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Laia Balcells

@laiabalcells

Yale educated political scientist. Georgetown professor. Views here are personal. Reskeets are not endorsements.

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Latest posts by Laia Balcells @laiabalcells

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Do Transitional Justice Museums Change Minds? Georgetown scholar Laia Balcells's research finds that museums commemorating past atrocities can shift political attitudes — but the extent of that shift depends on context.

I had the pleasure of sharing my research on Transitional Justice museums at Stanford’s CDDRL last week. You can find a summary of the talk here:
cddrl.fsi.stanford.edu/news/do-tran...

10.03.2026 13:53 👍 4 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
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*Now* can we ask about the Epstein Files, AG Bondi?

09.03.2026 17:44 👍 149 🔁 34 💬 3 📌 1

Were the pardons conceived to work this way?

09.03.2026 15:22 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
ESOC-ReCIPE Annual Meeting 2026 | Growth Research Platform The organising committee of this conference is composed of Elena Esposito, Dominic Rohner, Renard Sexton, and Oliver Vanden Eynde.

ESOC-ReCIPE meeting in Paris. Call for proposals: grp.cepr.org/events/esoc-...

07.03.2026 01:44 👍 2 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
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This is not good.

06.03.2026 13:40 👍 9686 🔁 3708 💬 761 📌 467

Turns out shutting off immigration, deporting people, and taxing imports are bad for the economy.

Who knew!?*

*every person who actually took and tried to learn something in Econ 101

06.03.2026 14:03 👍 55 🔁 6 💬 3 📌 0

As an editor, I really appreciate it when people declining to review suggest potential reviewers. We (editors) don't know everybody and this is super helpful.

26.02.2026 17:10 👍 37 🔁 8 💬 2 📌 2

Academic folks: do you also notice that every now and then the number of Google Scholar citations gets trimmed significantly? If I remember correctly, my citations were close to 600 for years 2024 and 2025 and they are now around 560. Does anyone know why this can be the case?

26.02.2026 15:00 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0

idk if anyone's read orhan pamuk's (turkish nobel laureate in literature) museum of innocence but there's now a new netflix adaptation. it wasn't my favorite pamuk novel. what i most remember from it was this endless sense of boredom and dread. like a downward spiraling groundhog day,

26.02.2026 07:16 👍 8 🔁 1 💬 1 📌 0

Reports that FL Melania Trump will preside over the UN Security Council on Monday, March 2, as the US takes on the UNSC rotating presidency for March

26.02.2026 01:17 👍 46 🔁 14 💬 14 📌 59
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IOC clears FIFA president Gianni Infantino of breaching political neutrality rules (Gift Article) Infantino was seen at the inaugural Board of Peace meeting on Thursday wearing a red Donald Trump-themed 'USA' cap.

IOC to Ukrainian skeleton racer w/ helmet featuring photos of dead Ukrainian athletes: "Disqualified."

IOC to Catalan skimo fans waving the Estalada and Senyera: "Those are banned propaganda & we're confiscating them"

IOC to Gianni Infantino, wearing a red USA 45-47 hat: "Looks good on you buddy"

24.02.2026 14:01 👍 132 🔁 63 💬 6 📌 2

One of the biggest wastes of academic productivity is the variation in page/word limits across journals in the same/related fields.

09.02.2026 18:17 👍 79 🔁 12 💬 2 📌 2

Interesting data:

23.02.2026 01:43 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0

Amazing. Good luck!

23.02.2026 01:42 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0
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'Gail's law' breast cancer screening bill passes unanimously Gail's Law will require insurance companies to cover additional breast cancer screenings for women with dense breasts.

As someone who has to get multiple mammograms and ultrasounds a year, I'm glad to see that Wisconsin has passed Gail's Law, which requires insurance companies to cover repeat screenings for dense, hard-to-diagnose tissue, with no out-of-pocket cost.

www.jsonline.com/story/news/p...

