Clifford Bob's research interests include social movements, ethnic politics, globalization, and human rights with a special interest in the developing world. He teaches courses on these topics, as well as introductory and advanced courses in comparative politics. Dr. Bob has worked as a corporate litigator in a New York City law firm, taught law at the National University of Singapore, and received research support from the Social Science Research Council, the Albert Einstein Institution, and the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs of the John F. Kennedy School of Government 

Clifford Bob's book, The Marketing of Rebellion: Insurgents, Media, and International Activism (Cambridge, 2005), has won three prizes, including 2007 Best Book of the International Studies Association. It develops a sophisticated theory and comparative analysis of social movements in Nigeria and Mexico to understand why some gain international support, while others don't. Based on 60 interviews and other sources, his focus is on the links between insurgent organizations and NGOs. He gives agency to insurgents as they seek NGO support in various ways, arguing in a public sociology mode that this research is of value to NGOs and international insurgents.

Forthcoming from the University of Pennsylvania Press is an edited volume, Rights on the Rise: The Struggle for New Human Rights, featuring his own work on the human rights of dalit untouchables, and chapters on LGBT persons, disabled people's rights, female genital mutilation, persons living with HIV/AIDS, and war orphans.

A major second book in progress, Globalizing the Right-Wing: Conservative Activism and World Politics, looks at struggles around gun control, family policy, and genetically-modified (GM) food, and the clash between advocates on both sides of these questions. The goal again is to tease out why some movements succeed and others fail, this time in direct competition with each other. A key finding is that global civil society is more conflictive than many scholars have argued.