under the auspices of St. Petersburg State University. He received fellowships from the Open Society Institute and the National...

Robert Elias has taught in USF’s politics department since 1989. Hailing from a Czech and Irish-Catholic working class family in New York City, Professor Elias created the USF Legal Studies, Criminal Justice Studies, and Peace & Justice Studies programs. He’s taught in USF's Honors Humanities and in the BA/MA in International Studies programs.

Elias has taught previously at McGill University (Montreal), Tufts University (Boston and France), the UC Berkeley, Penn State University, and the...