Johan Skytte Prize Awarded to Robert Putnam APSA Press Release

April 25, 2006: For Immediate Release
Contact: Bahram Rajaee, (202) 483-2512

2006 Johan Skytte Prize Awarded to Robert Putnam

Washington, DC--The Skytte Foundation at Uppsala University, Sweden, has awarded the Johan Skytte Prize in Political Science for 2006 to Professor Robert Putnam (Harvard University) for his path-breaking research on the theory of social capital.

Professor Putnam ranks among the most famous and influential political scientists in the world today. He became internationally known with the book Making Democracy Work (1993), using the concept of social capital to explain the difference in political culture between Southern and Northern Italy. In Bowling Alone (2000) Professor Putnam analysed the collapse of social capital in the US but also suggested ways to vitalise it.

The Skytte Prize was established in 1994 from the donation made in 1622 by Johan Skytte, a member of the Swedish government and Chancellor of Uppsala University. Consisting of an award of $50,000, the prize is one of the largest and most prestigious in political science. Earlier winners include noted political scientists Robert Dahl (1995), Juan Linz (1996), Arend Lijphart (1997), Alexander George (1998), Elinor Ostrom (1999), Fritz Scharpf (2000), Brian Barry (2001), Sidney Verba (2002), Hanna Pitkin (2003), Jean Blondel (2004), and Robert Keohane (2005).  Annual nominations are made from around the world to a prize committee at Uppsala University by November 30. The official decision is made by the Skytte Foundation.

The Skytte Prize will be awarded to Professor Putnam in a ceremony in Uppsala on September 30, 2006.

For more on the Johan Skytte Prize in Political Science, see the following:

• www.statsvet.uu.se/prize/  
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johan_Skytte_Prize_in_Political_Science 

# # #

The American Political Science Association (est. 1903) is the leading professional organization for the study of political science and has over 14,000 members in 80 countries. For more information about political science research visit the APSA's media website, www.politicalsciencenews.org.