Tom O'Mealia is a PhD candidate in Political Science at the University of Michigan. His research spans international relations and comparative politics. He studies autocratic politics and political violence, with a specific emphasis on civil-military relations, bureaucracies, and leadership survival in sub-Saharan Africa. O'Mealia also researches United Nations peacekeeping operations and other international interventions seeking to stop violence.

The Interdisciplinary Workshop in Comparative Politics (IWCP) provides a platform for sharing and improving research that provides comparative perspectives on the causes and effects of political and economic processes. We have participants from Economics, the Ford School of Public Policy, the Law School, the Lieberthal-Rogel Center for Chinese Studies, Mathematics, Political Science, the Ross School of Business, Sociology, Statistics, and the Weiser Center for Emerging Democracies.