Team directory: P

A. David Paltiel, Professor of Public Health (Health Policy); Professor of Management; Co-Director, Public Health Modeling Concentration; Affiliated Faculty, Yale Institute for Global Health

The objective that guides Dr. Paltiel’s scholarly activities is to promote a reasoned approach to decision making and resource allocation in public health and medicine. Trained in the field of Operations Research, Dr. Paltiel designs and implements policy models and cost-effectiveness analyses. He has a special interest and expertise in HIV/AIDS and has published broadly on the cost-effectiveness of testing, prevention, treatment, and care, both in the United States and around the world.

Rohini Pande, Henry J. Heinz II Professor of Economics

Rohini Pande is the Henry J. Heinz II Professor of Economics and Director of the Economic Growth Center, Yale University.

Michael Paz, ISPS Director's Fellow 2024

Michael Paz (he/him) is a first-generation college student from Oxnard, California, majoring in English. He is passionate about immigration law and policy. Michael has taken a gap year to work at a small immigration law firm in California, and he has worked with immigration clinics at Harvard and Yale Law Schools. For classes and freelance work, he writes long-form articles about immigration. He is driven by a theory of change that focuses on communicating how law and policy live in people’s lives, capturing in words and images authentic portraits of people.

Limor Peer, Associate Director for Research & Strategic Initiatives

Office Location: 87 Trumbull Street
Phone: 203-432-0054
Email: limor.peer@yale.edu

Theophile Penigaud de Mourgues , Postdoctoral Associate

Theophile Penigaud de Mourgues is a Postdoctoral Associate with the Democratic Innovations program at Yale’s Institution for Social and Policy Studies. He holds a Ph.D. in philosophy from the Ecole Normale Supérieure de Lyon, where he also led a multidisciplinary junior laboratory studying the mutations in democratic practices and theories (2018-2022).

Danielle Petrafesa, Financial Assistant

Address: 77 Prospect Street
Phone: 203-432-9736
Email: danielle.petrafesa@yale.edu;

Sovy Phan, ISPS Director's Fellow 2024

Sovy Pham is a sophomore from Atlanta, Georgia majoring in American Studies and Urban Studies. Her primary policy interests include land-use reform, zoning equity, and socio-spatial relations in urbanity. She is also interested in critical cartography and questions of
territory/sovereignty. On campus, she serves on the Yale College Council, plays Saybrook intramural sports, and directs the FOCUS on New Haven program.

Benjamin Polak, William C Brainard Professor of Economics; Professor of Management

Professor Polak is an expert on decision theory, game theory, and economic history. His work explores economic agents whose goals are richer than those captured in traditional models. His work on game theory ranges from foundational theoretical work on common knowledge, to applied topics in corporate finance and law and economics. Most recently, he has made contributions to the theory of repeated games with asymmetric information. Other research interests include economic inequality and individuals’ responses to uncertainty.

Isabel Prioleau, Dahl Scholar, 2023-2024

Isabel Prioleau is a junior in Davenport College pursuing a Political Science major and a certificate in French. Her research focuses on comparative European politics, and especially on understanding how contemporary threats to democracy shape and are shaped by dynamics of party competition, welfare state development, and European integration. As a Dahl Scholar, Isabel is working under the guidance of Professor Isabela Mares to situate democratic backsliding in Hungary and Poland within the context of social policy reform and nonprogrammatic electoral competition.