Kunal Singh

I am a political scientist who works on nuclear weapons and international security. I am a Stanton Nuclear Security Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs. I recently completed my PhD from the Security Studies Program in the Department of Political Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

My dissertation, which is also my first book project, is titled Nipping the Atom in the Bud: Strategies of Counterproliferation and How States Select Among Them. It lays out a typology of strategies available to a state (counterproliferator) to stop the nuclear weapons program of another state (proliferant), and then develops a novel theory to explain which strategy the counterproliferator chooses and why. In this project, I draw on fresh evidence gathered from interviewing top national security officials in India and Israel.

Beyond nonproliferation and counterproliferation, I work on strategic stability, international conflicts, and regional security issues. I specialize in the security landscape of South Asia. I have written a book chapter on India-US relations and contributed hundreds of media articles on subjects relating to foreign and defense policies of India. I am trained in both quantitative and qualitative methods of causal inference. A list of my projects with short descriptions can be found on my publications page. I have a B.Tech (honours) in Metallurgical and Materials Engineering from Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur.

I am an avid follower of cricket, and a more-than-occasional follower of badminton and tennis. I like to play badminton and write Hindi/Urdu poems.