Saad Gulzar
Associate Professor of Political Science and Global Affairs
- Office
- O231 Hesburgh Center for International Studies University of Notre Dame
Notre Dame, IN 46556 - Phone
- (574) 631-7067
- sgulzar@nd.edu
On leave for 2026-27 academic year
Expertise
Political economy; development; environmental governance and conservation; South Asia
Biography & Research
Saad Gulzar is an associate professor of political science and global affairs in the Keough School of Global Affairs at the University of Notre Dame and holds a joint appointment in Notre Dame's Department of Political Science. He is also a core-affiliated faculty member of the Kellogg Institute.
Gulzar's research interests lie in political economy, comparative politics, development, and environmental governance and conservation, with a regional focus on South Asia. Government performance profoundly shapes citizens’ daily lives, serving as the most immediate and powerful force determining their well-being and opportunities. He studies government performance in the context of politicians’ and bureaucrats’ management of large-scale bureaucratic and political organizations that are responsible for the implementation of social programs, the provision of public goods and the management of political campaigns at scale. His most recent work extends this inquiry to the study of environmental governance and conservation.
Gulzar’s work has appeared in top journals including Nature, the American Political Science Review and The Review of Economics Studies. He earned a Ph.D. in politics from New York University in 2017 and was previously an assistant professor at Stanford University and Princeton University.
Gulzar is a faculty fellow of the Keough School's Kellogg Institute for International Studies.
Recent Work
- "Democracy and the Environment" (Annual Review of Political Science)
- Policy brief: "Air pollution could be reduced by incentivizing local government officials to control crop burning" (Nature)
- “Bureaucrat Incentives Reduce Crop Burning and Child Mortality in South Asia” (Nature)
- “Good Politicians: Experimental Evidence on Motivations for Political Candidacy and Government Performance" (The Review of Economic Studies)
- “Can Party Elites Shape the Rank and File? Evidence from a Recruitment Campaign in India” (American Political Science Review)
- “Representation and Forest Conservation: Evidence from India’s Scheduled Areas” (American Political Science Review)