23.02.2026 00:03 👍 180 🔁 27 💬 4 📌 5

I know the AI hype can drive anxiety about academic productivity, but please remember that an additional paper can have negative returns to both society and your reputation.

23.02.2026 01:33 👍 14 🔁 3 💬 0 📌 0

This made me cry.

22.02.2026 20:25 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0

This is big. The last kingpin. Of Mexico’s biggest cartel- CJNG. Many thought he was already dead. Now he is.

22.02.2026 19:39 👍 26 🔁 10 💬 1 📌 0

WTF? I'm more bullish about the academic potential of AI than most of my colleagues but this is a joke

22.02.2026 20:08 👍 73 🔁 9 💬 10 📌 3

Reminder that if Trump thinks tariffs are so important, he could work with Congress to pass legislation authorizing him to impose them.

20.02.2026 17:59 👍 4 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0

Afegiria que als EUA, Alemanya, Hungria, Itàlia, França, El Salvador, Xile, Holanda, Finlàndia, Rússia, Israel, etc, també és culpa del Procés.

20.02.2026 18:02 👍 47 🔁 15 💬 6 📌 1
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Very excited that my paper "National attachment, past in-group perpetratorhood, and out-group attitudes", co-authored with the great Elias Dinas & Ethan vanderWilden, has been accepted for publication at the British Journal of Political Science. Abstract copied below:

19.02.2026 17:59 👍 3 🔁 1 💬 1 📌 0

Congrats to Political Science Professor Anil Menon and co- authors who were featured in JHPPL for their article, ""Thoughts and Prayers": The (Non) Effect of Partisan Response to Mass Shootings on Public Opinion."

Read article here: read.dukeupress.edu/jhppl/articl...

19.02.2026 17:33 👍 0 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0

Catalan flags were confiscated today in the Olympic games (a Catalan won gold in Skimo) because political symbols are not allowed. As if all the nationalist symbols in the games were not political!

19.02.2026 17:30 👍 3 🔁 2 💬 0 📌 0
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DOG AT THE OLYMPICS
FULL COMPETITION HIGHLIGHTS

18.02.2026 13:26 👍 19680 🔁 5924 💬 502 📌 1140
ad

Postdoc position!

Myself and @jordanaxt.bsky.social are seeking applications for a shared post-doctoral researcher at McGill, beginning Fall 2026.

Topic area broadly centered on intergroup dynamics, prejudice, discrimination

Full description here: hehmanlab.org/ad
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11.02.2026 19:45 👍 39 🔁 49 💬 3 📌 1

Applications for the 2026 Journeys in World Politics workshop (10/1-10/3) in San Diego are being accepted (due 6/1). The workshop features Kathleen Cunningham & Leah Windsor as senior mentors. Christina Schneider is our local host! Visit the site below to apply.

www.saramitchell.org/journeys.html

12.02.2026 19:55 👍 10 🔁 14 💬 0 📌 1
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British Woman shot by dad in Texas after 'arguing about Donald Trump' Lucy Harrison, 23, was alone in a bedroom at her father's home in Texas when she was shot dead.

A MAGA freak in Texas murdered his own daughter in cold blood after they had an argument about Trump.

A grand jury in the Dallas area then *declined to indict him*, and he has not yet faced charges.

Seems like many Texans believe a man has the right to kill his own child for disobedience.

11.02.2026 01:12 👍 2462 🔁 893 💬 118 📌 197
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British Woman shot by dad in Texas after 'arguing about Donald Trump' Lucy Harrison, 23, was alone in a bedroom at her father's home in Texas when she was shot dead.

"Police in the town investigated the 23-year-old's death as possible manslaughter but no criminal case was brought against Kris Harrison after a grand jury in Collin County declined to indict him." www.bbc.com/news/article...

11.02.2026 08:13 👍 1 🔁 1 💬 1 📌 1

This is the second time an ICE employee has been arrested in in a Bloomington, MN underage sex trafficking sting www.cbsnews.com/minnesota/ne...

10.02.2026 21:26 👍 5436 🔁 2256 💬 104 📌 112