David A. Singer is the Department Head and Raphael Dorman-Helen Starbuck Professor of Political Science at MIT. Professor Singer’s research and teaching focus on international political economy with an emphasis on international financial relations, migration, international institutions and governance, and monetary and currency policies. He is co-author (with Mark Copelovitch) of Banks on the Brink: Global Capital, Securities Markets, and the Political Roots of Financial Crises (Cambridge University Press, 2020) and author of Regulating Capital: Setting Standards for the International Financial System (Cornell University Press, 2007, 2010) as well as articles in American Journal of Political Science, American Political Science Review, International Organization, Journal of Politics, International Studies Quarterly, and other journals. He served on the Board of Directors of the International Political Economy Society (2015-2021) and as Associate Editor of International Studies Quarterly (2013-18). Singer received a BA from the University of Michigan and a PhD from Harvard University. Before joining the MIT faculty, he was Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of Notre Dame (2004-2006), and also worked in corporate finance and for a tech startup. He was a Visiting Scholar at the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2008-9, a Visiting Professor at Harvard University’s Weatherhead Center for International Affairs in 2010-11, and a Visiting Professor at Singapore University of Technology and Design in 2015. Since 2007 he has been Associate Head of MacGregor House, an undergraduate residence hall.
Professor Singer was the inaugural chair of the MIT Committee on Sexual Misconduct Prevention and Response. He was the recipient in 2017 of the MIT Change Maker Award for “Shifting the culture that perpetuates sexual violence.” From 2019-2021 he was Secretary of the MIT Faculty.