American Academy of Political and Social Science
Encyclopedia
The American Academy of Political and Social Science was founded in 1889 to promote progress in the social sciences. Sparked by Professor Edmund J. James
and drawing from members of the faculty of the University of Pennsylvania
, Swarthmore College
, and Bryn Mawr College
, the Academy sought to establish communication between scientific thought and practical effort. The goal of its founders was to foster, across disciplines, important questions in the realm of social sciences
, and to promote the work of those whose research aimed to address important social problems
. Today the AAPSS is headquartered at the Annenberg Public Policy Center
in Philadelphia and aims to continue to offer interdisciplinary perspectives on important social issues.
.
Membership was open and inclusive with an emphasis on educated professionals; even from the its establishment, women were permitted to obtain membership. The Academy's members have included not only academicians
, but also distinguished public servants
such as Herbert Hoover
and Frances Perkins
. Perhaps for this reason, it is not a member of the American Council of Learned Societies
. Nevertheless, in 2000 the Academy began selecting and installing Fellows in recognition of social scientists who have made outstanding contributions to the field. Since 2008 the Academy has presented an annual Daniel Patrick Moynihan Prize to recognize public officials and scholars who have used social science and informed judgment to advance the public good
, William Howard Taft
, Theodore Roosevelt
, W. E. B. Du Bois, Margaret Mead
, Thurgood Marshall
, Mahatma Gandhi
, and Booker T. Washington
. More recently, authors and editors have included Henry Louis Gates Jr., Richard A. Clarke
, Joseph S. Nye, Jr. and William Julius Wilson
. The Annals has been published by SAGE Publications
since 1981. In 2003 it changed from its traditional plain orange cover to a more graphic cover containing photographs.
'The Annals' has covered topics ranging from “The World’s Food” (November, 1917) to “The Motion Picture and its Economic and Social Aspects” (November 1926), “Women in the Modern World” (May, 1929), “America and Japan” (May, 1941), “Urban Renewal Goals and Standards (March, 1964), and “The Global Refugee Problem” (May, 1982). More recent volumes have focused on such topics as “Confronting the Specter of Nuclear Terrorism,” and “The Moynihan Report Revisited: Lessons and Reflections after Four Decades."
.
Edmund J. James
Edmund Janes James was an American academic, president of the University of Illinois from 1904 to 1920, and the primary founder of, first president of, and first editor for the American Academy of Political and Social Science....
and drawing from members of the faculty of the University of Pennsylvania
University of Pennsylvania
The University of Pennsylvania is a private, Ivy League university located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Penn is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States,Penn is the fourth-oldest using the founding dates claimed by each institution...
, Swarthmore College
Swarthmore College
Swarthmore College is a private, independent, liberal arts college in the United States with an enrollment of about 1,500 students. The college is located in the borough of Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, 11 miles southwest of Philadelphia....
, and Bryn Mawr College
Bryn Mawr College
Bryn Mawr College is a women's liberal arts college located in Bryn Mawr, a community in Lower Merion Township, Pennsylvania, ten miles west of Philadelphia. The name "Bryn Mawr" means "big hill" in Welsh....
, the Academy sought to establish communication between scientific thought and practical effort. The goal of its founders was to foster, across disciplines, important questions in the realm of social sciences
Social sciences
Social science is the field of study concerned with society. "Social science" is commonly used as an umbrella term to refer to a plurality of fields outside of the natural sciences usually exclusive of the administrative or managerial sciences...
, and to promote the work of those whose research aimed to address important social problems
Social problems
Social problems are problems and difficulties that people often face in society. These include:*crime*corruption*poverty*homelessness*hunger*disease*drug addiction*alcoholism*schizophrenia*depression*pollution...
. Today the AAPSS is headquartered at the Annenberg Public Policy Center
Annenberg Public Policy Center
The Annenberg Public Policy Center is a center for the study of public policy at the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania. It has offices in Washington, D.C...
in Philadelphia and aims to continue to offer interdisciplinary perspectives on important social issues.
Establishment
The primary modes of the Academy's communication were to be the bimonthly journal, The Annals, annual meetings, symposia, and special publications. Difficult topics were not avoided. The 1901 annual meeting was on race relations in America, and included a paper by Booker T. WashingtonBooker T. Washington
Booker Taliaferro Washington was an American educator, author, orator, and political leader. He was the dominant figure in the African-American community in the United States from 1890 to 1915...
.
