Tara Maller is a doctoral candidate in the Security Studies Program in the Department of Political Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Her general areas of interest include terrorism, insurgency, intelligence, U.S. diplomacy and conflict resolution. Her dissertation develops and tests a new theory of the effectiveness of sanctions by assessing the role of information, communication and diplomatic ties as determinants of sanction outcomes. Whereas previous studies of sanctions tend to focus on economic sanctions, her project aims to develop a more nuanced understanding of sanctions’ success and failure through an analysis of both economic and diplomatic sanctions.
Prior to MIT, Ms. Maller worked as a Military Analyst at the Central Intelligence Agency, where she focused on the insurgency in Iraq. Specific areas of focus included analysis of insurgent attacks in Baghdad and population displacement trends. Ms. Maller graduated with honors from the University of Chicago, where she received a Master's in International Relations. She graduated cum laude from Dartmouth College with the distinction of Honors in Government. While at Dartmouth, she spent time working at Dartmouth's Institute of Security and Technology Studies and spent her summers interning on Capitol Hill. She also spent a semester studying politics abroad at Oxford University.
"The Dangers of Diplomatic Disengagement in Counterterrorism" Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, Vol. 32, No. 6 (June 2009): 511-536.
