What drives engagement with civic organizations addressing women's issues? While past work suggests that individuals' preferences regarding civic engagement are influenced by geographic proximity, it remains unclear whether proximity or other organizational attributes shape civic engagement with organizations focused on women's issues. Drawing on interviews of volunteers with women's civic organizations, this study develops an inductive theory about how proximity – both geographic and in terms of the intervention or approach to advocacy – shapes engagement with women's organizations. More specifically, it argues that individuals are more likely to engage with organizations that are local and that provide direct interventions that target individual needs. We test the implications of this theory with an original survey experiment in the United States. We find that individuals prefer to volunteer with local over national women's organizations and prefer organizations that provide direct support rather than indirect interventions. There are no significant differences between men and women; those that identity as feminist and not; and those with past volunteer experience. These findings help us understand how organizational attributes shape preferences for civic engagement and demonstrate that, even amid deep political polarization, individuals still prioritize local and immediate responses to women's issues rather than national and institutional solutions.

This study examines whether women politicians address violence against women (VAW) more effectively than their male counterparts at the local level in Mexico. Using a regression discontinuity design that leverages close mayoral elections, we find that women mayors reduce some of the most egregious violent crimes committed against women, with estimates suggesting a 64.7% reduction in homicides of women over their 3-year terms. As evidence of potential mechanisms, we find that women mayors actively work to combat VAW, appoint more women to leadership and support roles, and expand specialized services for crime victims. These findings suggest that women’s representation in local politics may be an important factor in advancing women’s safety.

What effect does sexual exploitation and abuse (SEA) reporting by the United Nations (UN) have on the actions of peacekeeping missions’ troop and police contributing countries (TPCCs)? While past scholarship has studied the effect of naming and shaming for states’ human rights records, we examine the relationship between the UN’s reporting on human rights abuses committed by its Member States’ personnel and their policy and personnel responses. Focusing on SEA reporting within peacekeeping missions, we theorize the ways in which the UN’s reporting of SEA may lead to two distinct responses: TPCCs may issue legal frameworks to demonstrate compliance and address SEA, or they may withdraw from peacekeeping missions by reducing their personnel commitments. Using an original, cross-national dataset of UN reporting on SEA allegations and the patterns of framework issuance and personnel commitments among TPCCs (2010–2020), we find that TPCCs with SEA reports are more likely to issue legal frameworks and to reduce personnel contributions than their nonreported counterparts, and that this relationship is particularly strong following the first instance of reporting. With targeted TPCCs demonstrating both greater policy compliance and personnel withdrawal, our findings highlight the dynamic impact that UN reporting for SEA can have on the actions of TPCCs.

• Women’s Political Conversations Following Wartime and Domestic Violence. (with Cameron Mailhot) R&R.

• Gender Reforms and Backlash: Institutional and Individual Dynamics of Violence Against Women in Latin America. (with Alejandra López Villegas) R&R.

• Civil Society and the Effectiveness of Violence Against Women Interventions: Evidence from Mexico's Gender Violence Alerts. (with Juan C. Campos)

• Endorsing the Rule of Law: Legal and Extralegal Punishment Preferences in Mexico.

  • 2025 Women’s Caucus for International Studies (WCIS) Graduate Student Best Paper Award, International Studies Association

  • 2024 Feminist Theory and Gender Studies (FTGS) Best Graduate Student Paper Award, International Studies Association

• Protection Under Heat: How Environmental Conditions Shape UN Peacekeeping Effectiveness. (with Zinab Attai, Emily B. Jackson, Taylor Vincent, and Sabrina Karim)

• Who Demands Truth? Gender and Support for Truth and Reconciliation Commissions in Mexico.

• The Persistence of Gendered States.

  • 2024 Frances V. Harbour Graduate Student Paper Award, International Ethics Section, International Studies Association

• Spotlighting the State: Political Responses in the Aftermath of Gender-Based Violence

  •  Supporting Diverse Voices Book Proposal Development Grant, Princeton University Press

• The Paradox of Peace: Violence against Women in the aftermath of Civil War. (with Priscilla Torres, Taylor Vincent, Zinab Attai, Sumin Lee, and Sabrina Karim)

Torres-Beltrán, A. (2025). Gender Gap in Political Participation. in Lia K. Roberts (Ed). The SAGE International Encyclopedia of Politics and Gender, 4: 1109-1116. SAGE Publications.

Karim, S., Kunkel, S., Roark, D., Torres-Beltrán, A., Mailhot, C., Lee, S., Saad, R., Torres, P., Jackson, E. Moving Beyond Zero Tolerance: Preventing Sexual Exploitation, Abuse, and Harassment in UN Peace Operations. (2024). GSS Lab Report. The Elsie Initiative Fund.

Torres-Beltrán, A. (2024). The Suffragist Peace: How Women Shape the Politics of War. Robert F. Trager and Joslyn N. Barnhart. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2023. 272 pp. $19.99 (hardcover). ISBN: 9780197629758. Politics & Gender, 20(4): 1028–1030.

Torres-Beltrán, A. (2024). Inequality across State Lines: How Policymakers Have Failed Domestic Violence Victims in the United States. by Kaitlin Sidorsky and Wendy J. Schiller. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2023. ISBN: 9781009279154. Political Science Quarterly, 139(1): 149-15.

Torres-Beltrán, A. (2023). Feminist Global Health Security: by Clare Wenham, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2021, 288 pp.,£ 47.99 (hardback), ISBN 978-0-19-755693-1. International Feminist Journal of Politics, 25(1): 153–155.

Torres-Beltrán, A., & Brannon, E. (2022). Early-Career Graduate Preparation through the Gender and Political Participation Graduate Working Group. PS: Political Science & Politics, 55(3): 546–548.

Schnabel, L., Abdelhadi, E., Ally Zaslavsky, K., Ho, J.S. and Torres-Beltrán, A. (2022). Gender, Sexuality, and Religion: A Critical Integrative Review and Agenda for Future Research. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 61: 271-292. 

Torres-Beltrán, A., Mailhot, C., Dorssom, E. I., and Boyes, C. A. (2022). Show Me the Money: Information, Strategies, and Guidelines for Applying to Grants and Fellowships in Graduate School. In APSA Strategies for Navigating Graduate School and Beyond, eds. Kevin G. Lorentz II, Daniel J. Mallinson, Julia Marin Hellwege, Davin Phoenix, and J. Cherie Strachan.

Karim, Sabrina M., Kyle Beardsley, Tessa Devereaux Evans, Laura Huber, and Angie Torres-Beltrán. (2021). Women and Peacemaking/Peacekeeping. In Oxford Bibliographies in International Relations. Ed. Patrick James. Oxford University Press.