Membership was open and inclusive with an emphasis on educated professionals; even from the its establishment, women were permitted to obtain membership. The Academy's members have included not only academicians
Academic degree
An academic degree is a position and title within a college or university that is usually awarded in recognition of the recipient having either satisfactorily completed a prescribed course of study or having conducted a scholarly endeavour deemed worthy of his or her admission to the degree...
, but also distinguished public servants
Civil service
The term civil service has two distinct meanings:* A branch of governmental service in which individuals are employed on the basis of professional merit as proven by competitive examinations....
such as Herbert Hoover
Herbert Hoover
Herbert Clark Hoover was the 31st President of the United States . Hoover was originally a professional mining engineer and author. As the United States Secretary of Commerce in the 1920s under Presidents Warren Harding and Calvin Coolidge, he promoted partnerships between government and business...
and Frances Perkins
Frances Perkins
Frances Perkins , born Fannie Coralie Perkins, was the U.S. Secretary of Labor from 1933 to 1945, and the first woman appointed to the U.S. Cabinet. As a loyal supporter of her friend, Franklin D. Roosevelt, she helped pull the labor movement into the New Deal coalition...
. Perhaps for this reason, it is not a member of the American Council of Learned Societies
American Council of Learned Societies
The American Council of Learned Societies , founded in 1919, is a private nonprofit federation of seventy scholarly organizations.ACLS is best known as a funder of humanities research through fellowships and grants awards. ACLS Fellowships are designed to permit scholars holding the Ph.D...
. Nevertheless, in 2000 the Academy began selecting and installing Fellows in recognition of social scientists who have made outstanding contributions to the field. Since 2008 the Academy has presented an annual Daniel Patrick Moynihan Prize to recognize public officials and scholars who have used social science and informed judgment to advance the public good
Presidents of the Academy
- 1889–1895 - Edmund J. James
- 1896–1900 - Roland P. Falkner (acting in the absence of Edmund J. James)
- 1900–1902 - Samuel McCune Lindsay
- 1902–1929 - Leo S. Rowe
- 1930–1952 - Ernest M. Patterson
- 1953–1970 - James C. Charlesworth
- 1970–1972 - Richard D. Lambert
- 1972–1998 - Marvin E. Wolfgang
- 1998–1999 - Kathleen Hall JamiesonKathleen Hall JamiesonKathleen Hall Jamieson is an American Professor of Communication and the director of the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania...
- 1999–2001 - Jaroslav PelikanJaroslav PelikanJaroslav Jan Pelikan was a scholar in the history of Christianity, Christian theology and medieval intellectual history.-Early years:...
- 2001–2005 - Lawrence W. ShermanLawrence W. ShermanLawrence W. Sherman is an academic criminologist. In 2006, he was elected Wolfson Professor of Criminology at the Cambridge Institute of Criminology at Cambridge University, where he was appointed founding director of the Jerry Lee Centre for Experimental Criminology in 2008...
- 2006–present - Douglas S. Massey
The Annals
The Annals, a policy and scientific journal in political and social science, began publication in July 1890 and has continued uninterrupted up until the present. Authors and special editors of The Annals have included influential individuals, such as Eleanor RooseveltEleanor Roosevelt
Anna Eleanor Roosevelt was the First Lady of the United States from 1933 to 1945. She supported the New Deal policies of her husband, distant cousin Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and became an advocate for civil rights. After her husband's death in 1945, Roosevelt continued to be an international...
, William Howard Taft
William Howard Taft
William Howard Taft was the 27th President of the United States and later the tenth Chief Justice of the United States...
, Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt was the 26th President of the United States . He is noted for his exuberant personality, range of interests and achievements, and his leadership of the Progressive Movement, as well as his "cowboy" persona and robust masculinity...
, W. E. B. Du Bois, Margaret Mead
Margaret Mead
Margaret Mead was an American cultural anthropologist, who was frequently a featured writer and speaker in the mass media throughout the 1960s and 1970s....
, Thurgood Marshall
Thurgood Marshall
Thurgood Marshall was an Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court, serving from October 1967 until October 1991...
, Mahatma Gandhi
Mahatma Gandhi
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi , pronounced . 2 October 1869 – 30 January 1948) was the pre-eminent political and ideological leader of India during the Indian independence movement...
, and Booker T. Washington
Booker T. Washington
Booker Taliaferro Washington was an American educator, author, orator, and political leader. He was the dominant figure in the African-American community in the United States from 1890 to 1915...
