Coming up to the Plate: Dr. Boutton
Before becoming a part of the Knights family, Dr. Andrew Boutton earned his B.A. in International Studies from Texas A&M University (2007), his M.A. in Political Science (2010) and Ph.D. in Political Science (2014) from Pennsylvania State University. His research and teaching interests focus on international relations and comparative politics. Within those areas he concentrates on the politics of counterterrorism as well as the effects of foreign aid on the politics of the recipient country. Dr. Boutton’s dissertation,”Purchasing Counterterrorism: The Effect of U.S. Foreign Aid on Host State Counterterrorism Effort,” explores the factors that are involved in causing foreign aid to have perverse effects on cooperation and in what contexts those factors operate. He also had the honor of becoming a Security Studies Pre-Doctoral Fellow at the Strauss Center of International Security and Law at the University of Texas.
From Texas to Pennsylvania to Texas, Dr. Boutton has now grounded himself in Orlando as an assistant professor. Some of his recent research appears in the Journal of Conflict Resolution and the Journal of Peace Research. He is currently working on research with graduate students on the effect of U.S. security aid as a counterterrorism recipient and how state politics affects the use of foreign aid.
Outside the classroom, Dr. Boutton finds time to achieve equilibrium between academic and personal life. He says, “Trying to manage all the different demands while making time for yourself is a challenging part of this job.” Although there are difficult aspects of being a new faculty member with rigorous work, he still finds time to partake in outdoor activities such as playing on a baseball league in Orlando.
When asked what three words best characterize himself, Dr. Boutton responded with: resilient, thoughtful and confident. Dr. Boutton’s resilience and confidence has brought him here, and we are happy to welcome him. His thoughtfulness lead to his final response regarding advice to future students: “Get ready to read a lot!”