UROP Project
Cabinet Members' Career Paths and Government Performance in Latin America
Cabinet Members, Work Experience, Latin America, Government, Performance, Bilingual Research
Research Mentor: Mauricio Astudillo-Rodas,
Department, College, Affiliation: Askew School of Public Administration and Policy , Social Sciences and Public Policy
Contact Email: mastudillorodas@fsu.edu
Research Assistant Supervisor (if different from mentor):
Research Assistant Supervisor Email:
Faculty Collaborators:
Faculty Collaborators Email:
Department, College, Affiliation: Askew School of Public Administration and Policy , Social Sciences and Public Policy
Contact Email: mastudillorodas@fsu.edu
Research Assistant Supervisor (if different from mentor):
Research Assistant Supervisor Email:
Faculty Collaborators:
Faculty Collaborators Email:
Looking for Research Assistants: Yes
Number of Research Assistants: 2
Relevant Majors: Open to all majors
Project Location: Remote project
Research Assistant Transportation Required: No, the project is remote Remote or In-person: Fully Remote
Approximate Weekly Hours: 5, Flexible schedule (Combination of business and outside of business. TBD between student and research mentor.)
Roundtable Times and Zoom Link:
Number of Research Assistants: 2
Relevant Majors: Open to all majors
Project Location: Remote project
Research Assistant Transportation Required: No, the project is remote Remote or In-person: Fully Remote
Approximate Weekly Hours: 5, Flexible schedule (Combination of business and outside of business. TBD between student and research mentor.)
Roundtable Times and Zoom Link:
- Day: Wednesday, September 2
Start Time: 2:30
End Time: 3:30
Zoom Link: https://fsu.zoom.us/j/95741189552
Project Description
Every time a new minister is appointed, one big question emerges: will they actually be good at the job? Academics have studied for decades why cabinet ministers are appointed and removed, but almost no one has asked whether a minister's career background shapes how well the government performs, especially in countries where political institutions are weak and cabinet seats are often used as bargaining chips to hold governing coalitions together. This project asks: does it matter if a minister previously ran a hospital system, led a company, or spent years working inside a government agency before taking the job? In places with weaker institutional constraints (like Latin American democracies), ministers often have only a short window in office to prove themselves. We think their prior career experience may explain why some ministers deliver results under that pressure while others don't. To find out, we are building a new dataset tracking the career backgrounds of every minister and vice minister appointed in Colombia over the past 25 years. Research assistants on this project will help build this dataset from scratch (searching biographies, public records, and news archives) and then help analyze what we find.Research Tasks: As a research assistant, you will get hands-on experience across the full research process: 1. Help plan our data collection strategy (e.g., Freedom of Information requests, LinkedIn, official government websites). 2. Help design and refine the coding scheme we use to capture ministers' career backgrounds. 3. Collect and code real biographical data on Colombian cabinet members. 4. Help analyze the coded data to look for patterns. 5. Contribute to sharing our results with academic and practitioner audiences.
Skills that research assistant(s) may need: SPANISH language proficiency is REQUIRED. Almost all of our source material (news archives, official records, LinkedIn profiles) is in Spanish, so you must be comfortable reading and researching in Spanish. Coding, analysis, and reporting will be done in English, so you should be comfortable working in both languages. No prior research experience is required. An interest in Latin American politics, public administration, or comparative government is a plus.