Gemma Sala

Fields: Comparative Politics, Political Economy and Judicial Politics

Gemma Sala is a Ph.D. Candidate in Political Science at Yale University. She is currently finishing her dissertation on federalism and judicial politics in Spain, entitled “The Judicialization of Federalism: The Impact of the Constitutional Court on Federal Conflict in Spain”, under the direction of Frances M. Rosenbluth. It analyzes the conditions under which central and regional governments choose to resolve federal conflict in the judicial or in the political arena, as well as the policy outcomes derived from the choice of one or another venue. Her research shows that prior court decisions signal the strategies available to political actors to deal with federal conflict. It introduces a formal model that expresses how judicial decisions affect the interaction between regional and federal governments, and provides evidence for her arguments through the analysis of an original data set that includes every appeal on federalism brought to the Spanish Constitutional Court, as well as intensive interviews with Constitutional Court justices, clerks and central and regional public officials. Sala’s broader areas of interest are judicial and constitutional politics, federalism, nationalism, as well as European and Latin American politics. She has acquired solid teaching experience as Visiting Instructor of Government at Wesleyan University, and was appointed to be Lecturer in Political Science at Yale University in the Spring of 2008.

Curriculum Vitae

Email: gemma.sala@aya.yale.edu