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Mary Shiraef, Ph.D. Candidate

mshiraef@nd.edu


Graduate Student

University of Notre Dame

City: Austin, Texas

Country: United States

About Me:

Mary A. Shiraef is a Ph.D. Candidate in political science. Her work examines identity transmission outcomes of border policies, with a focus on collective memory, migration, and sites of memorialization during and after periods of authoritarian rule in communist contexts. With an MLitt degree in International Relations theory from the University of St Andrews and an M.A. degree from the University of Notre Dame specializing in comparative politics, her PhD dissertation draws from historical and contemporary data to address the questions: how are minority identities transmitted under authoritarian institutions and under which conditions are they linked to political beliefs and behaviors? Her population of interest is those born in Albania 1890 to now.

Research Interests

Political Theory

European Politics

Immigration & Citizenship

Refugees

Public Opinion

History Of Ideas

Comparative Politics

International Relations Theory

Protest

Political Culture

Countries of Interest

Greece

Albania

My Research:

Shiraef's research connects with post-Soviet literature on identity and to broader migration and authoritarianism literatures. Her dissertation work has been supported by the American Political Science Association's Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement Grant (APSA DDRIG), funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF), by a Boren Fellowship, as well as by a number of internal grants and fellowships.

She is also a recent contributor to #openscience efforts, having led a team called the COVID Border Accountability Project (COBAP) which hand-coded an original dataset of border policies introduced in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. COBAP covered 200+ countries and associated island territories and was published in the open access journal Scientific Data in the Nature Portfolio. The first study she led using the data yielded no evidence that 2020 international border closures curbed the spread of the novel coronavirus, published in Scientific Reports also under Nature.

Publications:

Journal Articles:

(2022) Did border closures slow SARS-CoV-2?, Scientific Reports Nature

Despite the economic, social, and humanitarian costs of border closures, more than 1000 new international border closures were introduced in response to the 2020–2021 pandemic by nearly every country in the world. The objective of this study was to examine whether these border closures reduced the spread of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). Prior to 2020, the impacts of border closures on disease spread were largely unknown, and their use as a pandemic policy was advised against by international organizations. We tested whether they were helpful in reducing spread by using matching techniques on our hand-coded COVID Border Accountability Project (COBAP) Team database of international closures, converted to a time-series cross-sectional data format. We controlled for national-level internal movement restrictions (domestic lockdowns) using the Oxford COVID-19 Government Response Tracker (OxCGRT) time-series data. We found no evidence in favor of international border closures, whereas we found a strong association between national-level lockdowns and a reduced spread of SARS-CoV-2 cases. More research must be done to evaluate the byproduct effects of closures versus lockdowns as well as the efficacy of other preventative measures introduced at international borders.

(2021) COVID Border Accountability Project, a hand-coded global database of border closures introduced during 2020, Scientific Data Nature

Quantifying the timing and content of policy changes affecting international travel and immigration is key to ongoing research on the spread of SARS-CoV-2 and the socioeconomic impacts of border closures. The COVID Border Accountability Project (COBAP) provides a hand-coded dataset of >1000 policies systematized to reflect a complete timeline of country-level restrictions on movement across international borders during 2020. Trained research assistants used pre-set definitions to source, categorize and verify for each new border policy: start and end dates, whether the closure is “complete” or “partial”, which exceptions are made, which countries are banned, and which air/land/sea borders were closed. COBAP verified the database through internal and external audits from public health experts. For purposes of further verification and future data mining efforts of pandemic research, the full text of each policy was archived. The structure of the COBAP dataset is designed for use by social and biomedical scientists. For broad accessibility to policymakers and the public, our website depicts the data in an interactive, user-friendly, time-based map.

Other:

(2022) Europe’s Border Responses to COVID-19 in Global Context, Europe in the World

Europe’s response to the pandemic both threatened its internal Schengen agreement and, at the same time, was uniquely consistent on border closures when compared to the rest of the world. Addressing the question of whether the public health gains of closures were worth putting the brakes on Schengen is a pressing and yet unanswered question. This piece describes the COVID Border Accountability Project with a focus on the unique European border context.

(2021) Closed borders, travel bans and halted immigration: 5 ways COVID-19 changed how and where people move around the world, The Conversation

A piece released at the "anniversary" of the COVID-19 pandemic declaration on the international border closures introduced in 2020-21. Also published in Firstpost, Salon, and more than 40 local news outlets

(2020) Will COVID-19 Harden the World’s Borders?, Immigration Policy Lab Stanford University

Setting out to map the pandemic’s effects on migration and travel around the world.

(2014) What Good is a Liberal Arts Education?: Tocqueville’s Education as a Public Good, Agora

This piece adapted the French thinker Alexis de Tocqueville's account of how classical education addresses the equalizing nature of liberal democracy to the debate on the utility of higher education in the U.S.

(2013) From Fighting to Electing Nazis: Explaining the Rise of Golden Dawn in Greece, Cornell International Affairs Review

This piece details the way in which the neo-fascist party in Greece gained ground in the 2011 parliamentary elections. In short, Golden Dawn conspicuously fills inefficient state-run services; they ran on an anti-austerity platform during a time of unforgiving European intervention; they provide a simplistic and accessible answer for the cause and solution to Greece's complex problems; their votes provide increased power for Greek lawmakers; and they appeal to Greece's ethnocentric tendencies while strategically disassociating themselves from open acts of violence. For these reasons among others, Golden Dawn has gained popularity in Greece and continues to expand its influence.

Media Appearances:

Radio Appearances:

(2022) The Perch Pod

"Has COVID Accelerated Border Closures and a Little Bit about Albania with Mary Shiraef"

Newspaper Quotes:

(2022) Healthline

“Did Border Closures Help Curb Coronavirus Spread?” Feb 15 2022

(2019) Newtral

"Facing the Xenophobic and Ultra-right Narrative"

(2018) Al Jazeera

"Who’s behind the attacks on migrants in Greece?"

Blog Posts:

(2022) Political Science Now

“Meet Mary Shiraef, 2021 APSA Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement Grantee"

Other:

(2016) The Saint

"An Open Letter to my Donors: Ransome Scholar shares lessons learned at St Andrews"

(2014) Emory Magazine

"Lasting Lessons: Mary Shiraef 110X 13C reflects on one of her most influential Emory professors"

(2012) The Owl

“Eating with the Greeks”