. More recently, authors and editors have included Henry Louis Gates Jr., Richard A. Clarke
Richard A. Clarke
Richard Alan Clarke was a U.S. government employee for 30 years, 1973–2003. He worked for the State Department during the presidency of Ronald Reagan. In 1992, President George H.W. Bush appointed him to chair the Counter-terrorism Security Group and to a seat on the United States National...
, Joseph S. Nye, Jr. and William Julius Wilson
William Julius Wilson
William Julius Wilson is an American sociologist. He worked at the University of Chicago 1972-1996 before moving to Harvard....
. The Annals has been published by SAGE Publications
SAGE Publications
SAGE is an independent academic publisher of books, journals, and electronic products in the humanities and social sciences and the scientific, technical, and medical fields. SAGE was founded in 1965 by George McCune and Sara Miller McCune. The company is headquartered in Thousand Oaks, California,...
since 1981. In 2003 it changed from its traditional plain orange cover to a more graphic cover containing photographs.
'The Annals' has covered topics ranging from “The World’s Food” (November, 1917) to “The Motion Picture and its Economic and Social Aspects” (November 1926), “Women in the Modern World” (May, 1929), “America and Japan” (May, 1941), “Urban Renewal Goals and Standards (March, 1964), and “The Global Refugee Problem” (May, 1982). More recent volumes have focused on such topics as “Confronting the Specter of Nuclear Terrorism,” and “The Moynihan Report Revisited: Lessons and Reflections after Four Decades."
Editors
- 1890–1895, Edmund J. JamesEdmund J. JamesEdmund Janes James was an American academic, president of the University of Illinois from 1904 to 1920, and the primary founder of, first president of, and first editor for the American Academy of Political and Social Science....
- 1896–1900, Roland P. Falkner
- Jan. 1901–Mar. 1902, Henry Rogers SeagerHenry Rogers SeagerHenry Rogers Seager, Ph.D. was an American economist.He studied at the University of Michigan , at the University of Pennsylvania , at Johns Hopkins University, and in Europe at Halle, Berlin, and Vienna.He was employed at the University of Pennsylvania from 1897-1902, and then at Columbia...
- May 1902–Sept. 1914, Emory R. Johnson
- Nov. 1914–July 1929, Clyde L. King
- Sept. 1929–July 1968, Thorsten SellinThorsten SellinJohan Thorsten Sellin was an American sociologist at the University of Pennsylvania, a penologist and one of the pioneers of scientific criminology.-Biography:...
- Jan. 1969–Nov. 1995 Richard D. Lambert
- Jan. 1996–Nov. 2003 Alan W. Heston
- Jan 2003–May 2006 Robert W. Pearson
- July 2006–Present Phyllis KanissPhyllis KanissPhyllis Kaniss was the Executive Director of the American Academy of Political and Social Science. Born in 1951 in Philadelphia, she received her B.A degree from the University of Pennsylvania and a Ph.D in Regional Science from Cornell University....
Academy Blog
In 2006, the Academy Blog was created to take advantage of the Internet to provide a forum for ideas and research in the social sciencesSocial sciences
Social science is the field of study concerned with society. "Social science" is commonly used as an umbrella term to refer to a plurality of fields outside of the natural sciences usually exclusive of the administrative or managerial sciences...
.
External links
Not to be confused with
- American Academy of Arts and Letters
- American Academy of Arts and SciencesAmerican Academy of Arts and SciencesThe American Academy of Arts and Sciences is an independent policy research center that conducts multidisciplinary studies of complex and emerging problems. The Academy’s elected members are leaders in the academic disciplines, the arts, business, and public affairs.James Bowdoin, John Adams, and...
- American Association for the Advancement of Sciences
- American Political Science AssociationAmerican Political Science AssociationThe American Political Science Association is a professional association of political science students and scholars in the United States. Founded in 1903, it publishes three academic journals...
- American Social Science AssociationAmerican Social Science AssociationIn 1865, at Boston, Massachusetts, a society for the study of social questions was organized and given the name American Social Science Association. The group grew to where its membership totaled about 1,000 persons. About 30 corresponding members were located in Europe...
- United States National Academy of SciencesUnited States National Academy of SciencesThe National Academy of Sciences is a corporation in the United States whose members serve pro bono as "advisers to the nation on science, engineering, and medicine." As a national academy, new members of the organization are elected annually by current members, based on their distinguished and...