2021 APSA Winners

Bruce Bueno de Mesquita (PhD 1971) received the SSIP Distinguished Scholar Award for his contributions to the scientific study of international processes.   This award was launched last year.  The first recipient was Jim Morrow.

Chinbo Chong (PhD 2019) and Tanika Raychaudhuri (BA 2014 ) received APSA’s Race & Ethnic Politics Best Paper Award of 2020 entitled “Group-based belief systems about the racial order: Racial stereotypes and Asian American partisan identification”

Cathy J. Cohen (PhD 1993) received the Hanes Walton, Jr. Career Award in recognition of a political scientist whose lifetime of distinguished scholarship has made significant contributions to our understanding of racial and ethnic politics and illuminates the conditions under which diversity and intergroup tolerance thrive in democratic societies.  

Lauren Davenport (BA 2005) received the Emerging Scholar Award from the Elections, Public Opinion, and Voting Behavior section. Recognizing a top scholar in the field who is within 10 years of the Ph.D.  She joins these previous UM recipients: Yanna Krupnikov (PhD 2009), Cindy Kam (PhD 2003), Ted Bradner, Adam Berinsky (PhD 2000), and Skip Lupia. 

Mandi Eatough (current PhD Student) received the CQ Press Award for the best paper presented on Legislative Studies at APSA 2020.  She joins this great UM group: Stuart Soroka, Dan Magleby (PhD  2011), Pam Clouser McCann (PhD 2011), and Liz Gerber (Ph D 1991)

Edgar Franco Vivanco received the Heinz Eulau Award for the article “Killing in the Slums: Social Order, Criminal Governance and Police Violence in Rio de Janeiro."  The Eulau Award honors the best articles published during the previous calendar year in the American Political Science Review and Perspectives on Politics. Edgar joins a fabulous group of UM Eulau Award winners: Kathy Cramer (PhD 2000), Noah Nathan, Lars-Erik Cederman (twice!) (PhD 1994), David Lazer (PhD 1996), Liz Perry (PhD 1978), Liz Gerber (1991), and John Jackson.

Rick Hall received the Samuel Eldersveld Career Achievement Award from the Political Organizations and Parties section of APSA! The Eldersveld Award recognizes a scholar whose lifetime professional work has made an outstanding contribution to the field. Professor Hall also received the APSA Public Policy Section’s Excellence in Mentoring Award.   This award was established to recognize sustained efforts by senior scholars to encourage and facilitate the careers of emerging political scientists in the field of public policy. 

Mai Hassan received the Robert A. Dahl Award for her book, Regime Threats and State Solutions (Cambridge, 2020).  The Dahl Award honors an untenured scholar who has produced scholarship of the highest quality on the subject of democracy.   (Of course, Mai is now Associate Professor of Political Science.)

Nathan Kalmoe (PhD 2012)  received two awards -- the ISPP David Sears award for best book on mass politics (co-winning with LaFleur!) and the Leon Epstein outstanding book award from the APSA section on political organizations and parties, for his book, With Ballots and Bullets: Partisanship and Violence in the American Civil War (Cambridge, 2020).  Previous UM recipients of the Leon Epstein Award include Frank Baumgartner (PhD 1986). Ken Kollman (twice!), Phil Converse, Warren Miller, Donald Stokes, and Angus Campbell.

Christina Kinane (PhD 2019) received the E.E. Schattschneider Award for the best dissertation in American politics for her dissertation, "Control without Confirmation: The Politics of Vacancies in Presidential Appointments." She joins a great group of UM Schattschneider Award winners: Rachel Potter (PhD 2014), Adam Levine (PhD 2010), Rob Mickey, David King (PhD 1992), Doug Dion (PhD 1991), Laura Stoker (PhD 1990), Mark Peterson (PhD 1985), Paul Light (PhD 1980), and Michael Robinson (PhD 1972). 

Yanna Krupnikov's (PhD 2009) book, Independent Politics:  How American Disdain for Politics Leads to Political Inaction (Cambridge, 2016), received the Philip E. Converse Award for an outstanding book on public opinion, published more than five years ago. Here are the fabulous previous UM winners of the Converse Award: Tali Mendelberg (PhD, 1994, twice!), Don Kinder, and, then, the first recipients of this award were Angus Campbell, Phil Converse, Warren Miller, and Don Stokes.

Michael Lerner (PhD 2021) received an honorable mention for the Walter Lippmann Best Published Article Award for his article, “Investigating the Generation and Spread of Numerical Misinformation: A Combined Eye Movement Monitoring and Social Transmission Approach.”

Skip Lupia received the Charles E. Merriam Award. This award recognizes a person whose published work and career represent a significant contribution to the art of government through the application of social science research. First presented in 1975, the award was revived in 1995 and is presented biennially.    Skip joins another great group of UM Merriam Award winners: Bob Axelrod and Tom Mann (PhD  1977). 

Mara Cecilia Ostfeld and Nicole Yadon (PhD 2020) received the award for the Best Article in Political Behavior published during 2020 for “The New White Flight?: The Effects of Political Appeals to Latinos on White Democrats.” Mara won this award last year, as well, along with Antoine Banks (PhD 2009), Ismail White (PhD 2005), and Brian McKenzie (PhD  2004).

Chinnu Parinandi (PhD 2015) received the APSA State Politics Section award for the best article about US state politics or policy published in the last year, for his AJPS article, "Policy Inventing and Borrowing among State Legislatures."  

Tanika Raychaudhuri  (BA  2014)  received the 2020 APSA Best Poster Award for her poster, "Group Threat or Contact? The Effects of Local Immigration Primes on Policy Views."

J. David Singer received the J David Singer Data Innovation Award for the Militarized Interstate Disputes Data.   

Kimberly Smith (PhD 1997) was awarded the Lynton Keith Caldwell Prize for her book, The Conservation Constitution, The conservation movement and constitutional change 1870-1930.   The prize is given for the best book on environmental politics and policy published in the past three years. Barry Rabe received this award in 2005.

LaFleur Stephens (PhD 2013) received the APSA Ralph Bunche award for the best book on ethnic or cultural pluralism, Race to the Bottom:   How Racial Appeals Work in American Politics (Chicago, 2020).   LaFleur also just won the ISPP David Sears book award for best book on mass politics. She joins UM Ralph Bunche recipients Davin Phoenix (PhD 2015), Julie Novkov (PhD 1998), and Brian McKenzie (PhD 2004).

Ismail White (PhD  2005) won *the* APSA best book award (formerly the Woodrow Wilson award) for his co-authored book, Steadfast Democrats:   How Social Forces Shape Black Political Behavior (Princeton, 2020).   He joins this great UM group: Kristina Miler (PhD  2003), Tali Mendelberg (PhD 1994), Phil Converse, and Sam Eldersveld.

Nicole Yadon (PhD 2020) and Mara Ostfeld will receive the award for the best paper in Race and Ethnic Politics (for a paper that is now coming out in Social Forces); this is also the award that Chinbo and Tanika received. 

Kirill Zhirkov (PhD 2020) won the best dissertation prize in political psychology from the International Society of Political Psychology (ISPP). Carly Wayne (PhD 2019) won last year.