Bio
Peter M. Lewis is Warren Weinstein Chair of African Studies
Director of Africa and Middle East Programs at SAIS Europe
Peter Lewis is the Warren Weinstein Chair of African Studies at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS). Lewis, who served as SAIS Associate Dean for Academic and Faculty Affairs from 2015 to 2018, has directed the school's Africa Studies program since joining Johns Hopkins SAIS in 2006, and currently oversees the school’s Middle East program.
Lewis’ research and teaching focus on economic reform and political transition in developing countries, with particular emphasis on governance and development in sub-Saharan Africa. He has written extensively on economic adjustment, democratization, and civil society in Africa; democratic reform and political economy in Nigeria; public attitudes toward reform and democracy in West Africa; and the comparative politics of economic change in Africa and Southeast Asia. His most recent book,
Coping with Crisis in African States, examines sources of resilience and fragility across African countries and presents a series of critical cases. His previous book,
Growing Apart: Politics and Economic Change in Indonesia and Nigeria is concerned with the institutional basis of economic development. Lewis has published several other co-authored and edited books, numerous book chapters, and articles in
World Politics, World Development, the Journal of Democracy, the Journal of Modern African Studies, African Affairs, and others.
Lewis is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the editorial board of the Journal of Democracy. He has consulted for the Ford Foundation, the MacArthur Foundation, the Carter Center, the Council on Foreign Relations, Freedom House, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), and the World Bank. He received a bachelor’s degree from the University of California, Berkeley, and masters and doctorate degrees from Princeton University.
Courses
- Political Economy of African Development
Examines the political context of Africa’s post-colonial development. Considers the historical evolution of African economies from the colonial era, and the structural and institutional features of economic development since independence. Reviews the evolution of economic policy and the nature of political regimes. Considers the incentives of political and economic elites and popular constituencies. Examines the genesis of economic crisis and attempted reform.
- Energy, Politics and Development in Africa
This course focuses on the political and economic challenges associated with resource wealth in SSA with particular attention paid to petroleum. Course topics include debate over the resource curse, conflict, corruption, a taxonomy of oil country regimes, taxation and revenue management, state enterprises and other key players. The course profiles a number of individual oil-rich SSA countries.