Khalilah L. Brown-Dean is Professor of Political Science and Associate Provost for Faculty Affairs at Quinnipiac University. She holds a B.A. in Government from The University of Virginia and a Ph.D. in Political Science from The Ohio State University. Previously she served as Senior Director for Inclusive Excellence at Quinnipiac where she oversaw campus wide efforts to ensure curricular, professional, co-curricular, and experiential offerings enhanced equity. She is Founder of the Inclusive Excellence Teaching Lab; an interdisciplinary cohort of scholars with a demonstrated commitment to, and interest in, issues of equity, diversity, and inclusion. Her scholarship centers the importance of identity in shaping access to democracy, justice, and representation with a particular emphasis on voting rights, civic engagement, and the politics of punishment. She is the author of Identity Politics in the United States (Polity Press 2019) and co-author with Ray Block, Jr. of Penn State University of a new project entitled Protesting Vulnerability: Race and Pandemic Politics (Cambridge University Press). Her scholarship appears in numerous journals, edited volumes, and popular outlets including a co-authored Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies report, “Fifty Years of the Voting Rights Act: The State of Race in Politics.” She has held elected and appointed positions in the American Political Science Association, the National Conference of Black Political Scientists, the Association for Ethnic Studies, and other professional organizations.
Statement of views: I am honored to be nominated for this opportunity to serve. I gave my first Annual Meeting presentation as an undergraduate fellow of the Ralph Bunche Summer Institute and have been active with the Association ever since. Bunche introduced me to the importance of building dedicated pipelines and programmatic commitments that create myriad opportunities for scholars trained in political science. As a member of the Council I will work to deepen our investment in the recruitment, retention, and promotion of scholars from diverse backgrounds. The ever-changing landscape of both politics and higher education demand that we evaluate our approaches to this evolution. How do we best prepare our members to successfully navigate this terrain while remaining rooted in the positive traditions that have sustained APSA for over 118 years? How do we make commitment investments in the long-term success of our members and partners that includes sustained interest in those working within and beyond the academy? How do the innovations made in response to COVID-19 guide how we will approach future conferences and commitments? Finally, how do we emphasize the “scholar” in public scholarship to empower members to leverage their expertise to enhance awareness, civic engagement, and meaningful change? I look forward to exploring these possibilities as a member of the Council.
Scott Desposato is Professor of Political Science and Simón Bolívar Chair of Latin American Studies at the University of California, San Diego. He co-chaired APSA’s Ad Hoc Committee on Human Subjects Research, which drafted the new Principles and Guidance to support ethical political science research. He was Director of Latin American Studies at UCSD, a Fulbright Scholar to Brazil, and a Harvard Academy Scholar. His core research interests include Latin American politics, democratic institutions, and voting behavior. Other recent work has examined the ethics of political science experiments and the long term impact of social movements.
He has been active in APSA and other associations, with service on APSA’s Ad-Hoc Committee on Human Subjects, the Committee on Professional Ethics, Right and Freedoms, as well as MPSA’s Committee on Professional Ethics and several editorial and advisory boards.
Statement of views: I am honored to be nominated for the APSA Council. My priorities include keeping costs low and making APSA membership and conferences affordable, continuing APSA’s commitment to intellectual and methodological diversity, promoting ethical and transparent research that respects the subjects and societies we study, and supporting the inclusion of all underrepresented groups.
I am also deeply concerned with the erosion of democratic institutions in many countries and believe that political scientists and APSA need to contribute their voices and research in defense of democracy.
Raymond Foxworth is Vice President of First Nations Development Institute and a Visiting Scholar at the University of New Mexico (2021-2022). At First Nations, Raymond conducts research on barriers and opportunities to Native American economic and community development. His community-engaged scholarship has focused on public opinion about Native Americans, Native American public opinion, policy barriers to healthy food access in Native American communities and persistent policy barriers to Native American private and nonprofit sector development. He also leads research efforts focused on unpacking the pathologies of philanthropy, focused on understanding why donors (philanthropy at large) continue to underinvest in poor and under resourced communities (including Native America communities) and how donor practices reinforce inequities for these communities.
