Alex Diamond

Visit Dr. Alex Diamond's Person Website

Bio:

As ethnographer, educator, photographer, and documentary filmmaker, he focuses on understanding how political, economic, and environmental transformation connect through people's lives. Whether studying politicians and coca farmers in Colombia or marijuana farmers and dispensary owners in Oklahoma, he uses a deep engagement with people's lives to provide a fresh perspective on longstanding debates related to peace, politics, and social deviance: What kinds of drug economies emerge from different configurations of economic and political relations? How are power, crime, violence, and corrupt practices (re)produced in community life? How can we establish peace, social justice, and state authority? He has published articles in leading peer-reviewed journals like Social Problems, Qualitative Sociology, Sociological Forum, and Revista Maguaré and his book, Governing the Excluded, is under contract with University of Chicago Press. He has also written a dozen public articles on Colombian politics in Spanish and English for outlets like El Espectador, the North American Congress on Latin America, Jacobin, and Colombia Reports. He is the co-founder and co-editor (with Sneha Annavarapu) of the website and podcast Ethnographic Marginalia, which provides a space for reflection on and discussion of ethnographic methods and experiences. Along with written articles, he draws heavily on photography, and is co-director of the documentary film titled "An Uncomfortable Peace."

 

Select Works:

Books

 Governing the Excluded: Rural Livelihoods Beyond Coca in Colombia’s Peace Laboratory, was published by the University of Chicago Press in 2026. A Spanish translation, ¿Quién Gobierna a los Excluidos? El Sustento Rural Más Allá de la Coca en el Laboratorio de Paz de Colombia, was published by the Universidad del Rosario Press in Colombia.

Peer-Reviewed Articles and Chapters