New Council 2024 – Pi Sigma Alpha

New Executive Council Members Elected for 2024-2028 Term

During last month’s biennial business meeting, Pi Sigma Alpha announced the election of Dr. Amy Below, Dr. Marilyn Davis, Dr. Sharron Herron-Williams, Dr. Mary Manjikian, Dr. Paul Musgrave, and Dr. Judith Russell as members of the Executive Council for a four-year term (2024-2028). Please join us in welcoming them! You can read more about our new council members below.

Dr. Amy Below is an Associate Professor and Chair of Political Science at California State University, East Bay. Dr. Below has a PhD in Politics and International Relations from the University of Southern California. She teaches courses in International Relations and Comparative Politics with a substantive focus on the environment and climate change and a regional focus in the Americas. Dr. Below has published research on climate as a security threat and climate as a foreign policy for both U.S. and Latin American countries including a manuscript with Routledge on the decision making of Argentina, Mexico, and Venezuela (2016). She also publishes pedagogical research on active learning and study abroad programs and has served in various leadership roles in the International Studies Association, including chair of the Innovative Pedagogy Conference Planning Committee. Dr. Below has been the faculty advisor for two Pi Sigma Alpha Chapters, Kappa Gamma (Oregon State University) and Alpha Iota Theta (California State University, East Bay).

Dr. Marilyn A. Davis (not pictured) has been a member of the Spelman College faculty since August 1981. She currently serves as Associate Professor of Political Science as well as Chapter Advisor for the Gamma Lambda chapter. Dr. Davis has a BA in political science from Hampton Institute, as well as a MA and PhD in political science from Atlanta University. Her research interest is primarily in the area of electoral behavior. Currently, Dr. Davis is exploring the role that African American women play in the electoral politics of Georgia’s congressional and state legislative districts. A related research focus concerns mainstream media images of African American women in the political arena. Her most recent scholarship has been published by HarperCollins and Worth Publishers.

Dr. Sharron Y. Herron-Williams serves as President and Chair of the Board of Directors for Study Louisiana, President and the Southern Conference on African American Studies, Inc. (SCAASI), Advancement Committee Chair for the Board of Directors for the North Louisiana Civil Rights Coalition (NLCRC) and member of the Community Advisory Board for Honeywell UOP. She was recently appointed by the U.S. Secretary of Commerce to the Board of Directors for Louisiana District Export Council (LDEC). Dr. Herron-Williams has a Bachelor’s degree from Stillman College, as well as a MPPA and PhD in Public Administration from Mississippi State University. While continuing to envision the broader connections developed by having people communicate and create through different forums, she created SUSLA Engage at Southern University at Shreveport and Dream Beyond with Dr. Shavonne, for which she also serves as host and producer. She currently serves as Fulbright Scholar Liaison, Tenured, Full Professor of Political Science at Southern University at Shreveport, Project Director and Point of Contact for the SUSLA Hub for Apple/HBCU C2 and Project Director and Point of Contact for the EPIC Center.

Dr. Mary Manjikian is a Professor at Regent University in Virginia Beach, VA. She received her BA from Wellesley College, an M.Phil from Oxford University and an MA and PhD from the University of Michigan. She is the author of Apocalypse and Post-Politics: The Romance of the End (Lexington, 2012); Threat Talk: Comparative Politics of Internet Addiction (Ashgate, 2012) The Securitization of Property Squatting in Western Europe (Routledge, 2013) and Gender, Sexuality and Intelligence: The Spy in the Closet (Palgrave, 2020). She also authored two textbooks: Cybersecurity Ethics: An Introduction (Routledge, 2017), and Introduction to Cyber Politics and Policy (Sage, 2019). Dr. Manjikian is the co-editor of The Routledge Companion to Global Cybersecurity Strategy (Routledge, 2020). Her work has also appeared in International Studies Quarterly, Alternatives, Millenium, International Feminist Journal of Politics and International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence. In 2012, she was a Fulbright Scholar at the Institute of Advanced Study at Durham University in the UK. A former US foreign service officer with service in the Netherlands, Russia and Bulgaria, Dr. Manjikian teaches comparative politics and international relations at the College of Arts and Sciences at Regent University. She is the Chapter Advisor for the Alpha Epsilon Theta chapter.

Dr. Paul Musgrave is associate professor of government at Georgetown University Qatar. He studies U.S. foreign policy, international relations theory, and how oil and politics mix. His research has appeared in International Organization, International Studies Quarterly, Security Studies, Presidential Studies Quarterly, and Comparative Political Studies, and he has written for The Washington Post, Foreign Policy, and other outlets. He holds a Ph.D. in Government with a focus on International Relations from Georgetown University.

Dr. Judith Russell is the author of Economics, Bureaucracy, and Race: How Keynesians Misguided the War on Poverty (Columbia University Press, 2004), which analyzes the programmatic failure of the US government to produce coherent programs to address poverty. She received her BA (1979), MA (1983), MPhil (1987), and PhD (1992) from Columbia University. Since 2004, Dr. Russell has served as an Adjunct Associate Professor at Columbia University, where she now also serves as faculty advisor for the Mu chapter. She has taught American government and politics, public policy, and institutions, including courses on income inequality, urban politics, the welfare state, democratic and constitutional theory, employment policy, antipoverty policy, economic development, federalism, and intergovernmental relations. Her advisory work has included security and terrorism, international business, economic development, non-governmental organizations, employment, minority business, and labor and union relations. In addition, Dr. Russell is active in political, social, and children’s welfare organizations and sits on boards of directors for organizations concerned with homelessness and girls’ education in New York City and Washington, D.C.