Raymond is a proud first-generation college graduate and received his PhD from the University of Colorado in 2015. Raymond has an active research agenda focused on Indigenous politics in the U.S. and Latin America. His work, which has been published in Social Science Quarterly, Perspectives on Politics and Political Research Quarterly, has focused on issues of Indigenous representation, participation and economic development. In 2020, he received an APSA Indigenous Politics Diversity and Inclusion Research Advancement Award.
Statement of views: I am extremely honored to be nominated to serve on the APSA Council. If elected to serve on the APSA Council, I would continue to champion ways to make the discipline more inclusive – for scholars and for consumers of our research. I would also contribute to ongoing diversity, equity and inclusion efforts of APSA, with a focus on providing a welcoming environment for diverse voices and scholarship to be heard in our field. Finally, I would actively work to promote more community-engaged scholarships in the field.
I have worked with APSA representatives and other scholars to identify barriers to recruitment of Indigenous scholars in the field of political science. As a member of the APSA Council, I would continue to champion this work, with a goal of making our disciple more diverse, equitable and inclusive. Secondly, training as a political scientist and work experience in non-profits and policy has equipped me with skills and tools to be a valuable research partner with communities, tackling real-world issues that impact the lives of average citizens. As an APSA Council member, I would continue to advocate for ways that political scientists can use their skills and training to solve real-world problems that are important to communities across the globe.
Terri E. Givens studied international relations at Stanford University and completed her PhD in political science at UCLA in 2000. She began her career at the University of Washington and went on to the Government Department at the University of Texas at Austin, where she co-founded the Center for European Studies, and was Vice Provost for Undergraduate Curriculum and International Affairs. She became Provost at Menlo College in 2015, and in 2019 founded Brighter Higher Ed, a platform for professional development for higher education leaders. She is a prolific author, and her most recent book The Roots of Racism will be published by Bristol University Press in early 2022. She has been on a variety of APSA committees and with Luis Fraga co-chaired Dianne Pinderhughes’ presidential task force which produced the report “Political Science in the 21st Century.”
Statement of views: Higher education is facing ongoing political and financial challenges that are undermining support for tenured faculty, their research, and leaving our students with high levels of debt. In the wake of the pandemic, political science will need to monitor broader trends and ways that developments in online/remote learning and educational technology are impacting students and faculty. Changing demographics will impact the discipline in a variety of ways, but we need to be more proactive in supporting diversity of all kinds and creating a discipline that is preparing our students to be global citizens, understanding the inequalities that our society must address. My experience as a provost and leader will provide a unique perspective on these issues. I also believe that political scientists need to be more aware of the history of our discipline, including the role of leaders like Ralph Bunch and Merze Tate, to ensure that our students understand the origins of the discipline and how it impacts political science today.
Eileen M. Hunt is a political theorist and Professor of Political Science at Notre Dame. Her scholarly interests cover modern political thought, feminism, the family, rights, ethics of technology, and philosophy and literature. She has taught at Notre Dame since receiving her Ph.D. from Yale in 2001. Her books are Family Feuds: Wollstonecraft, Burke, and Rousseau on the Transformation of the Family (SUNY, 2006); Wollstonecraft, Mill, and Women's Human Rights (Yale, 2016); Mary Shelley and the Rights of the Child: Political Philosophy in "Frankenstein" (Penn Press, 2017); and Artificial Life After Frankenstein (Penn Press, 2020). She is an editor of Feminist Interpretations of Alexis de Tocqueville (Penn State Press, 2009); Reminiscences and Traditions of Boston by Hannah Mather Crocker (NEHGS, 2011); A Vindication of the Rights of Woman by Mary Wollstonecraft (Yale, 2014); The Wollstonecraftian Mind (Routledge, 2019); and the two-volume reference set Portraits of Wollstonecraft (Bloomsbury Philosophy, 2021). Her work has been supported by the American Council of Learned Societies (2015-16), the Notre Dame Institute for Advanced Study (2019), and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, Public Understanding of Science, Technology & Economics Program (2019-20). Her essays have appeared in Aeon Magazine, The Washington Post, The New York Times, The Chicago Tribune, Public Seminar, and The TLS.
