Salvador Santino F. Regilme Jr. is currently an Assistant Professor of International Relations (Universitair Docent) at the Institute for History, University of Leiden. He previously held tenure track faculty positions at Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL, USA and at De La Salle University-Manila, Philippines. He was appointed as Käte Hamburger Postdoctoral Fellow at the Center for Global Cooperation Research at the University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany and a Fox International Fellow at the MacMillan Center for Area and International Studies at Yale University, USA. In 2015, he earned his PhD (Dr.rer.pol.) at the Freie Universität Berlin, Germany.

More information about Salvador Regilme

Research

Research agenda

My long-term research agenda aims to investigate how trans/international factors and domestic factors interact as they produce transformative political outcomes at the national or local level, especially in the context of the Global South.

My current book project examines how US foreign aid and public diplomacy, together with the domestic political context in recipient countries, produce variation in the level of human rights outcome in partner countries over time.

Current Research Projects

 1. US Foreign Aid and Human Rights in the Global South (2011-2020)
-book project: under consideration by a leading university press
- published peer-reviewed article in Third World Quarterly
- working papers on US aid in Thailand, Philippines, Colombia, and Mexico (in progress and other papers under peer review)

2. Emerging Powers and the Future of American Hegemony (2014-2020)
-edited volume under review by Routledge (Global Cooperation Series), co-edited with James Parisot (Department of Sociology, SUNY Binghamton)
- working paper on US-led East Asian order and the South China Sea dispute
- conceptualization of a book proposal on the future of American hegemony in the Asia-Pacific region

3. The Global Political Economy of United States Offshore Business Process Outsourcing: Labour Rights in the Philippines and India (2020-2025)

Current book project

Shared Interests, Localized Outcomes: United States Aid, Diplomacy, and Human Rights in Southeast Asia and Beyond
What causes human rights violations in developing democracies? Do US aid and public diplomacy undermine human rights? If so, then how and under what set of conditions does it transform the human rights situation in aid recipient countries? This book challenges the two dominant beliefs held by scholars and policy practitioners: that human rights violations are either (1) mostly generated by local factors, as comparative politics scholars contend, or (2) violations are primarily shaped by transnational factors, including the strategic interests of powerful countries such as the United States or the limitations of international law, as international relations scholars argue. The exclusive adherence to any of the two beliefs distorts the reality in many countries in the Global South, and more importantly, produces potentially sub-optimal policies initially intended in bolstering human rights. Hence, this book demonstrates that the dynamic interactions of transnational and domestic factors generate the variation in human rights compliance in many developing countries over time. It also provides useful policy insights intended to address the transnational and local causes and consequences of human rights norm compliance. Closely examining several cases of US foreign policy and human rights situation in Thailand and the Philippines, Shared Interests, Localized Outcomes offers a novel theory of foreign aid and diplomacy’s impact on human rights and state repression by eclectically integrating insights from comparative politics, international relations, and political sociology.

Previous Research Projects

1. The Impact of the Global Political Economy on Democratic Consolidation (2009-2011)
- peer-reviewed articles in Journal of Developing Societies (forthcoming, December 2015), International Studies Perspectives, and Peace Review: A Journal of Social Justice
- working paper on Turkey and the Philippines (co-written with Burak Tansel)

2. The European Union and its Impact in East Asia (2009-2011)
-peer-reviewed article in the Central European Journal of International and Security Studies, reprinted in the edited volume on Global Power Europe by Springer

3. Political Theory and Democracy in the Age of Globalization (2009-2010)
- peer-reviewed article in Hamburg Review of Social Sciences; working paper on Habermasian ideas on the civil society in the age of globalization (under peer review)

Curriculum vitae

Salvador Santino F. Regilme Jr. is currently an Assistant Professor of International Relations (Universitair Docent) at the Institute for History, the University of Leiden. He previously held tenure track positions as an Assistant Professor at the Department of Political Science, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL, USA and as an Associate Professor of Political Science at De La Salle University-Manila, Philippines. He was appointed as Käte Hamburger Postdoctoral Fellow at the Center for Global Cooperation Research at the University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany and a 2013-2014 Fox International Fellow at the MacMillan Center for Area and International Studies at Yale University, USA.

