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Dani Gilbert

@danigilbert.bsky.social

Assistant professor of political science at Northwestern, studying hostage taking in international security. Director with Bridging the Gap, contributor to Good Authority. She/her. Hiking, biking, mostly plants 🌱 #COYS

300 Posts3602 Follower1764 Folgt
Roberta Buffett Institute for Global Affairs@buffett.northwestern.edu · 3w ago

New research on hostage diplomacy negotiations co-authored by Buffett Faculty Fellow Danielle Gilbert ( @danigilbert.bsky.social ) ⬇️

Political Science Department at Northwestern University@polisciatnu.bsky.social · last mo.

🔥Hot off the press via @ispp-pops.bsky.social A very particular set of skills: The role of perspective-taking in hostage diplomacy negotiations Profs. Dani Gilbert ( @danigilbert.bsky.social / @buffett.northwestern.edu ) & Cynthia Wang ( @cynthiascwang.bsky.social / @drrc-kellogg.bsky.social )

Gilbert, D., & Wang, C. S. (2026). A very particular set of skills: The role of perspective-taking in hostage diplomacy negotiations. Political Psychology, 47, e70173. https://doi.org/10.1111/pops.70173 Abstract Hostage diplomacy—detaining foreign nationals for leverage under the pretext of national law—is a growing international security problem. Beyond constituting a violation of international law, hostage diplomacy is challenging to resolve. Target states must deal with aggressive, sovereign perpetrators; handle a fraudulent but plausible legal process; account for numerous stakeholders; and protect their citizens from future harm. How do target-state negotiators navigate these challenges? This theory-building article explores perspective-taking—imagining the world from another's vantage point—as a tool to shape target-state negotiators' effectiveness in navigating hostage diplomacy. We introduce a model that conceptualizes perspective-taking on two dimensions. First, negotiators can use multiple-perspective taking, considering various stakeholders, including interests within their own government, the perpetrator's government, and the hostage's family. Second, across stakeholders, negotiators can take strategic, cultural, emotional, and moral perspectives. We posit that engaging in different forms of perspective-taking improves target-state negotiators' ability to identify a domestic win-set, reach international agreement, and anticipate future crises. Drawing on insights from members of the U.S. hostage-recovery enterprise, we offer a plausibility probe suggesting that perspective-taking affects the process and outcomes of negotiations. Perspective-taking may thus help negotiators better manage power dynamics, navigate informal rules of engagement, alleviate uncertainty, and bolster global security.
Institute for Policy Research at Northwestern University@ipratnu.bsky.social · 10mo ago

In @goodauth.bsky.social, @polisciatnu.bsky.social's @danigilbert.bsky.social explains President Trump’s new executive order creating a “state sponsor of wrongful detention” designation, aimed at punishing countries that detain foreigners as bargaining chips. spr.ly/63323ASHdP

Trump wants to punish countries that wrongfully detain U.S. citizens

A new executive order aims to strike back against “hostage diplomacy.”

spr.ly

Political Science Department at Northwestern University@polisciatnu.bsky.social · 10mo ago

Will Trump's new executive order “Strengthening Efforts to Protect U.S. Nationals from Wrongful Detention Abroad” help deter hostage diplomacy? Four big questions remain. Professor @danigilbert.bsky.social via @goodauth.bsky.social goodauthority.org/news/trump-w...

Trump wants to punish countries that wrongfully detain U.S. citizens

A new executive order aims to strike back against “hostage diplomacy.”

goodauthority.org

Erica De Bruin@edebruin.bsky.social · last yr.

I’m currently building a dataset on police forces around the globe. No other country has a force quite like ICE (w/ broad enforcement powers, tactical gear, immigration focus); the most apt comparisons are to secret police in authoritarian regimes rather than border/immigration forces elsewhere.

Erica Chenoweth@chenoweth.bsky.social · last yr.

@adamprz.bsky.social on ICE's authorities & operating procedures: "The comparativist in me wants to think about other police forces in history which had such broad and ill-defined powers. But such comparisons are too frightening."

Jason "Red5" Lyall@jaylyall.bsky.social · last yr.

This is an unappreciated downside of the Iranian airstrikes: it revealed capabilities of the MOD and the B-2 itself (both radar x-section and actual combat load/range) and, despite everything working perfectly, appears to have failed to destroy the program despite being built for this use

post malone ergo propter malone@proptermalone.bsky.social · last yr.

