Sowon Park

Hi! I am a Ph.D. candidate in Politics at the University of Virginia. My research interests focus on international security, U.S. foreign policy, legislative behavior, public opinion, and political psychology.

My dissertation explores the structure of foreign policy preferences among U.S. legislators and the mass public, with a particular focus on the ideological nature of these preferences. Using various methodologies, including machine learning, text-as-data, survey experiments, and statistical methods, I study how the interaction between ideology and party shapes foreign policy behaviors of domestic actors in the U.S. and its implications for interstate bargaining.

I have been a graduate research fellow at the National Security Policy Center in the Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy (2022-23), the Quantitative Collaborative (2021-22), and the Democratic Statecraft Lab (2020-22) at the University of Virginia. My dissertation is supported by the Albert Gallatin Fellowship funds from the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation.

Email: sp4eh[at]virginia[dot]edu