José Miguel Cruz is director of research at the Kimberly Green Latin American and Caribbean Center at Florida International University. He holds a Ph.D. in Political Science from Vanderbilt University, a master’s degree in public policy in Latin America from the University of Oxford and a Bachelor’s degree in Psychology from the Central American University of El Salvador (UCA). Dr. Cruz was also the director of the Public Opinion University Institute at the UCA from 1993 to 2006 and has served as a consultant for many regional institutions and international cooperation agencies. Dr. Cruz is a researcher on issues of security, violence, youth gangs, political culture, and democratization.