I am a tenured researcher at the Institute for Economic Analysis (IAE(CSIC)) and an Associate Research Professor and Program Director for the Data Science for Decision Making M.Sc. at the Barcelona School of Economics (BSE). My CV can be found here.
My fields of interest are machine learning, political economy, development economics, conflict studies, and industrial organization. In my most recent research projects, I have analyzed how political institutions can make societies more robust, the channels through which violence affects the economy and how conflict can be predicted using millions of newspaper articles. Based on this last project we have launched the conflict forecast webpage which delivers monthly updates on conflict risks worldwide.
My work has been published in leading journals in economics and political science such as the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), the American Economic Review (AER), the American Political Science Review (APSR), the Journal of the European Economic Association (JEEA) and the American Journal of Economics: Macro (AEJ: Macro). I have also produced research reports for governments, NGOs, the IMF, the World Bank, and the UN.
My main activity as is to conduct research on the economy and political institutions that drive our wellbeing. My research is mostly quantitative and I am typically combining methods from several fields of economics, political science and data science both in terms of empirical tools and theory.
Much of my most recent research is motivated by the enormous challenges posed by armed conflict. This is also why I am engaged in policy-oriented research for organizations like the UN, IMF, World Bank, ECA, Banco de España, FCDO (UK), DFID (UK) and the Universal Rights Group.
I completed my Ph.D. in Economics at the London School of Economics in 2008. Since then I have been working at the Institute for Economic Studies (IAE(CSIC)) and became a tenured researcher at the institute in 2018. In 2019 I also became Associate Research Professor at the Barcelona SE and in 2020 I became program director of the Data Science for Decision Making M.Sc. I am also affiliated with MOVE and CEPR.
Apart from my academic research I am trying to be useful by both teaching and providing policy-oriented research. I teach political economy at the IDEA program and political economy and data science at the Barcelona School of Economics (BSE).