Visiting scholars and postdoctoral fellows

Jodi Benenson, Ph.D. is the 2023-2024 Fulbright Canada Research Chair in Governance and Public Administration at the Centre on Governance at the University of Ottawa. She is an Associate Professor in the School of Public Administration at the University of Nebraska Omaha, where her primary research and teaching interests include civic engagement, nonprofit organizations, social policy, and social equity. Previously, she served as a Postdoctoral Scholar at Tufts University and as the Academic Director for the U.S. Department of State's YSEALI Institute on Civic Engagement. Her research has been published in a variety of academic and practice-based outlets, and she is engaged with several local, national, and international organizations that center civic engagement, equity, and representation.

María Verónica Elías, PhD. is assistant professor of public administration at the University of Texas, San Antonio. She is the 2022-2023 Fulbright Canada Research Chair in Governance and Public Administration, with the University of Ottawa’s Center on Governance. Her research interests lie in the areas of public administration theory and epistemology, participatory governance processes, policy and governance of the US-Mexico borderlands, and Canadian border policy implementation and management. She has recently published in the Journal of Borderland Studies, Administration & Society, Critical Policy Studies, Revue Gouvernance, Public Administration Quarterly, and Journal of Community Practice, among other outlets. During her Fulbright Canada Research Chair Position, she plans to investigate border management in Canada in times of the COVID 19 pandemic through the study of policy stakeholders’ narratives.

The CoG is very pleased to be hosting a visiting professor, Dr. Sabine Kropp, Professor of German Politics at the Freie Universität Berlin. Previously, she was Professor of Political Science at the German University of Administrative Sciences Speyer (2008-2013) as well as Professor of Comparative Politics and Public Policy at the Heinrich-Heine-University Duesseldorf (2004-2008). Her primary field of research is comparative federalism and multilevel politics, with an emphasis on Germany and post-Soviet countries. A recurrent focus of her research is the change and resilience of institutional design in times of transition and crisis. Currently, she is working on a novel dataset including discursive strategies of parties in the German federal system during the Covid-19 pandemic. During her stay at U Ottawa, she looks forward to extend her research to a comparison with the Canadian case. She wants to conduct explorative interviews with researchers and practioners in order conceptualize a structured comparison of two cases that widely differ in the structure of their party systems and federal institutions.

Goktug Morcol is a visiting professor and a Fulbright Canada Research Chair in Governance and Public Administration at the Centre on Governance, the University of Ottawa. His home institution is the Pennsylvania State University at Harrisburg. He has authored, edited, or co-edited 8 books: Complex governance networks (Routledge, forthcoming), Challenges to democratic governance in developing countries (Springer, 2014); A complexity theory for public policy (Routledge, 2012); Business improvement districts (CRC Press, 2008); Complexity and policy analysis (ISCE Publishing, 2008); Handbook of decision making (CRC Press, 2007); A new mind for policy analysis (Praeger, 2002); and New sciences for public administration and policy (Chatelaine Press, 2000). His articles have appeared in journals such as Public Administration Review, Administration and Society, Policy Sciences, Public Administration Quarterly, Politics and Policy, International Journal of Public Administration, Journal of Urban Affairs, Urban Affairs Review, , Administrative Theory and Praxis, and Emergence. He served as the first chair of the Section on Complexity and Network Studies of the American Society for Public Administration and the founding editor-in-chief of the journal Complexity, Governance & Networks. He is an editorial board member of Complexity, Governance & Networks, the International Journal of Public Administration and Public Organization Review.

Lauren Touchant is a PhD in Public Administration Graduate from the School of Political Studies, Faculty of Social Sciences at the University of Ottawa. She is currently a Postdoctoral Fellow with the Centre for Environmental Law and Global Sustainability and the Centre on Governance, and the recipient of the Alex Trebek Scholarship. She is also a 2016-2019 Vanier Scholar. Her thesis focused on how municipalities elaborate policy instruments within municipal networks in environmental and energy governance in Canada and the United States. She explored three primary networks: Partners for Climate Protection, managed by the Canadian Federation of Municipalities; Great Lakes and St. Lawrence Cities Initiatives; and QUEST Canada. Lauren's research interests are: Climate, Environmental, and Energy policy and governance, the Arctic, and Emergency Preparedness and disaster management.

Oliver J. Kim is the recipient of a Fulbright Scholar award and brings nearly two decades of experience in law, health policy, and policy-making. He teaches as part of the “Semester in DC” program for the University of Pittsburgh, where he has appointments with the university’s law school and graduate school of public and international affairs. Oliver spent a decade working in the United States Senate, first as a senior advisor to a U.S. Senator during the debate over the Affordable Care Act and then as the deputy director for the Senate Special Committee on Aging. He also served as the legislative director for Planned Parenthood Federation of America, providing guidance on the Affordable Care Act while defending the organization from legislative attacks on its ability to provide healthcare. Oliver has a BA in English and history from Indiana University at Bloomington, a JD from the University of Minnesota, and an LLM from Georgetown University. He has presented internationally and been published on aging, health equity, reproductive health, and the role of technology in healthcare. He was selected for an Endeavour fellowship from the Australian government, the Woodrow Wilson foreign policy fellowship,the Academy Health Health Policy in Action award, and the American Council of Young Political Leaders’ political exchange program.

Selected Publications:

• Is The Grass The Same Colour? Reflections On National Governments Implementing Health Care Initiatives 
• Health Is Not Always Local: Beginning A Cross-Border Health Dialogue
• Oliver J. Kim, Cogs in the Machine: Two Countries Attempt to Balance Individualized Concerns in the Pursuit of Public Health, 44 S.Ill. Univ. L.J. 41, 41 (Fall 2019)