RESEARCH EXPERIENCE

RESEARCH INTERESTS

  • Climate-Conflict Nexus, International Political Economy, Development, Climate Policy, (Im)migration Policy, Refugee Studies, Civil War & Peacebuilding, Conflict, Research Methodology, Quasi-Experimental Analysis, Geospatial Data, Computational Social Science

PUBLICATIONS

  • Article: Maboudi, T. & D’Amico, E. (2024). Vulnerability, Climate Laws, and Adaptation in the Middle East and North Africa. Environmental Policy and Governance.

FORTHCOMING

  • Article: D’Amico, E., Melin, M., & Sosa, S. (R&R). No Ex-Combatant Left Behind: Economic Reintegration & the Durability of Peace. Journal of Peace Research.
  • Article: D’Amico, E. (R&R). Unrest in Urbanity: Unraveling the Impact of Economic Shocks on Migration and Urban Dynamics. Review of International Political Economy.

UNDER REVIEW

  • Article: D’Amico, E. Resilient by Design: An Investigation of Climate Adaptation Laws in New England. Nature Cities.
  • Article: D’Amico, E. & Maboudi, T. Timing Matters: Analyzing Climate Policies and Adaptive Resilience. Nature Climate Change.
  • Article: D’Amico, E., & Houghton, K. Financial dependencies and conflict resolution: The role of militarized mediators in modern insurgencies. Civil Wars.
  • Article: D’Amico, E. Balancing the Power: A Comparative Analysis of Hydropower Development and Conflict in the Global Renewable Energy Transition. Global Environmental Politics.
  • Article: D’Amico, E. & Maboudi, T. Life, Liberty, and Litigation: The Impact of Environmental Laws and Constitutional Rights on Climate Change Litigation. Journal of Politics.
  • Book Chapter: D’Amico, E. Chapter 4: The National Framework for Peace: Cross-national Instances of Economic Reincorporation in Treaties and their Outcomes. In M. Melin & S. Sosa (Eds.), The Missing Peace: Understanding Private Enterprises in Conflict Prevention and Resolution. Oxford University Press.
  • Book Chapter: Clausen, M. & D’Amico, E. Chapter 7: Reducing Urban Violence: The Case of Chicago. In M. Melin & S. Sosa (Eds.), The Missing Peace: Understanding Private Enterprises in Conflict Prevention and Resolution. Oxford University Press.

WORKS IN PROGRESS

  • Book: D’Amico, Elisa A. Turbulent Tides: Climate, Migration, Conflict, and the Quest for Economic Stability. Oxford University Press "Studies in Comparative Energy and Environmental Politics" series, planned.
  • Article: Peter, M. & D’Amico, E. Conflict Management in a Multipolar World: Identifying the Turning Point.
  • Article: D’Amico, E. Climate Quandary: Investigating Causality from Climate Displacement to Unrest.
  • Article: D’Amico, E., Hendrix, C., & Glaser, S. From Ocean Changes to Conflict: Predicting Fishery-Related Militarized Disputes in a Warming World.

ALTERNATIVE PUBLICATIONS

  • Report: D’Amico, E. (2024). Semi-automated Coding for Conflict Mediation Research: Database Development. In Peace Analytics Series. PeaceRep.
  • Policy Brief: D’Amico, E. (2024). How Climate Shocks Impact Rebel Demands and Peace Agreement
    Outcomes. In Peace Analytics Series. PeaceRep
  • Conference Paper: D’Amico, E. & Peter, M. (2024). Enhancing Conflict Mediation Research: Introducing the Innovative Global Peace Actors Database (GLO-PAD). CARMA 2024. Valencia, June 2024.
  • IOM Blog Post: D’Amico, E. (2024). “Stitching a Sustainable Future: Policy for Youth Migration, and Climate in Bangladesh’s Textile Industry” in Blog Series: Youth, Migration, Environment, Climate Change, And Disaster Risk Reduction. IOM UN Migration.
  • Legal Case: D’Amico, E. (2023). Montenegro v. Ashcroft Case Summary. Earth Refuge Legal Database.
  • Op-Ed: D’Amico, E. (2023). Rising Tides and Sudden Surprises: The Two Faces of Climate Displacement. Medium.

RESEARCH EXPERIENCE

2024–Present
Postdoctoral Research Fellow, University of St Andrews, School of International Relations
Global Fragmentation and Peacemaking, Development of PeaceRep Global Peacemaking Database

2024
Visiting Fellow, Institute for European Global Studies, Universität Basel
“Natural Resources as Objects of Conflict” Research & Teaching Appointment

2023–2024
Data & Modeling Research Consultant, University of Denver and World Wildlife Fund
Forecasting future fisheries conflict; Leveraging big data and running prediction models

2023
Data Scientist, Chicago Public Schools, School Counseling and Postsecondary Advising
Data science, empirical modeling, Google AppScript, SQL, SAS, etc.

Automation Research Consultant, University of St Andrews, School of International Relations
Global Fragmentation and Peacemaking PeaceRep Consultancy and Database Building

Graduate Student Associate, Institute for Racial Justice, Loyola University
Transcribed and coded focus group recordings, synthesizing data on equity in gifted programming.

2018–2023
Research Assistant, Loyola University Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA
Worked with Dr. Eric Hansen, Dr. Kara Ross Camarena, Dr. Patrick Boyle, Dr. Sarah Maxey, Dr. Tofigh Maboudi, Dr. Molly Melin, Dr. Sooyeon Kang, and Dr. Jay Kao on various projects in political science.

2017
Special Interest Groups Data Analyst, Project VoteSmart
Web-scraping and cleaning of special interest groups data in R

2016
Research Intern, The Scottish Parliament, Edinburgh, Scotland, UK
Served under Alex Rowley, Member of the Scottish Parliament; Focus on devolution of powers, taxation, and public well-being

AD HOC PROJECTS

  • Wrote Stata scripts for correlation vs. causation and quasi-experimental projects.
  • Created quizzes in Qualtrics for complex grading schemes.
  • Used Python console to import, polygonize, spatially merge, and export data in QGIS.
  • Used Excel VBA and Stata to merge large climate law and litigation data.
  • Used R to scrape, code, and semi-automate text analysis from peace agreement documents.
  • Created a dynamic infographic of climate disasters and migration patterns over time by mapping and merging geospatial data.
  • Integrated geospatial climate resilience data in New England with nonspatial adaptation policy data through mapping and merging techniques.
  • Used R and APIs to query Chicago crime and census data and geospatially merge.
  • Used SQL BigQuery on a number of conflict-related projects to extract data.

CERTIFICATIONS

  • 2023: DataCamp Data Scientist Professional, R; SQL, Python
  • 2023: Qualtrics XM Professional Certification
  • 2022: Empirical Implications of Theoretical Models (EITM) Certification

COMPUTER AND TECHNICAL SKILLS

  • Created R Packages: BreakFinder: Enables comprehensive change point analysis by iterating through all variables in data, in newly specified ways, revealing abrupt transitions in aggregate.
  • Data Skills: Querying (e.g., SQL/Python/Google BigQuery); Excel VBA; GIS (e.g., QGIS/R); data mining and scraping.
  • Software Proficiency: R, QGIS, SQL, STATA, JMP, Python, Google App Script, SAS, SPSS, Excel VBA, LaTeX.