Skarlet Olivera

I am an MPhil student in Politics (Comparative Government) at the Department of Politics and International Relations. My primary research areas are broadly embedded in the comparative political economy of institutions and the political economy of development. These include state capacity, political institutions, inequality, and state-building in Latin America and Africa. I also work with mixed methods techniques, combining time series, case studies, and game theory. My current research examines patterns of strengthening in science and technology industrial policy among middle-income democracies in the Global South.

Before Oxford, I graduated with a first-class BA in Social Sciences from Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú (PUCP). I also hold a first-class Professional Degree in Political Science and Government (minoring in Comparative Politics) with a distinction in my thesis. In this dissertation, I proposed a typology of institutional strength, categorising state agencies based on the (high or low) levels of autonomy and state capacity and their changes over time. The theory was tested empirically through cases of space and nuclear agencies.

My academic production includes co-authored articles in journals such as Political Geography and Colombia Internacional. I have also worked as a research assistant and collaborated on several projects affiliated with MIT, PUCP and Universidad del Pacífico, covering topics such as state regulation, policy feedback, reform legacies, and forest policies. My professional experience also encompasses teaching assistance in courses on State Theory and Comparative Political Analysis at the Social Sciences Department - PUCP.

I have received awards for Best Political Science Student Paper, Best Political Science Undergraduate Student, Best Political Science Teaching Assistant Research Project, among others. Outside academia, I worked in the Research Department of the National Office of Electoral Processes. Find my CV here.