In 2015 he earned his PhD (Dr.rer.pol.) in Political Science and North American Studies from the Freie Universität Berlin, Germany, and he did his graduate training at Yale, Osnabrück, Göttingen, and Hamburg. During his PhD training, he was the first non-European to be elected as a Executive Committee Member of the Graduate Student Network of the European Consortium for Political Research, which is the largest coalition of all political science departments and institutes in Europe. Prior to his graduate education, he finished his BA Major in Philosophy, Minor in Political Science magna cum laude degree, at the top of his graduating batch in 2005, at De La Salle University-Manila in the Philippines.

His research appeared in leading journals such as Third World Quarterly, International Studies Perspectives, Journal of Developing Societies, Perspectives on Political Science, Asia Maior, and Peace Review: A Journal of Social Justice, among many others. His two book projects include a manuscript-in-progress on the impact of US foreign policy on human rights in partner countries, and an edited volume (together with James Parisot) contracted by Routledge on its Global Cooperation Series entitled “American Hegemony and the Rise of Emerging Powers: Cooperation or Conflict”. 

He has presented his research in conferences and invited talks in Oxford, London, Vienna, Manchester, Freiburg im Breisgau, Heidelberg, Duisburg, Hannover, Graz, St. Gallen, Berlin, Toronto, Providence/Rhode Island, and New Haven in Connecticut, among others. He serves as a member of the Editorial Board of Central European Journal of International and Security Studies, Eastern Europe’s leading English-language journal in international politics.

Grants and awards

• Postdoctoral Research Fellowship Award, 42,000 Euros (12 Months Tax-Free Fellowship), Center for Global Cooperation Research, Käte Hamburger Kolleg – Center for Global Cooperation Research, University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany – Funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research, 2015-2016
• New PhD Grant, University Research Coordination Office, De La Salle University-Manila, Philippines, 2000 US Dollars, 2016-2017 (Declined)
• Fox International Fellowship, Yale University – MacMillan Center for Area and International Studies, 23,200 USD plus 2,000 USD travel grant, 2013-2014
• DFG Excellence Initiative – Free University of Berlin Dissertation Completion Fellowship, October 2014 to March 2015, 9,000 Euros
• One of the 100 World Finalists, Falling Walls Lab Conference Berlin, 2014.
• German Research Foundation (DFG-Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft) Excellence Initiative Scholarship, for PhD Research at the Graduate School for North American Studies, Freie Universität Berlin 54,000 Euros (Living Expenses for 36 months) and 6,000 Euros (Travel Grant), October 2011 to September 2014 -
• Named as One of the “100 Leaders of Tomorrow” Chosen Worldwide Among Graduate Students and Participation 42nd St. Gallen Symposium, Universität St. Gallen in Switzerland, 2012
• Cambridge Overseas Trust Fund for Graduate Studies in Sociology, Sidney Sussex College, The University of Cambridge, United Kingdom (DECLINED), 2011
• Top in the Cohort, MA in Political Science - Democratic Governance and Civil Society, Universität Osnabrück, Germany, 2009-2011
• Public Policy and Good Governance Scholarship, MA Studies, German Academic Exchange Service and the German Foreign Office, 18,000 Euros (Living Expenses for 24 months), 9,000 Euros (6-month Language course), 2009 – 2011
• University Scholarship, Graduate Studies in Political Science, De La Salle University, 2006-2009
• Top in the Graduating Cohort, Academic Year 2004-2005 Graduating Class of 1200 Members, De La Salle University-Manila
• University Scholarship, Undergraduate Studies, De La Salle University-Manila, 2002-2005
• Dean’s Award for Academic Excellence, College of Liberal Arts, De La Salle University, 2005
• Permanent Membership, Jose Rizal Honors Society, De La Salle University in Manila, 2005
• Magna Cum Laude for BA Graduation, Top in the Graduating Class of the College of Liberal Arts (Social Sciences and Humanities), De La Salle University, 2005
Full Scholarship for Secondary School Education, Franciscan Capuchin Friars – Lourdes School, Quezon City, 1998-2002

Publications