The American Academy of Political and Social Science

Policy Makers & Businesses Need Reliable Information and Data: The Impact of Falling Response Rates to Social Surveys and What Can Be Done.  Sponsored by Senator Jay Rockefeller and Congressmen Chaka Fattah and Charles Dent. Friday, April 26, 10:00 AM to 11:30 AM, Capitol Visitors Center room SVC 209-08 Organized by AAPSS in collaboration with the Annie E Casey Foundation, the Russell Sage foundation, Sage publications and the NRC’s Committee on National Statistics, the briefing reviewed the state of survey research and its role in the federal statistical system, assessed the nonresponse challenge and discussed alternate approaches for providing…

William Julius Wilson, the Lewis P. and Linda L. Geyser University Professor at Harvard University, has been named the winner of the 2013 Daniel Patrick Moynihan Prize.  He will receive the prize on Thursday, May 9, in Washington DC, at the Academy’s annual gala dinner at the Newseum.  The same day, in Washington, Wilson will deliver the inaugural Daniel Patrick Moynihan Lecture on Social Science and Public Policy. “Bill Wilson is one of the most influential social scientists of the twentieth century and, arguably, one of the great American scholars of our time,” said AAPSS President Douglas S. Massey.…

The Academy has selected four scholar/public servants to become Fellows in 2013. A small group of Fellows is inducted each year in recognition of their scholarly contributions to the social sciences, their efforts to communicate that scholarship to audiences beyond their own disciplines, and their commitment to improving public policy with research. The four 2013 Fellows are: Dr. Norman Bradburn, a social psychologist whose work has focused on psychological well-being and assessments of quality of life, particularly through the use of large-scale surveys. He is the Tiffany and Margaret Blake Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus at the University of Chicago and Senior Fellow…

  AAPSS Fellow James S. Jackson has been elected as the next president of the Consortium of Social Science Associations. Jackson, Director of the Institute for Social Research at the University of Michigan, begins his two-year term on January 1, 2013, succeeding AAPSS Fellow Ken Prewitt.

AAPSS Board Member and Fellow Ken Prewitt has co-authored (with Thomas Schwandt and Miron Straf) Using Science as Evidence in Public Policy, published by National Academies Press. “This has been the most difficult professional task I've undertaken,” said Prewitt of what it took to bring together the relatively six-inch report. In it, Prewitt “investigates why scientific evidence is important to policy making and argues that an extensive body of research on knowledge utilization has not led to any widely accepted explanation of what it means to use science in public policy. [The report] identifies the gaps in our understanding and…

AAPSS Fellow Sheldon Danziger, the recipient of an AAPSS Fellows conference grant, will host a symposium on January 17 and 18, 2013 on the effects of the Great Recession. Three years after the official end the Great Recession, the unemployment rate remains high, and the effects of the recession on workers, families and children are still unfolding. The conference will result in the November 2013 publication of a volume of The ANNALS. 

In October, the Academy mourned the loss of Fellow Andrew Brimmer. Brimmer, an economist, was a Harvard professor, Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Economic Affairs, and the first African American member of the Federal Reserve Board. Brimmer was remembered in this New York Times piece.

In June, the Academy joined colleagues worldwide in mourning the loss of Elinor Ostrom. The distinguished political scientist, AAPSS Fellow and Nobel laureate was remembered in this obituary in the New York Times.

Many US workers are faced with the undesirable choice between meeting the demands of work and the needs of their families. Special editors Kathleen Christensen and Barbara Schneider took on the topic in depth in the November 2011 volume of the ANNALS, making it clear that there is a sizable and increasing mismatch between the needs of modern families and the structure of employment in contemporary America. For those adults who need and want to work, but who also have significant family responsibilities, flexibility in the time, timing, and location of work provides one way to realign the structure of…

AAPSS Fellow Dr. Felton (Tony) Earls took the stage at Saint Joseph’s University in Philadelphia, PA, to present his research on violence, child rights, and public health.  On Wednesday, September 28, 2011, Earls spoke to a full room that included Philadelphia School District Superintendent Leroy Nunery, Deputy Mayor of Public Safety Everett Gillison, and University of Pennsylvania professor John DiIulio, the former head of the White House's office of faith-based initiatives.  Earls’ talk was based on two large-scale research projects that, together, led to the January 2011 issue of The Annals of the American Academy…