Austin Carson is a recent graduate (PhD, 2013) who came to Ohio State after a successful career in policy debate at Michigan State University and three years of research and project support for the Center for Strategic & International Studies.  He currently splits his time between Washington, D.C. and Princeton, New Jersey, and is a post-doctoral research fellow at Princeton’s Niehaus Center for Globalization and Governance for 2013-2014.

His research focuses on themes of secrecy, institutional transparency, and the emergence of covert competition.  He explores why great powers select into and maintain a kind of “backstage” on which to engage in competition for influence, and also what motivates them to stop.  An example of covert competition is the struggle for influence in the Third World during the Cold War.  Both the United States and Soviet Union provided military assistance and even performed combat roles covertly.  His research explores why they did this and why, even though both sides often knew what the other was doing, the two sides “tacitly colluded” to keep such activity on the “backstage.”  One of his motivations is to explore the dilemma between the utility of these programs and the democratic value in transparency of government. 

One of the unique aspects of Carson’s research is that it requires accessing formerly classified information on both sides of such covert competition to understand the politics within it.  This challenge has, in his view, become a strength of the project:  it requires patience and creativity to find accessible documents and foreign material translated by historians. 

Prior to his current position, Carson received a pre-doctoral fellowship from the Institute for Security and Conflict Studies at George Washington University and he used his time there to complete his dissertation, which he defended in the summer of2013.  One of the most rewarding aspects he found in both his pre- and post-docs was the opportunity to participate in these intellectual communities.  His time at both Princeton and George Washington has allowed him to engage with other academics researching similar topics, improving his work.

Austin Carson is currently on the job market.  Additional information about himself and his research can be found on his personal website.