I use class presentations and an oral exam alongside papers now in my undergrad seminar (and blue book final all by side papers in my UG lecture): “Professors are turning to this old-school method to stop AI use on exams” wapo.st/4pU5mNf

Sushila Karki government beset by court decisions kathmandupost.com/politics/202... via @kathmandupost

My thoughts on US-India relations in the Trump era for Chicago Council on Global Affairs: - US deeply unreliable & mercurial - Unclear if even a weakened Trump would lead to a rapid shift back toward pro-India policies - India needs to engage more broadly in US, especially beyond the coasts (1/2)

Illinois & Chicago stuck in "high tax, massive debt, comparatively unremarkable public services" equilibrium that will take either crisis or real political creativity to change: www.statecraft.pub/p/should-the...

"Casinos, high-rises and fraud: The BBC visits a bizarre city built on scams" bbc.com/news/article...

huge sale on Cornell University Press books:

I could spend my life just watching camera release videos: www.youtube.com/watch?v=XMXV...

Really important survey from @ChicagoCouncil: “the bipartisan embrace of US-China competition no longer holds among the public, with partisan differences in perceived threats from China and disagreements on current US-China trade policy” globalaffairs.org/research/pub...

From Brooklyn Heights

Pakistani general's Dhaka visit explores stronger defence ties www.thedailystar.net/news/banglad...

Border patrol agents deployed tear gas on the 3700 block of North Kildare where residents say a landscape worker, a resident, and a woman on a bike were detained. Video from a resident.

Chicago's SkyDeck is pretty awesome (first time I've been here despite living in Chicago 19 of the past 25 years):

Afghanistan-Pakistan clashes: www.dawn.com/news/1948219...

Can't say I am loving the "Donald Trump sends combat forces to Chicago on an obvious pretext" experience.

Trump’s ‘Compact’ With Universities Is Just Extortion www.nytimes.com/2025/10/02/o...

Based on his track record at UChicago, there is truly no one I would less want to be in a foxhole with than Daniel Diermeier, so very unsurprising news here: www.nytimes.com/2025/10/02/u...

current draft syllabus for my Political Violence lecture class: www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/8swsa...

current draft syllabus for my Political Violence lecture class: www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/8swsa...

Fun video on assessing US cities' "Majorness": www.youtube.com/watch?v=rrj-...

vintage Canon FD 50/1.4: surprisingly sharp in the middle, weird, fun bokeh in the background

A cool find for the 6 people on earth (including me) with overlapping interests in photography and Chicago politics:

Molten water

South Asia has seen 3 governments fall due to mass protests in as many years. But returning to the status quo or simply holding elections isn't enough, real change is needed, @pstaniland.bsky.social on the current wave of protests impacting the region. www.journalofdemocracy.org/online-exclu...

Plus more info from university yesterday suggests a lot of the internet coverage of this stuff - "UChicago goes bankrupt in MAGA-inspired self-immolation aimed at annihilating human knowledge while becoming nothing more than a start-up incubator" - was not correct

A key takeaway, including from the budget town hall today, is that the UChicago debt situation is getting better rather than worse, plus some of the spicier internet claims appear to be hyperbolic/inaccurate. Still challenges, but not a cataclysm (i.e. my dept is hiring 2 lines):

I have a new article out in the Journal of Democracy comparing mass protests and government collapse in 2025 Nepal, 2024 Bangladesh, and 2022 Sri Lanka: www.journalofdemocracy.org/online-exclu...

Some clarification from UChicago admin about finances; the most amusing bullet point is the "No, the University has not lost money on cryptocurrency" one: provost.uchicago.edu/announcement...

I have a new article out in the Journal of Democracy comparing mass protests and government collapse in 2025 Nepal, 2024 Bangladesh, and 2022 Sri Lanka: www.journalofdemocracy.org/online-exclu...

An H-Diplo/ISSF Jervis Forum Roundtable on Roger Petersen's "Death, Dominance, and State-Building" (I wrote the introduction): issforum.org/roundtables/...

Excited to be joining the @global-affairs.bsky.social as a nonresident senior fellow in Asia Studies:

President Trump’s recent levying of tariffs has prompted India to reassess its relationship with the US. The Council was pleased to host a roundtable discussion led by @pstaniland.bsky.social and @kfriedhoff.bsky.social on what shifting US-India relations mean for the US, China, and the region.

Nepal's government steps down in face of spiraling protests and police violence, unclear who is running the show and what comes next.

unclear whether Trump hates India or Chicago more.

a thoughtful op-ed from the computer science/data science part of UChicago: "These are challenging times for higher education. The right response is not to pit disciplines against one another but to work together to serve our students and the public." chicagomaroon.com/48362/viewpo...

The Nobel Prize and a Testy Phone Call: How the Trump-Modi Relationship Unraveled www.nytimes.com/2025/08/30/u...

now with an updated link for the American search: academicjobs.uchicago.edu/positions/16...

The University of Chicago Department of Political Science is hiring at the junior level in American Politics and Quantitative Methods; links below:

dystopian Chicago sinks further into unchecked violence and collapse, desperately crying out for the liberatory hand of the Trump administration:

architectural reflections #chicago

New blog post: "Views of India among the global public" paulstaniland.com/2025/08/18/v...

"These are not the first signs that American higher education is losing its dominant position. . . . With more appealing alternatives, the Trump administration’s hostile stance may hasten the decline in U.S. higher education pre-eminence" www.nytimes.com/2025/08/14/b...

Chicago, morning and night

Perhaps relevant to today’s politics (from Gary Kristy’s “City of Scoundrels” about 1919 Chicago):

Daniel Diermeier is as close to to a comic book super-villain as I've met in higher ed (he spent some time at UChicago doing publicity-hunting things that then blew up, but only after he moved on to his next promotion), so his position here is extremely unsurprising: archive.is/6yuU4

Now that I've finally gotten my Mexican residency I guess I can announce some very good news. I successfully defended my dissertation at UChicago in July and soon I'll start as an assistant professor at Tec de Monterrey. I'm so excited about this new chapter!