Statement of views: As a political theorist and historian of political thought, I have been an advocate of methodological pluralism who considers constitutional democracy and equal rights to be governing concepts of the discipline of political science. It is crucial to train the next generation of political theorists to substantively engage with the other subfields in political science, in order to make clear the value of political theory for the wider discipline, and to better understand theories and practices of democracy and rights. Historically, the most creative and important work in political science has been done in a way that is radically interdisciplinary. The future of the APSA is rooted in its professional origins in the early twentieth century, with the rise of the social sciences alongside the modern humanistic disciplines of history, literature and languages, and philosophy. Substantively, political science and political theory have never mattered more than in the crisis-driven pandemic and presidential election year of 2020 to 2021. Going forward, political science and political theory must be ready to take up the task of clarifying why the study of ideas and practices of equal rights and democratic constitutionalism matter not only for the advancement of knowledge across disciplines, but also for the political goal of securing freedom and justice for each and all.
Mary McHugh is the Executive Director of Civic and Community Engagement in the Stevens Service Learning Center at Merrimack College. As a member of the college’s political science department for over 27 years, she has taught a variety of courses in US Politics and Political Institutions. She is the advisor to Pi Sigma Alpha and the Faculty Athletic Representative to the NCAA. McHugh received her BA from Colby College and her MA from Boston College. Her teaching and research interests include congress, the presidency, popular culture, civic engagement and service-learning. She is a contributing co-author to Teaching Civic Engagement: From Student to Active Citizen (with Russell Mayer), Teaching Civic Engagement Across the Disciplines (with Elizabeth Matto), and The Making of the Presidential Candidates 2020 (with Linda Beail and Lilly Goren). She has also authored chapters in Hatred of America’s Presidents: Personal Attacks on the White House from Washington to Trump, Women and the White House: Gender, Popular Culture, and Presidential Politics, and You’ve Come a Long Way Baby: Women, Politics, and Popular Culture. Recently, she contributed an article to the APSA Raise the Vote Campaign.
McHugh has been active in APSA throughout her career. She served on the executive committee of the Political Science Education section, as co-chair for Political Science Education Division for the 2019 APSA annual meeting and is currently a member of an APSA award committee. She is a regular participant at the APSA’s Teaching and Learning Conferences (serving as a track moderator in 2018 and 2020). She is also a member of the editorial board for the Journal of Political Science Education.
Statement of views: It is an honor to be nominated to serve on the APSA Council. Even though I have been a member of APSA for over 25 years, as someone who has worked at a smaller liberal arts institution, I never expected to be in this position, because of the type of institution where I work. As such, if elected, I would like to focus my term on making APSA more relevant and welcoming to the entire membership. As Higher Education faces the long-term effects of COVID19 and a fragile political environment, the association needs to prioritize and work collaboratively with members who come from a wide array of colleges, universities, and institutions outside of academia, all of which are venues where political scientists work. Our younger members and colleagues are also facing a very different job market than in the past. We should seek ways to promote affordable professional development opportunities, create additional time and space to talk about quality teaching and learning, and continue discussions of non-traditional career paths. Additionally, we need to integrate and increase the work we are doing in civic and political engagement more fully into all areas of the discipline as we respond to political events throughout the country and the world. Thus, I would like to focus my time and efforts on the Council on insuring that these areas of the discipline and the membership are represented within the organization.
