Faculty

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 political 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 Bay Area. Her book Remaking Citizenship: Latina Immigrants and New American Politics (Stanford University Press, 2010) is an ethnography of San Francisco immigrant women’s experiences and activism in the context of hostile national immigration, welfare, and labor policies. Her...

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...

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...

Kouslaa Kessler-Mata arrived at USF in 2007 as an ethnic minority dissertation fellow after completing a fellowship at the National Congress of American Indians in 2006–07. She received her PhD in Political Science at the University of Chicago and serves in the Politics Department at USF as an associate professor. Her research interests include: democratic politics; the normative dimensions of policy making; negotiating political boundaries between local and tribal governments; federalism; and...

Kathleen Klaus’ research focuses on political violence, land rights, forced migration, and elections, with a focus on sub-Saharan Africa. Her recent book, Political Violence in Kenya: Land, Elections, and Claim-Making, is published with Cambridge University Press. Klaus has conducted extensive research in Kenya, Ghana, Uganda, and Malawi and has received support for her research from the Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation, United States Institute of Peace, and others. Klaus teaches a range of...

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...

Jeffrey Paller specializes in African politics and sustainable urban development, and his research examines the practice of democracy and accountability in urban Africa. He has conducted fieldwork in Ghana, Kenya, Uganda, and South Africa. He recently published the book Democracy in Ghana: Everyday Politics in Urban Africa (Cambridge UP, 2019). His new project examines the contentious politics of African urbanization. He has received funding from the Social Science Research Council, National...

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...

Annick T.R. Wibben is professor of Politics and International Studies as well as the director of the Peace and Justice Studies program. She contributes to the Politics, International Studies, Gender & Sexualities Studies, Peace & Justice Studies and Legal Studies curricula. Before joining the USF faculty, she worked as co-Investigator (with James Der Derian) of the Information Technology, War and Peace Project infopeace.org at the Watson Institute for International Studies at Brown...

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, and globalization. He served as the founder and first 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 frequently to the...