Jessica A.J. Rich is Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science at Marquette University. She is the author of State-Sponsored Activism: Bureaucrats and Social Movements in Democratic Brazil, published with Cambridge University Press in 2019, and translated into Portuguese as Ativismo Patrocinado pelo Estado: burocratas e movimentos sociais no Brasil democrático (Editora Fiocruz 2021). Her articles have appeared in a variety of top academic journals. 

Rich’s research uses comparative qualitative analysis to identify the factors that help activists and advocates in their fight to make public policy more inclusive. Her work is centered in Brazil, with collaborative projects across developing countries.  

Rich holds a B.A., magna cum laude, from Carleton College, and a Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley. She has held postdoctoral fellowships at Tulane University’s Center for Inter-American Policy and Research (2012-2014) and at the London School of Economics and Political Science. 

Prof. Rich’s areas of expertise include activism, NGOs, bureaucracy, state capacity, and public health.