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2007 APSA Annual Meeting Synopsis
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Grounded in APSA President Robert Axelrod’s task force on interdisciplinarity, attendees at the 103rd Annual Meeting in Chicago moved beyond disciplinary boundaries to explore “Political Science and Beyond.” Program Co-Chairs Elisabeth Gerber of the University of Michigan and David Lake of the University of California, San Diego worked close with the Program Committee, a 52-member team drawn from the APSA Organized Sections, to organize the many panels and plenary sessions.
Wednesday’s pre-convention professional day featured 20 short courses sponsored by the Organized Sections and Related Groups, with topics ranging from "Machine Politics" to "Britain After Blair." By Thursday the conference had officially begun, and after trips to the lively exhibition hall filled with political science publishers, plenary sessions, and panel discussions, scholars were welcomed by the president’s address and subsequent reception. Using his personal experience studying the intersections between political science and cancer research on tumors, President Axelrod got to the core of interdisciplinarity in his speech, “Can Political Science ‘Export’ to Other Disciplines as Well as We ‘Import’ from Them.” Thursday was also a day to recognize notable achievements in the profession at the Awards Luncheon and Ceremony, where Paula D. McClain, Frank P. Scioli, and Lee Sigelman were honored with the Frank J. Goodnow Award and over 140 people received awards from APSA and the Organized Sections for their books, dissertation, papers, and career achievements.
Many sessions emphasized creative forms of interdisciplinary collaboration that can contribute to a better understanding of U.S. and international politics. In special events, speakers from political science and other disciplines illuminated the challenges and the potentials of interdisciplinary activity. Friday brought distinguished lectures of two of the Award Ceremony’s honorees. Laurence E. Lynn, Jr., from Texas A&M University, gave the John Gaus Lecture on “New Frontiers of Public Administration: The Practice of Theory and the Theory of Practice.” Stanford University’s Lawrence Lessig gave the Ithiel de Sola Pool Lecture, titled, “Pool 2.0: Pool and Where we are with the Net.” Both speeches will appear in the January issue of PS: Political Science and Politics.
On Saturday, attendees of the APSA Annual Business Meeting had their chance to participate in the Association’s governance and witness the transition in leadership from Axelrod to President-Elect Dianne Pinderhughes.
In other highlights of the meeting, the APSA Teaching and Learning Committee sponsored the plenary session “Is American Political Science too Parochial?” This sparked a conversation with faculty across sub-disciplines about the intellectual state of political science. Also, Frans de Waal, author of Chimpanzee Politics, presented “Chimpanzee Politics: 25th Anniversary of a Machiavellian Exposé.
Working groups organized around specific areas of interest convened throughout the meeting. Each of these 17 groups focused on a specific topic, and participants attended corresponding panels, poster sessions, and plenaries and convened separately each day for a deeper discussion on the material. Universities and sections also organized a number of receptions and happy hours, including ones for graduate students and award-winning teachers.
Leading up to the meeting, job candidates and employers used APSA's eJobs Placement to help determine who would be interviewing at the meeting. At the Annual Meeting, APSA provided space and facilities for conducting interviews to 150 institutions and over 350 candidates.
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