Professional Affiliation

Associate Professor, Department of Political Science, University of California at Santa Barbara

Expert Bio

Dr. Amit Ahuja is an Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of California at Santa Barbara. His research focuses on the processes of inclusion and exclusion in multiethnic societies. He has studied this within the context of ethnic parties and movements, military organization, intercaste marriage, and skin color preferences in South Asia.

Expertise

Ethnic politics

Security

Political Mobilization

South Asia

Wilson Center Project

Building National Armies in Multiethnic States

Project Summary

How do multiethnic states construct unified, national militaries in divided societies? Drawing on hundreds of interviews, surveys of security officials, and firsthand observations, Building National Armies in Multiethnic States addresses this question.

Major Publications

Books

Internal Security in India: Violence, Order, and the State. New York: Oxford University Press, 2023. (with Devesh Kapur)

Mobilizing the Marginalized: Ethnic Parties Without Ethnic Movements. New York: Oxford University Press, 2019. Winner of the New India Foundation Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay Book Prize

Articles

“Preventive Repression: Protest Policing in New Delhi,” Journal of Urban Affairs, 2023. (with Rajkamal Singh and Rahul Hemrajani)