Mexican Center

Our Director

Bryan Roberts
C. B. Smith Sr. Centennial Chair in U.S.-Mexico Relations

Dr. Roberts was the founding director of the Mexican Center in 1980 and holds the C. B. Smith Sr. Centennial Chair in U.S.-Mexico Relations. He is also professor in the Department of Sociology and Co-Director of the Center for the Study of Urbanization and Internal Migration in Developing Countries.

Dr. Roberts is involved in multiple comparative research projects dealing with social policy, governance, and urbanization. He is currently leading two major research grants focusing on urban governance and intra-urban population differentials and Latin American urbanization, both through the Population Research Center.

Dr. Roberts recently completed a four-year research grant on self-sustaining community development through the Center for Latin American Social Policy (CLASPO), where he served as director from 2001-2005. He recently became coordinator of the Working Group on Global Change and Social Policy (International Social Sciences Council). This new research network gathers researchers and scholars from several countries who are studying policy trends in various regions of the world.

Bryan Roberts has published numerous articles and papers on issues of citizenship, social policy, irregular settlements, internal and international migration including Mexico-U.S., labor markets, informal economies, community development, and urbanization. Among these are (with R. Frank and F. Lozano),"Transnational Migrant Communities and Mexican Migration to the US" in Ethnic and Racial Studies, 22: 238-266, 1999; "Citizenship, Social Policy and Population Change" in C. Abel and C. Lewis (eds.), Exclusion and Engagement, pp.111-130, 2002; and the Latin American Research Review forthcoming article "Coping with Free Market Cities: Urban Collective Action in Latin America" (Summer 2006).

Dr. Roberts has published 12 books including Cities of Peasants: The Political Economy of Urbanization in the Third World; The Making of Citizens; and Free Market City: Studies in Comparative International Development. His latest publications are Rethinking Development in Latin America (Pennsylvania State University Press) and the forth coming Ciudades Latinoamericanas: Un Análisis Comparativo en el Umbral del Nuevo Siglo (Editorial Prometeo, Buenos Aires).