The Project
The Immigrant Visibility and Political Activism Research Collaborative (IVPARC) is a joint initiative of Providence College and the University of Massachusetts Boston, with funding from the Russell Sage Foundation and the Carnegie Corporation of New York*. Principal Investigators are Dr. Matt Guardino of Providence College and Dr. Jeff Pugh of UMass Boston.
This page is a venue for sharing research findings, works-in-progress, and for creating a knowledge community around the intersection of social differences, acceptance of migrant political participation and activism by the host community, and the role of partisanship, authoritarianism, contact, and other individual factors in amplifying or diminishing the intensity of the 'invisibility bargain' that structures the expectations of migrant behaviors in host societies.
Meet the Team
The IVPARC research team is led by Matt Guardino and Jeff Pugh, and is comprised of faculty, graduate students, and undergraduates from Providence College and the University of Massachusetts-Boston.
Matt Guardino, Ph.D
Co-Principal Investigator
Dr. Matt Guardino (he/him) is Associate Professor of Political Science at Providence College. His teaching and research focus on U.S. public opinion, political communication, political psychology, and the intersection of public policy and socioeconomic inequality. Guardino has authored or co-authored books published by Cambridge University Press (2013) and Oxford University Press (2019), and has published several articles in leading political science and communication journals. His current book project traces the historical development of U.S. media policy since 1980. He spent seven years writing for daily newspapers before earning his PhD from Syracuse University’s Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs.
Chris Langevin
Graduate Research Assistant
Chris Langevin (she/they) is a doctoral student of Global Governance and Human Security at the University of Massachusetts Boston with a focus in transnational security issues. Chris holds an MA from the University of New Hampshire in Political Science in comparative politics. Chris has worked in regulatory compliance of organic agricultural and manufactured goods in US and international markets.
Jeffrey Pugh, Ph.D
Co-Principal Investigator
Dr. Jeffrey D. Pugh (he/him) is an associate professor in the McCormack Graduate School of Policy & Global Studies at the University of Massachusetts Boston and is executive director of the Center for Mediation, Peace, and Resolution of Conflict (CE-MPROC). Pugh’s research focuses on peacebuilding and non-state actors, especially in the Global South. His award-winning book, The Invisibility Bargain: Governance Networks and Migrant Human Security (Oxford University Press), examines the integration, political participation, and access to human security of Colombian migrants in Ecuador. He occasionally serves as an expert witness for asylum cases of Ecuadorians in the United States, and he is a past president of the Middle Atlantic Council on Latin American Studies (MACLAS).
Ashraf Amiri
Graduate Research Assistant
Ashraf Amiri (he/him) is a Ph.D. student in Global Governance and Human Security at the John W. McCormack Graduate School of Policy and Global Studies at the University of Massachusetts Boston. He holds a Master’s degree in Conflict Resolution from UMass Boston and a bachelor’s degree in Political Science from Afghanistan. Ashraf is the recipient of the Fulbright Scholarship and has worked as a researcher, university lecturer, and battlefield interpreter in Afghanistan. Ashraf’s research interests include migration, violent extremism, identity conflict, and peace education in conflict/post-conflict societies.
Kelsey Edmond
Graduate Research Assistant
Kelsey Edmond (she/her) is a PhD candidate in Public Policy at the John W. Mc-Cormack Graduate School of Policy and Global Studies at the University of Massachusetts Boston. Her research interests include the digital divide, co-productive policymaking, and comparative public administration. She is a mixed methodologist with a special emphasis on computational social science methods. Kelsey holds a Master of Public Policy from UMass Boston, a Master of Public Administration as well as a Bachelor of Science in Organizational and Community Leadership from the University of Delaware. She is an avid traveler and enjoys all things outdoors.
Natalie Costa
Undergraduate Research Assistant
Natalie Costa (she/her) is an undergraduate student at Providence College, with a double major in Political Science and American Studies. She is pursuing a minor in Sociology and a certificate in Public Administration. Her interests include political history, protest movements, service delivery, and local government. She values the interdisciplinary nature of her studies, as it allows her to understand the ways in which history informs the present. As a member of Student Congress, she aims to promote fairness and create intentional spaces for students that will exist for years to come.
Social Distance: Percent respondents indicating they would not accept immigrants from different regions according to the following social context categories: “Relative by Marriage,” “Close Friend,” “Neighbor,” “Coworker,” “U.S. Citizen,” “U.S. Visitor.” Respondents were instructed to think about the immigrant group as a whole and not about the best or worst representative of the group the respondent has known.
*This work has been supported (in part) by Grant # 2009-27965 from the Russell Sage Foundation and the Carnegie Corporation of New York. Any opinions expressed are those of the principal investigators alone and should not be construed as representing the opinions of either Foundation.