Aileen Teague
Assistant Professor of International Affairs Education, The Bush School of Government and Public Service at Texas A&M University
Postdoctoral Fellow in International and Public Affairs, 2019-2020
Aileen Teague is a postdoctoral fellow at the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs. After completing her fellowship at the Watson Institute, she will begin her appointment as Assistant Professor of International Affairs at Texas A&M University’s Bush School of Government and Public Service. She earned her Ph.D. in History from Vanderbilt University in 2018. Born in Colon, Panama, Aileen travelled the world as part of a military family, and served in the U.S. Marine Corps. She has taught classes on U.S. history, as well as thematic courses addressing issues such as interventionism, drug enforcement, national security, and addiction in U.S. culture. Aileen enjoys providing a voice on how history has shaped current social and political issues. Her opinion pieces have appeared in History News Network, The Conversation, and Time magazine.
Aileen’s research interests focus broadly on questions of interventionism, militarization, and incorporating top-down and bottom-up perspectives to understand the effects of Unites States policies on foreign societies. Her research examines the effects of United States drug policies and policing efforts on 1970s Mexican politics and society. Aileen is currently drafting a book manuscript, which is based on her dissertation, Americanizing Mexican Drug Enforcement: The War on Drugs in Mexican Politics and Society, 1964–1982. The study incorporates a transnational approach, using archival sources from Mexico and the United States to explore the origins of bilateral drug enforcement measures and their relationship to Mexican state formation and U.S. domestic drug issues. Aileen’s project also sheds new light on how local histories of political instability shaped the Mexican government’s response to the U.S. war on drugs. Her research has received support from organizations, including Fulbright, the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations, and most recently, the Center for U.S.-Mexican Studies at the University of California, San Diego, where she served as a visiting fellow.
Peer-reviewed Articles:
“The United States, Mexico, and the Mutual Securitization of Drug Enforcement, 1969–1985,” Diplomatic History, forthcoming.
“Mexico’s Dirty War on Drugs: Source Control and Dissidence in Drug Enforcement,” in “U.S. Foreign Relations and the New Drug History,” Special Volume of The Social History of Alcohol and Drugs: An Interdisciplinary Journal, April 2019.
Other Publications:
“The Drug Trade in Mexico.” Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Latin American History. Ed. William Beezley. New York: Oxford University Press, 2016. (Encyclopedic Entry) Oxford Encyclopedia of Mexican History and Culture, 2018.
“War on Drugs.” America in the World, 1776 to the Present: A Supplement to the Dictionary of American History. Ed. Edward J. Blum. Vol. 2. Farmington Hills, MI: Charles Scribner's Sons, 2016. (Encyclopedic Entry)
“The International Impact of America’s War on Drugs,” Review Essay 128, H-Diplo, May 2015.
The U.S. War on Drugs: From History to Policymaking and Beyond (Spring 2019)
The Opioid Crisis: Causes, Effects, and Policy Solutions (Winter Session 2020)
December 2, 2019 Los Angeles Times
Aileen Teague, postdoctoral research associate at the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs, provided commentary in this article about Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador's new "hugs, not bullets" policies on the drug war and violence plaguing Mexico.
November 18, 2019 The Washington Post
Aileen Teague, postdoctoral research associate at the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs, penned this op-ed on why abruptly terminating drug-war-related policies, at least in the near term, is not the answer to reducing violence in Mexico.
September 5, 2019
Postdoctoral Fellow Aileen Teague recently published an article highlighting how the Dirty War legacy shaped the more aggressive U.S. drug enforcement practices in Mexico that led to the murder of Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) Agent Enrique “Kiki” Camarena by Mexican drug lords.
April 22, 2019
Postdoctoral Fellow Aileen Teague’s recent essay is included in the first issue of The Social History of Alcohol and Drugs published by The University of Chicago Press.
April 8, 2019 The Conversation
Postdoctoral Fellow Aileen Teague in The Conversation, "If Trump ever follows through on his threat and puts up a closed sign at the southern border, it wouldn’t be the first time. Twice in the last half-century the U.S. has tried to use the border to force Mexico to bend to America’s will. The ruse failed both times."