Christina M. Kinane
Assistant Professor, Political Science · Yale University
Welcome! I am an Assistant Professor of Political Science, a Faculty Fellow in the Institution for Social and Policy Studies, and the Faculty Director of the Millstone Fellowship in Public Service at Yale University. I also direct the KAPI Lab, which builds original datasets and public data resources on appointments and policymaking, and am a Faculty Fellow at the Miller Center for Public Affairs at the University of Virginia and a Good Authority Fellow.
I study American political institutions, with a particular emphasis on separation of powers and political control of the bureaucracy. My research agenda is animated by a deceptively simple question: who actually runs the government? I ask how presidents and Congress bargain over that choice and what it means for policymaking, and I take seriously situations in which actors sidestep formal powers, are strategically inactive, or in which policy does not change. My current work examines vacancies and acting appointees, congressional oversight of the appointments process, capacity and performance at independent regulatory commissions, and pathways for reforming the U.S. appointment process.
My book, Unconfirmed Power, traces more than two centuries of appointment authority in the federal executive branch and investigates how presidents strategically use vacancies and acting appointees to promote their policy priorities and unilaterally govern. My work has been published in the American Political Science Review and Presidential Studies Quarterly, among other outlets.
I received my Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Michigan in 2019. My dissertation received the 2021 E.E. Schattschneider Award for best dissertation in American government from APSA and the 2020 George C. Edwards III Award for best dissertation on executive politics. I also hold an M.P.A. from the London School of Economics and B.A.’s in Political Science and Economics from UCLA. I was on medical leave for cancer treatment from 2022 to 2023.