Matthew Amengual is a PhD candidate in MIT’s Political Science Department, focusing on comparative politics and political economy. His interests are broadly in state-society relations, labor regulation, environmental regulation, and democratic accountability. For his dissertation, he is studying the implementation of labor and environmental regulation in Argentina. This study uses a sub-national approach to examine how the regulatory policies, which have been strengthened with the waning of neoliberalism, have been put into practice. To better understand the conditions under which regulation is effective, he seeks to explain the large amount of variation among Argentine provinces in capacity and ability to implement regulations. Previously, Matthew conducted research in the Dominican Republic and Honduras, examining the way state labor inspectors and private monitors from multinational companies combine to govern labor conditions in export factories.
Before starting the PhD program in Political Science, Matthew received a Master in City Planning degree from the Department of Urban Studies and Planning at MIT, and an A.B. in Environmental Studies from Brown University.
“Norms of Deliberation: An Inductive Study”, Jane Mansbridge, Janette Hartz-Karp, Matthew Amengual, and John Gastil. Journal of Deliberative Democracy, Vol 2. Issue 1, 2006.
“Oversight” in The Encyclopedia of Governance, Mark Bevir editor. Sage Publications, 2006.