News

Political science students are invited to help celebrate the 10th anniversary of the unit’s founding with a special student-oriented event from 4:30-6:30 p.m. Oct. 18 in the Classroom and Office Building 2, Room 390. The event gives students the opportunity to meet with their faculty members — who...

More timely research, as Professor Courtenay Conrad's paper "Threat Perception and American Support for Torture" has just been published in Political Behavior (FirstView). Congratulations to Prof. Conrad and her co-authors! The paper presents theoretical and empirical evidence about...

Professor Alexander Theodoridis' paper "Disputed Ownership: Parties, Issues, and Traits in the Minds of Voters" has just been published in Political Behavior. Congratulations Prof. Theodoridis and co-author! The paper proposes two theoretical ways in which "ownership" of...

Considering that the United States spends about $3.3 billion on United Nations-related activity each year, including peacekeeping — and President Donald Trump has proposed a 40 percent cut in that spending — this seems like a good time for U.S. policy makers to have a clear understanding of how the...

Some wonderful news for UC Merced Political Science! Professors Courtenay Conrad and Nathan Monroe have just been awarded National Science Foundation funding to support their project "Process Matters: Legislative Procedure in the United Nations General Assembly." Congratulations...

Distracted or mentally taxed voters across America are less likely to vote for candidates of color, a new paper indicates. Through a series of mock election experiments, UC Merced Professor Jessica Trounstine, graduate student Kau Vue and two colleagues demonstrate that voters often rely on racial...

Professor Melissa Sands' paper "Exposure to Inequality Affects Support for Redistribution" has been doubly recognized as both the Best Paper in Political Psychology, and the Best Paper in Public Policy, presented at the American Political Science Association...

UC Merced Political Science is delighted to announce three new tenure-track Assistant Professors who will join the faculty on July 1st, 2017. Their appointments will further build the teaching and research profile of the university.   Adi Dasgupta joins UC Merced from Stanford University,...

Prof. Tom Hansford, graduate student Chanita Intawan, and Prof. Steve Nicholson wrote a blog post for Political Behavior, about their recent publication titled “Snap Judgment: Implicit Perceptions of a (Political) Court.”

Prof. Matthew Hibbing published a post entitled, "Satisfaction with public policy decisions is dependent on the racial composition of decision-makers, not only on the decisions themselves," on the USAPP Blog of the London School of Economics and Political Science.

Prof. Jessica Weeks of the University of Wisconsin will present her paper entitled "How and why does public opinion affect foreign policy in democracies?" on May 10th in our final seminar talk of Spring 2017.

The newest campus in the University of California system, UC Merced is a campus that attracts leaders — individuals who enjoy the challenge of paving the way for others to follow — and the Class of 2017 is no different. On May 13 and 14, the campus community will celebrate more than undergraduate...

Political science undergraduate student Eddie Lucero has been selected as a recipient of the School of Social Sciences, Humanities and Arts (SSHA) Outstanding Student Award.

Professor Elizabeth Maggie Penn of the University of Chicago gave a talk entitled "Does Representation Induce Polarization? A Theory of Choosing Representatives" on Wednesday, April 26th, as part of our understanding politics speaker series.

Graduate student Tessa Provins' paper, "Compensation, Opportunity, and Information: A Comparative Analysis of Legislative Nonresponse in the American States" (with David Fortunato), was accepted for publication in Political Research Quarterly.

Professor Jennifer Merolla of UC Riverside gave a talk on her book, Framing Immigrants: News Coverage, Public Opinion, and Policy (with Chris Haynes and S. Karthick Ramakrishnan), today as part of the Understanding Politics Speaker Series.

Professors Courtenay Conrad and Emily Ritter published a post, "A Trump moratorium on international treaties could roll back human rights — here at home," on the Washington Post's Monkey Cage blog.

Professor Tom Hansford, graduate student Chanita Intawan, and Professor Steve Nicholson's paper, “Snap Judgment: Implicit Perceptions of a (Political) Court,” has been accepted for publication in Political Behavior.

Professor Courtenay Conrad's paper, "Torture and the Limits of Democratic Institutions" (with Daniel W. Hill, Jr. and Will Moore), has been accepted for publication in the Journal of Peace Research.

Brad LeVeck's paper, "The Democratic Peace and the Wisdom of Crowds" (with Neil Narang), has been accepted by the International Studies Quarterly.