Political Science

Political Science at Brown University

The Political Science department enjoys a reputation for intellectual pluralism, creativity and research productivity.

Political Science is one of the largest and most dynamic concentrations at Brown. Undergraduates gain skill in critical thinking, empirical analysis, and normative inquiry, preparing them for leadership careers in the public, nonprofit and private sectors. Our doctoral program features close interaction with professors and offers state-of-the art training in American politics, comparative politics, international relations, and political theory.

The department is enriched by its close ties to key research centers, institutes, and programs at Brown, including the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs, the Center for Philosophy, Politics, and Economics, the Center for the Study of Race and Ethnicity in America, Modern Culture and Media, Cogut Institute for the Humanities, and Urban Studies.

Brown's community of graduate students, postdoctoral fellows, visiting scholars, and faculty members in political science is a close and collegial one.
Brown's Political Science faculty are deeply committed to excellence in both undergraduate teaching and graduate training.

Recent News

Harvard Magazine

A “Scholar’s Scholar”

“We were glad to admit her,” recalled Katherine Tate, assistant and then associate professor of government at Harvard from 1989 to 1993, a member of the department’s admissions committee. Among many talented applicants, “She soared,” Tate said recently, and “turned out to be a very talented student.”
The abstract for Patrick Heller and Ashutosh Varshney's paper states: "Research on democracy has shed much light on two kinds of democratic politics: patterns of voting and patterns of associational or movement politics. But there is growing recognition that in order to better understand the quality or depth of democracy, we need to move beyond this dualistic focus to better understand the everyday practices through which citizens can effectively wield their rights; these practices often diverge from the formal equality enshrined in laws and constitutions. We study this question through a large, unique sample survey carried out in a South Indian city. We find that effective citizenship is refracted through the institutional specificities of urban India and that, as a result, the poor access the state through political participation and the rich through particularistic connections to persons of influence. But unlike the conventional celebration of participation as a citizenship-deepening activity, we also find that a substantial part of participation is associated with forms of brokerage that compromise democratic citizenship."
Karra McCray Gibson (Brown University)

The New Congressional Black Caucus: Differentiating Divisions within the CBC

By investigating ideological heterogeneity among the members of the Congressional Black Caucus, this project seeks to understand the interaction between intersectional representation of individual members and the collective voice of the Congressional Black Caucus in Washington.

Contact Us

Political Science
Brown University

111 Thayer Street
Third Floor
Providence, RI 02912

Phone 401-863-2825
Fax 401-863-7018
brownupolisci@brown.edu

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