PhD Portfolio

Amarachi
Maduji

PhD Student · Biden School of Public Policy & Administration
University of Delaware

A nascent academic living at the intersection of public policy, public administration, and social policy. I am deeply curious about how the criminal justice system impacts housing stability and what that means for people's lives when these two worlds collide. I am also interested in workforce development initiatives for this group.

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Amarachi Maduji

Background

About Me

Hi, I'm Amarachi, a first-year PhD student at the Biden School of Public Policy and Administration at the University of Delaware.

I spend most of my time thinking about housing instability and homelessness among justice-involved individuals. Specifically, how the systems we've built shape who gets to have a stable home after contact with the criminal justice system. I live at the intersection of public policy, public administration, and social policy, and I'm genuinely fascinated by the ways institutions and power interact to produce the outcomes we see today.

When I'm not buried in academic journals, you can usually find me tucked in a corner somewhere with a comic book, or genuinely cackling at Abbott Elementary. I'm early in this journey and I'm glad you're here for it. If anything I'm working on resonates with you, let's connect.

Institution
University of Delaware
Biden School of Public Policy & Administration
Current Role
Graduate Research Assistant
Delaware Department of Labor
Research Focus
Housing & Reentry Policy
Justice-Involved Populations
Year
First Year PhD Student
2025 – Current

Scholarship

Publications & Writing Samples

Below is a mix of published work and essays written during my PhD coursework. I've included these essays as a record of my evolving thinking.

Published2024
Defining the Care Economy in New Jersey

A policy report analyzing the structure, challenges, and workforce dynamics of New Jersey's care economy.

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Analytical Essay
A Tale of Two Disciplines: Welfare Retrenchment and Carceral Expansion

Drawing on Soss et al.'s Disciplining the Poor, this essay evaluates the U.S. welfare system through Stuart White's framework of fair reciprocity — arguing that neoliberal paternalism transforms welfare from a social right into a mechanism of racialized poverty governance.

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Analytical Essay
The Hollowed State and Housing Policy: Landlords as Poverty Governors

This essay examines how the devolution of housing assistance to the private market transforms landlords into quasi-state actors who exercise disciplinary power over low-income tenants — situating these dynamics within theories of the "hollow state," collaborative governance, and marketization.

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Analytical Essay
Debt as Disciplinary Governance: A Foucauldian Analysis of Financial Control

Applying Foucault's theories of disciplinary power to criminal legal financial obligations (CLFOs), child support debt, and high-cost credit, this essay argues that U.S. financial policy functions as a mechanism of social control that surveils, classifies, and disciplines poor and marginalized communities.

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Annotated Analysis
Stigma, Visibility, and the Housing-Justice Nexus: Engaging Goffman

Engaging Goffman's Stigma: Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity, this analysis explores how stigma operates as a socially constructed system of exclusion — with particular attention to the ways welfare recipients, people experiencing homelessness, and justice-involved individuals navigate discreditable versus discredited identities.

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Curriculum Vitae

Professional Resume

Click below to view or download my current CV, detailed with my research experience at the University of Delaware and beyond.

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Get In Touch

Contact

I welcome collaborations, conversations, and questions about my research. Whether you're a researcher, practitioner, policy professional, or just curious, I'd love to connect.

linkedin.com/in/amarachimaduji acmaduji@udel.edu