Kimberly J. Renk

I am a PhD candidate in the Department of Political Science at the University of California San Diego. My research examines the political economy of extraction and resistance in predatory states, with a focus on Latin America and Spanish colonialism in particular. To study this topic, I combine formal reasoning with quasi-experimental methods, drawing from historical and geospatial data. 

My job market paper asks how premodern rulers imposed onerous forced labor on the peasant masses when they lacked the capacity to prevent them from fleeing. Using a simple model, I argue that rulers did so by exploiting peasants’ attachment to land, while setting burdens high enough to induce some flight. Consistent with these claims, evidence from the mining mita in colonial Peru shows that the Spanish Crown imposed heavier labor obligations where indigenous peasants held more valuable agricultural land and maintained burdens that provoked substantial flight.

Prior to pursuing academia, I worked on international disputes as a lawyer in Washington, DC, led projects in the governments of the Dominican Republic and Liberia, and managed policy and training programs at the Harvard Kennedy School and Stanford University.