The department would like to welcome Jan Pierskalla, a new faculty member in political science.  Professor Pierskalla specializes in the study of comparative politics, in particular topics related to the political economy of development and political violence.  While getting his Ph.D. at Duke, he did his field research in Southeast Asia focusing on regional and local politics in the region.  He travelled to Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia and Vietnam. As a follow up from his field research, he is currently working with the World Bank on a project on decentralization in Indonesia.

Professor Pierskalla is originally from Berlin, Germany. He attended the Free University of Berlin to study Political Science and Economics. The Free University of Berlin, founded in 1948 with the support of the Allied Forces, has always had strong connections to the United States via various exchange programs. This gave him the opportunity to come to Duke University for a year on a Fulbright scholarship during his undergraduate program.  He started out in classes with graduate students and from there on knew that he wanted to stay and continue on to his Ph.D. He also spent time working outside of the University, in the summer of 2006 he worked at UBS Investment Bank in London as an Analyst and then interned at the Delegation of the European Commission in Washington DC that fall.

After receiving his Ph.D., he was a Post-Doctoral Researcher at the GIGA (German Institute of Global and Area Studies) in Hamburg and then arrived in Columbus to start teaching in the department in January 2014.

Pierskalla was drawn to Ohio State by the amazing group of faculty he would be working with and the overall collegiality of the department. This past Spring, he taught courses on Southeast Asian politics and political violence. He was impressed with the engagement level of the undergrad students in his courses.  This Fall he will be teaching the undergrad level Politsc 3220 - Politics of the Developing World and Politsc 4782 - Research Methods in Political Science.