Robert S. Jansen

Robert Jansen is a comparative-historical sociologist with substantive interests in politics, culture, collective memory, and the built environment. His first book, Revolutionizing Repertoires, was a study of the historical emergence of populist mobilization in early twentieth century Peru. In this work, Jansen developed a practice-based understanding of populism and elaborated a new approach to explaining “situated political innovation” that is rooted in American pragmatist theories of action. His current book project, Materializing Memory, examines the emergence and institutionalization of historic preservationist movements, ideas, and practices in the United States, from the early nineteenth century through the present. Jansen is also working (with Andrew Deener, UCSB) to elaborate a sociological approach to the study of large-scale sociotechnical infrastructures, with a focus on infrastructural development, resilience, and change. In early articles, he demonstrated the “path dependence” of political reputations and showed how physical environments can both enable and constrain intersubjectivity-sustaining practices.

Jansen received his PhD from UCLA and was a junior fellow in the Michigan Society of Fellows before formally joining Michigan’s sociology department in 2012. Since that time, he has regularly taught a graduate seminar on “Professional Writing for Sociologists,” as well as “Introduction to Sociology” at the undergraduate level (among other offerings). He has also served as Associate Director and then Director of Graduate Studies (2018-21). His scholarship has been recognized with awards from various sections of the American Sociological Association, including the Comparative-Historical Section’s Theda Skocpol Dissertation Award and the Theory Section’s Theory Prize. He is currently serving as Chair-Elect of the Comparative-Historical Sociology section of the American Sociological Association.