Matías Dewey is a sociologist and Associate Professor of Latin American Studies at the University of St. Gallen. He received a postdoctoral scholarship from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation and worked as a senior researcher at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies in Cologne between 2011 and 2020. In 2020, he habilitated in Sociology at the University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany. Matias Dewey’s research focuses on informal and illegal economies from the perspective of economic and political sociology. He has conducted extensive field research on the relationship between illegal economies, politics and the state with special focus on the market for stolen cars and car parts, the market for counterfeit products, the trade in illicit drugs and the phenomenon of child sexual abuse material. His publications appeared in prestigious publishing companies and journals such as Socio-Economic Review, Regulation & Governance, Current Sociology, Latin American Research Review, Latin American Politics and Society and Journal of Latin American Studies.