Elizabeth F. Cohen

Elizabeth F. Cohen is an American political scientist. She is the Maxwell Professor of political science at Boston University. She is a political theorist who studies citizenship, immigration, and value of time in politics.

Education Cohen attended Swarthmore College, graduating with a B.A. degree in Philosophy and Sociology. She then attended graduate school at Yale University, where she earned an M.A., an M.Phil., and a Ph.D. in political science in 2003. In Semi‐citizenship in Democratic Politics, Cohen studies the idea that people can be only partially citizens, by being granted only some of the rights of citizens. She examines the different types of semi-citizens, splitting their rights into two major categories: autonomous rights, which are useful in any political context, and relative rights, such as the right to property, which are useful only in some political arrangements.

In 2018, Cohen published the book The Political Value of Time: Citizenship, Duration, and Democratic Justice. The Political Value of Time studies how time shapes and is incorporated into politics, like the relationship between space and politics that is studied in the field of political geography. Cohen shows that time is embedded into many of the most fundamental processes in democratic politics, such as the 18 years that it takes for a person to be able to vote in many countries, and the 3 to 5-year span that is a common waiting time for naturalization of new citizens.

Cohen was also the coauthor of the 2019 book Citizenship with Cyril A. Ghosh.

In addition to her scholarly writing, Cohen has written op-eds for numerous American newspapers, magazines, and websites. Her work has been discussed in the New York Times by Charles M. Blow, and in New York Magazine. She has also spoken in university and civic settings throughout North America and Western Europe.

Cohen was an Associate Editor of the American Journal of Political Science from 2019 to 2023.

Selected publications