She specializes in prison reform in the United States, the history of American feminist activism, and the politics of India.
The book studies the conditions under which nativist ideas can be organized into coherent political movements, using the case of the Hindu nationalist Shiv Sena Party in 1960s India.
[5] From 2001 to 2002, Katzenstein was the recipient of a Russell Sage Foundation grant to study how federal government policy in the US has impacted the growth of prisons.
[6] The study included the effects of policies such as mandatory minimum sentencing laws for the possession of certain drugs, or restricting access to Pell grants.
[6] Volumes that Katzenstein co-edited include Beyond Zero Tolerance; Discrimination and the Culture of the US Military, with Judith Reppy (1999), and Social Movements in India: Poverty, Power, and Politics, with Raka Ray (2005).