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University Communications

University of Richmond Professor Wins Lasswell Award for Best Doctoral Dissertation in Public Policy

September 16, 2005

Thad M. Williamson, assistant professor of leadership studies at the University of Richmond, has received the 2005 Harold D. Lasswell Award from the American Political Science Association. The award recognizes the best dissertation in the field of public policy studies completed in 2004.

Williamson’s dissertation explores the relationship of suburban sprawl and American civic life and suggests a model of how political theories can be applied to concrete public policy debates. Williamson is currently expanding his thesis into a book.

The judging panel cited Williamson’s use of theoretical perspectives to highlight fundamental local, regional and national policy problems likely to be produced by sprawl—adverse cost-benefit outcomes, socioeconomic inequalities, and impairments of civic virtue such as low political engagement and participation.

Williamson received a Ph.D. degree in political science in 2004 from Harvard University, an M.A. in religion from Union Theological Seminary in 1998 and an A.B. in history and religious studies from Brown University in 1992. He joined the faculty of the Jepson School of Leadership Studies at Richmond this year.

His professional experience includes work in Washington at both the Institute for Policy Studies and the National Center for Economic and Security Alternatives. He served as a teaching fellow and lecturer at Harvard, where he was thesis advisor for 11 undergraduates in government and social studies. In spring 2005, he taught a course of his own design on Contemporary American Metropolis.

He has written three books and numerous articles for a variety of scholarly and popular publications. He was lead co-author of “Making Place for Community: Local Democracy in a Global Era,” a comprehensive overview of the sources and possible remedies for community economic instability in the United States. The book is used widely in college-level urban politics and community development courses.