Peter Andreas
peter_andreas@brown.edu
+1 401 863 9839
111 Thayer Street, Room 312
John Hay Professor of International Studies and Political Science
Professor of International and Public Affairs
Peter Andreas is the John Hay Professor of International Studies. He joined the Institute in the fall of 2001, and holds a joint appointment with the Department of Political Science. Previously, Andreas was an academy scholar at Harvard University, a research fellow at the Brookings Institution, and an SSRC-MacArthur Foundation Fellow on International Peace and Security. He holds an MA and PhD in government from Cornell University and a BA in political science from Swarthmore College.
Andreas is the author, co-author, or co-editor of eleven books. These include Smuggler Nation: How Illicit Trade Made America (Oxford University Press, 2013, selected by Amazon and by Foreign Affairs as one of the best books of the year), Blue Helmets and Black Markets: The Business of Survival in the Siege of Sarajevo (Cornell University Press, 2008); Policing the Globe: Criminalization and Crime Control in International Relations (Oxford University Press, 2006); and Border Games: Policing the U.S.-Mexico Divide (Cornell University Press, 2000, second edition 2009, third edition 2020). His most recent book is a political memoir, Rebel Mother: My Childhood Chasing the Revolution (Simon & Schuster, 2017, selected by Foreign Affairs as a best book of the year). His new book, Killer High: A History of War in Six Drugs (Oxford University Press, 2020), explores the relationship between warfare and mind altering substances, from ancient times to the present.
Andreas has also written for a wide range of scholarly and policy publications, including International Security, International Studies Quarterly, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, The New Republic, Harper's, Slate, andThe Nation. Other writings include congressional testimonies and op-eds in major newspapers, such as the New York Times, Washington Post, Boston Globe, and The Guardian.
The clandestine dimensions of globalization involve illicit cross-border flows of people, goods, money and information. This project critically examines the interaction between states and illicit flows across time, place, and commodity, focusing especially on the practice and politics of government policing efforts. The project, which bridges the study of security, political economy, and cross-border crime, involves a wide range of outputs and activities: books and edited volumes, scholarly and policy articles, conferences, and courses.
This includes books such as Smuggler Nation: How Illicit Trade Made America (Oxford University Press, 2013); Blue Helmets and Black Markets: The Business of Survival in the Siege of Sarajevo (Cornell University Press, 2008); Policing the Globe: Criminalization and Crime Control in International Relations (paperback edition, Oxford University Press, 2008); Border Games: Policing the U.S.-Mexico Divide (second edition, Cornell University Press, 2009); and Sex, Drugs, and Body Counts: The Politics of Numbers in Global Crime and Conflict (Cornell University Press, 2010).
Other activities include recent policy and scholarly articles in such publications as Foreign Affairs and Political Science Quarterly; chapter contributions to edited volumes; co-editing a special issue of the interdisciplinary journal Crime, Law & Social Change; organizing a conference (focusing on the relationship between violence and illicit markets) hosted and sponsored by the Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation; op-eds in media outlets such as the Washington Post, Boston Globe, and Bloomberg.com; and lectures in the United States, Canada, and Europe. The teaching component includes a lecture course on "The Politics of the Illicit Global Economy" a senior research seminar on "Contraband Capitalism: States and Illegal Markets," and a first-year seminar on "Drug War Politics."
“Crime, Violence, and Illicit Economies in Regional and Global Perspective,” Perspectives on Politics (review article) (Vol. 17, No. 2, 2019).
“Drugs and War: What is the Relationship?” Annual Review of Political Science (2019).
“Border Collision: Power Dynamics of Enforcement and Evasion Across the U.S.-Mexico Line,” (w/Noelle Brigden), in Katzenstein and Seybert, eds. Protean Power: Exploring the Unexpected in World Politics, Cambridge University Press, 2018.
Rebel Mother: My Childhood Chasing the Revolution, Simon & Schuster, 2017 (paperback 2018)
“International Politics and the Illicit Global Economy,” Perspectives on Politics (review article) (Fall 2015), pp. 782-788.
“Illicit Americas: Historical Dynamics of Smuggling in U.S. Relations with its Neighbors,” in Jaskowski, Sotomayor, and Trinkunas, eds, American Crossings: Border Politics in the Western Hemisphere, Johns Hopkins University Press, 2015.
Post-Cold War Conflict (graduate seminar)
Politics of the Illicit Global Economy (lecture course)
Contraband Capitalism: States and Illegal Markets (senior seminar)
Drug War Politics (first year seminar)
March 28, 2019 Associated Press
Professor Peter Andreas comments on the United States' history of intellectual piracy, saying "Only after becoming the leading industrial power did it become a champion of intellectual-property protections."
January 23, 2019 Rolling Stone
Professor Peter Andreas offered his thoughts on President Trump's promise to build a wall along the United States-Mexico border, saying "The whole border in a sense has become more militarized and more difficult to cross by any measure."
January 11, 2019 Cambridge University Press
Professors Peter Andreas and Mark Blyth are mentioned in an article published by the Cambridge University Press that "identifies the 100 currently most-cited scholars, the 25 most-cited in each PhD cohort and subfield, the 40 most cited-women scholars, and the 25 most-cited emeriti."
October 24, 2018 Voice of San Diego
This article cites research by Professor Peter Andreas who found that the auto industry and economies of border towns, such as San Diego, were devastated by post-9/11 crackdowns at the U.S.-Mexico border.
July 3, 2018 The Washington Post
Professor Peter Andreas argues in a column penned on the eve of the Fourth of July that Americans should consider the fact that the U.S. founders were relentless lawbreakers -- particularly of laws meant to restrict who and what was allowed to cross borders.
June 6, 2018 The Atlantic
As sanctions restrict the legal flow of goods, people grow accustomed to the black market. In a 2005 study, Professor Peter Andreas noted that sanctions often breed "a higher level of public tolerance for lawbreaking and an undermined respect for the rule of law."
Thanks to Mom, the Marxist Revolutionary - New York Times
My Mother the Radical - Brown Alumni Magazine
Growing Up A Revolutionary - WNYC
Mothers and Sons – The New York Times
"Brown University professor writes about childhood with ‘Rebel Mother’" - Providence Journal
"Expats After the Coup" - The Baffler
"Unsentimental Education" - Swarthmore College Bulletin
"Smuggling My Way Into Academe" - The Chronicle of Higher Education
"What It's Like to Join a Revolution as a Five-Year-Old" - VICE
"Rebel Mother: My Childhood Chasing the Revolution" - Publisher's Weekly
"Rebel Mother - Review" - Kirkus
"Cooks, Rebel Mothers, & Media Stars | Memoir Previews, Apr. 2017, Pt. 3" - Library Journal
Watson Institute Interview & Book Talk
Book Talks
April 6: Watson Institute book launch event
April 18: Point Street Reading Series "Reading with Robin", Providence
April 19: Redwood Library, Newport http://www.redwoodlibrary.
April 22: Barrington Books, Barrington http://www.barringtonbooks.
April 26: Macaulay Honors College, New York City https://macaulay.cuny.edu/
May 2: Tattered Cover Bookstore, Denver http://www.tatteredcover.com/
May 3: Brown Club of Silicon Valley http://www.brownsv.
May 4: St. Francis Yacht Club/Brown Club of San Francisco
May 5: Book Passage Bookstore, San Francisco http://www.
May 7: Stories Books and Cafe, Los Angeles https://storiesla.com/blogs/
May 9: Annie Bloom's Books, Portland http://www.annieblooms.com/
May 10: Third Place Books, Seattle http://www.thirdplacebooks.
May 20: Books on the Square, Providence