I am a PhD candidate in political science at Boston University and a 2026-2027 Predoctoral Fellow with the International Security Program at Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs.

My work spans international security and comparative politics, with a substantive focus on industrial mobilization and national security institutions. I study how the interaction of domestic political and economic institutions, private actors, and international pressures shapes security policy and military power.

My dissertation asks why states with similar economic resources differ in their ability to increase military production during war. I argue that the success of mobilization depends on how readily peacetime industry can be converted to wartime production, and whether governments have the institutional capacity to obtain information from and exercise authority over private firms.

My manuscript “Leaders, Legislators and the Design of National Security Organizations” received the 2026 Patricia Weitsman Award from the International Security Studies Section (ISSS) of the International Studies Association (ISA).

CV | samgerstle@gmail.com

Appointments and Background

I am also a 2026-2027 non-resident Hans J. Morgenthau Fellow at the University of Notre Dame’s International Security Center and a co-convener of the Project on the Political Economy of Security at the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies. I was previously a 2025-2026 U.S.–Asia Grand Strategy Predoctoral Fellow at the University of Southern California.

My work has been supported by the Truman Library Institute, the Lyndon B. Johnson Foundation, the Center for Innovation in Social Science, and the Stand Together Trust. My published work has appeared in the Texas National Security Review and Defence Studies and is forthcoming at the Journal of Strategic Studies. Prior to graduate school, I worked at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, The Asia Group, and on the Japan Desk at the Office of the Secretary of Defense.

I hold a BA in History and Japanese and an MS in Foreign Service from Georgetown University. I live outside Boston with my wife, son, and dog.