Sara McLaughlin Mitchell is the F. Wendell Miller Professor of Political Science at the University of Iowa. She received her Ph.D. in Political Science at Michigan State University in 1997 and her B.S. degree in Economics and Political Science at Iowa State University in 1991. She is the author of six books and more than fifty journal articles and book chapters. She has received over 1.1 million dollars in external grants. Her areas of expertise include international conflict, political methodology, and gender issues in academia. She is the recipient of several major research awards from the Department of Defense, National Science Foundation, and the United States Agency for International Development. Professor Mitchell is co-founder of the Journeys in World Politics workshop, a mentoring workshop for junior women studying international relations. She received the Faculty Scholar Award (2007-2010), Collegiate Scholar Award (2011), and the Graduate College Outstanding Faculty Mentor Award (2012) from the University of Iowa, the Quincy Wright Distinguished Scholar Award (2015) from the International Studies Association, a distinguished alumni award from Iowa State University, and she served as President of the Peace Science Society.
Statement of views: I am very honored to be nominated for the APSA Council. As an APSA member for more than 25 years (yikes!), I have worked to promote gender equality in the organization and discipline more generally. I coauthored several articles with Vicki (Hesli) Claypool on gender disparities in rank, service loads, and salaries using APSA member survey data. I also worked with Michelle Dion and Jane Sumner to analyze gender gaps in citations and to understand why women are underrepresented in journals affiliated with APSA sections compared to section membership representation. I also co-founded the Journeys in World Politics program with Kelly Kadera to mentor women in international relations. I have been actively involved with the Visions in Methodology conferences to support women in political methodology. I also worked with leaders of the APSA political methodology section to improve gender representation and mentoring in the section. I served in various leadership positions in the International Studies Association to help address gender and diversity issues, and if elected as an APSA council member, I will bring this same energy to gender and diversity, equity, and inclusion issues in our association.
Costas Panagopoulos is Professor of Political Science and Chair of the Department of Political Science in the College of Social Sciences and Humanities at Northeastern University, where he was previously Director of Big Data and Quantitative Initiatives.
A leading expert on campaigns and elections, voting behavior, political psychology, campaign finance, and experimental research, Dr. Panagopoulos has been part of the Decision Desk team at NBC News since the 2006 election cycle. In 2020, he served on the APSA Presidential Task Force on Election Assistance. He is also editor of American Politics Research. Panagopoulos was previously Professor of Political Science at Fordham University, where he founded and directed the Center for Electoral Politics and Democracy and the graduate program in elections and campaign management. He was also adjunct professor of quantitative methods at Columbia University. In 2015-2016, Panagopoulos was visiting professor of political science and resident fellow at the Institution for Social and Policy Studies at Yale University. He was selected by the American Political Science Association as a Congressional Fellow in 2004-2005 and served in the office of then-Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY). He was a candidate for the Massachusetts state legislature in 1992.
Panagopoulos is author of over 100 scholarly articles that have appeared in leading journals, including the American Journal of Political Science and the Journal of Politics. He is also author, coauthor or editor of several books, including
Bases Loaded: How U.S. Presidential Campaigns Are Changing and Why It Matters (2020, Oxford University Press), Political Campaigns: Concepts, Context, and Consequences (2017, Oxford University Press) and A Citizen’s Guide to U.S. Elections (with Aaron Weinschenk) (2016, Routledge). Panagopoulos earned his A.B. in Government magna cum laude at Harvard University and his M.A. and Ph.D. in Politics at New York University.
Statement of views: I am honored to be nominated to serve on the APSA Council. This is a crucial time for our discipline and our association. While we are confronted simultaneously with some many challenges, these also present opportunities for our community to reinvigorate our efforts to promote social justice, diversity, equity and inclusion, to combat misinformation and shed light on truth in the political world, and to engage broadly and energetically with colleagues both within and outside of the academy. Robust dialogue and exchange between scholars, journalists, policymakers and elected officials are vital to sustaining, extending and strengthening the relevance and applicability of our scholarship and to solving the many, vexing social and political challenges we face. I believe the best solutions will emerge when ideas from our diverse perspectives are encouraged and debated, and APSA can play a central role in providing platforms and opportunities for such exchanges. There has arguably never been a time in APSA’s 122-year history when the need to leverage our expertise and to showcase the diverse voices of our discipline have been more essential, especially to help preserve and advance basic democratic principles and political institutions. I am committed to advocating for these priorities as a member of the Council.