About Me
Kyaw Hsan Hlaing (ကျော်ဆန်းလှိုင်) is a Ph.D. student in Political Science at Cornell University and a 2024 recipient of the Paul & Daisy Fellowships for New Americans. He primarily studies comparative politics with a focus on Regime Changes, Political violence, Contentious Politics, Authoritarianism, Democratic Backsliding, Political Culture, and Rebel Politics.
Before enrolling at Cornell, he resumed his undergraduate studies at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa in January 2023—following a seven-year hiatus from his studies at the Yangon University of Distance Education at Sittwe University (Branch)—and graduated summa cum laude in August 2024 with a B.A. in Asian Studies. Prior to his academic pursuits, Kyaw Hsan worked as an independent journalist and analyst, covering armed conflict, military coup, protests, and human rights violations for a range of international media outlets, including TIME Magazine, the Los Angeles Times, Foreign Policy, The Diplomat Magazine, and Al Jazeera.
A former contributing writer for Pulitzer Center, he was one of the winners of the 2021 Human Rights Press Awards (Commentary) and the 2021 Sigma Delta Chi Awards (Foreign Correspondence) from the Society of Professional Journalist (SPJ), as well as a finalist for the 2021 Society of Publisher in Asia (SOPA) awards for the Excellence in Opinion Writing. He has been invited to speak at Yale, George Washington, and American University, the University of Hong Kong, among others, sharing insights on Rakhine and Myanmar based on his on-the-ground experiences.
Reach out at kh827@cornell.edu
