Valentina Gonzalez-Rostani

Valentina Gonzalez-Rostani is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science and International Relations at the University of Southern California. She is also affiliated with the Mobilization and Political Economy NSF-REU program at the University of Pittsburgh, which supports underrepresented students in social science research. Prior to joining USC, she was a Postdoctoral Research Associate in the Department of Politics at Princeton University.

Her educational background includes a Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Pittsburgh (2024), an M.A. in Political Science from the same institution (2021), an M.S. in Public Policies from Universidad Catolica del Uruguay (2019), and a B.A. in Accounting from Universidad de la Republica (2015).

Gonzalez-Rostani specializes in political economy, with a focus on understanding how economic polarization fuels political polarization. Her research examines the political consequences of job automation, including effects on political attitudes, voting behavior, and political participation. She also develops methodological tools such as hierarchical models with spatial autocorrelation and computational methods to measure populism. Her work spans advanced economies and the Global South, with particular attention to Latin America.

Her recent publications reveal a strong trend connecting technological change with political outcomes. She has produced influential work on automation and political apathy, right-wing populism, and the interplay between economic and cultural factors in shaping political behavior. Her methodological contributions include innovative approaches to analyzing political discourse using social media data and developing scalable tools to measure political phenomena.

She is a member of the 2025 APSA Task Force on AI and Political Science, where she serves on the committee on economic inequality and the labor force. She also co-directs Razones y Personas, a 14-year-old blog where social scientists publish weekly pieces on politics and policy, with a focus on Latin America and Uruguay.

Gonzalez-Rostani is deeply committed to mentoring underrepresented students. She is affiliated with the Mobilization & Political Economy NSF-REU program, which supports the research paths of underrepresented students. Her work on inclusive mentorship has been published in PS: Political Science & Politics. Before moving to the United States, she worked in Uruguayan politics as a grassroots organizer and advised a member of Congress.

She teaches courses on Text as Data for Social Scientists, Introduction to Data Analysis, and The Politics of International Trade at USC. Her methodological expertise includes R programming, natural language processing, machine learning techniques, and advanced statistical modeling.