David Dagan writes on American politics, edits long-form pieces, and works with the Niskanen Center’s academic fellows to maximize the impact of their research. He is co-author, with Steven Teles, of Prison Break: Why Conservatives Turned Against Mass Incarceration (Oxford University Press, 2016) and is now working on a book tracing the origins of mass incarceration in state and local politics.
Dagan was previously a Visiting Assistant Professor at the George Washington University, a researcher at the Center for Public Integrity and a reporter at the Central Penn Business Journal in Harrisburg, where his investigative work earned the Spotlight award of the Society of Professional Journalists Keystone Chapter. As a freelancer and op-ed contributor, he has written for The Atlantic, 538, Vox, Foreign Policy, and The Washington Post. A native of Bonn, Germany, he holds a PhD in political science from Johns Hopkins University and master’s and bachelor’s degrees in politics from Brandeis University.