There's a lot of discussion about cost here and it matters but the thing that arguably matters more is that we just demonstrated inability to bomb Iran's hardened programs with the purpose-built weapons we had

jamelle@jamellebouie.net · last yr.

according to conservatives on the court, the constitution does not protect your right to your own body but does enable the government to ship you off to a foreign gulag without any hope of return

Mark Joseph Stern@mjsdc.bsky.social · last yr.

NEW: The Supreme Court's conservatives halt a preliminary injunction that had restricted the Trump administration's ability to rapidly deport migrants to "third countries" where they have never lived and where allegedly face torture. All three liberals dissent. www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/24p...

DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY, ET AL. v. D.V.D., ET AL. ON APPLICATION FOR STAY [June 23, 2025] The application for stay presented to JUSTICE JACKSON and by her referred to the Court is granted. The April 18, 2025, preliminary injunction of the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts, case No. 25–cv– 10676, is stayed pending the disposition of the appeal in the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit and disposition of a petition for a writ of certiorari, if such writ is timely sought. Should certiorari be denied, this stay shall terminate automatically. In the event certiorari is granted, the stay shall terminate upon the sending down of the judgment of the Court. JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR, with whom JUSTICE KAGAN and JUSTICE JACKSON join, dissenting. In matters of life and death, it is best to proceed with caution. In this case, the Government took the opposite approach. It wrongfully deported one plaintiff to Guatemala, even though an Immigration Judge found he was likely to face torture there. Then, in clear violation of a court order, it deported six more to South Sudan, a nation the State Department considers too unsafe for all but its most critical personnel. An attentive District Court’s timely intervention only narrowly prevented a third set of unlawful removals to Libya. Rather than allowing our lower court colleagues to manage this high-stakes litigation with the care and attention
Aaron Reichlin-Melnick@reichlinmelnick.bsky.social · last yr.

Justice Sotomayor ends her dissent by saying the Supreme Court has permitted "thousands [to] suffer violence in farflung locales," an action which "rewards lawlessness" by the Trump administration. She says the Court has undermined the basic concept of Due Process under the law.

The Due Process Clause represents “the principle that ours is a government of laws, not of men, and that we submit ourselves to rulers only if under rules.” Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer, 343 U. S. 579, 646 (1952) (Jackson, J., concurring). By rewarding lawlessness, the Court once again undermines that foundational principle. Apparently, the Court finds the idea that thousands will suffer violence in farflung locales more palatable than the remote possibility that a District Court exceeded its remedial powers when it ordered the Government to provide notice and process to which the plaintiffs are constitutionally and statutorily entitled. That use of discretion is as incomprehensible as it is inexcusable. Respectfully, but regretfully, I dissent.
Aaron Reichlin-Melnick@reichlinmelnick.bsky.social · last yr.

Sotomayor's dissent is scathing. She accuses her colleagues of a gross abuse of discretion, saying they "interven[ed] to grant the Government emergency relief from an order it has repeatedly defied." She's right. The 6-justice majority is effectively endorsing contempt of court.

DHS v. D.V.D. Sotomayor, J, dissent. "... [T]his Court now intervenes to grant the Government emergency relief from an order it has repeatedly defied. I cannot join so gross an abuse of the Court’s equitable discretion."
Garrett M. Graff@vermontgmg.bsky.social · last yr.

By the way, one of the reasons it’s terrible all of these people lie all of the time about meaningless things is it makes it impossible to believe them when they’re talking about incredibly consequential things.

Hugo Lowell@hugolowell.bsky.social · last yr.

Pete Hegseth repeated claims by Trump that US strikes had completely destroyed Iran’s nuclear facilities even as the Pentagon acknowledged it was too early to provide a full damage assessment @theguardian.com latest www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

Elizabeth N. Saunders@profsaunders.bsky.social · last yr.

Journalists: this thread has many, many people who can comment on different angles of the US attack on Iran. Contact them!

Elizabeth N. Saunders@profsaunders.bsky.social · last yr.

🧵IR scholars, let's start a thread of what we know that's relevant for a US attack on Iran. Won't change any minds, but might help us teach this crisis and learn new angles. Please add (incl. your own work!), forgive/correct omissions. Nobody can cover everything and it's great to find new work. 1/?

Chris Murphy@chrismurphyct.bsky.social · last yr.

Donald Trump, a weak and dangerously reckless president, has put the United States on a path to a war in the Middle East that the country does not want, the law does not allow, and our security does not demand.

Loren DeJonge Schulman@lorenraeds.bsky.social · last yr.

Trump is skipping over all potential checks on use of force. Intl law - no claim of self defense. US law - no AUMF, does not meet WPR criteria, Article 2 so stretched it’s tearing. Partisan congressional notification only. Intel and defense principals objected. Vast majority of Americans opposed. 1/