Pippa Norris is the recipient of the American Political Science Association’s 2019 Charles E. Merriam Award. The prize is awarded biennially to recognize a person “whose published work and career represent a significant contribution to the art of government through the application of social science research.”
Norris, the Paul F. McGuire Lecturer in Comparative Politics, is a prolific author and widely cited scholar who focuses on democracy, public opinion and elections, political communications, and gender politics. She directs The Electoral Integrity Project, established in 2012. She also teaches at the University of Sydney, in Australia.
Her most recent book, “Cultural Backlash,” written with Richard Inglehart, examines the rise of authoritarian populism. She has previously been honored for her work with the Johan Skytte Prize, the Karl Deutsch Prize, and the Sir Isaiah Berlin Lifetime Achievement Award.
The American Political Science Association’s (APSA) Charles E. Merriam Award, first established in 1975, is named after Charles Merriam, a political scientist whose career exemplified a combination of innovative political and social science scholarship and practical public service. The political science department at the University of Chicago, which he chaired from the 1920s to the 1940s, set the agenda of the political science profession in the post-World War II decades. His public service included membership in the Chicago City Council and President Roosevelt's National Resources Planning Board, and the Committee on Administrative Management.
The award will be presented at APSA’s annual meeting in August in Washington, D.C. Past winners include Harvard Kennedy School’s Kathryn Sikkink, Ryan Professor of Human Rights Policy; Joseph S. Nye Jr., Harvard University Distinguished Service Professor, Emeritus; and Robert Putnam, Peter and Isabel Malkin Professor of Public Policy, Emeritus.