Foundations in the United States have long exerted considerable power over education and scholarly production. Although today's titans of philanthropy proclaim more loudly their desire to transform schools and universities than did some of their predecessors, philanthropic programs designed to reshape educational institutions are at least a century old. In Foundations and American Political Science, Emily Hauptmann focuses on the postwar Carnegie, Ford, and Rockefeller programs that reshaped political science. She shows how significant changes in the methods and research interests of postwar political scientists began as responses to the priorities set by their philanthropic patrons.

Informed by years of research in foundation and university archives, Foundations and American Political Science follows the course of several streams of private philanthropic money as they wended their way through public universities and political science departments in the postwar period. The programs launched by the Carnegie, Ford, and Rockefeller philanthropies as well as their reception at the universities of California and Michigan steered political scientists towards particular problems as well as particular ways of studying them. The rise of statistical analyses of survey data, the decline of public administration, and persistent conflicts over the discipline's purpose and the best methods for understanding politics, Hauptmann argues, all had their roots in the ways that postwar universities responded to foundations' programs. Additionally, the new emphasis universities placed on sponsored research sparked sharp disputes among political scientists over what should count as legitimate knowledge about politics and what the ultimate purpose of the discipline should be.

About the Author
Emily Hauptmann is professor of political science at Western Michigan University.

Reviews

"Emily Hauptmann's Foundations and American Political Science makes a valuable contribution to our understanding of the development of US political science in the postwar era, and particularly of the role of private philanthropy in shaping both the discipline itself and the institutions and practices of American higher education more generally. It is deeply researched and clearly written and organized. This is an impressive work."-Jessica Blatt, associate professor of political science at Marymount Manhattan College

Book Information
ISBN 9780700633777
Author Emily Hauptmann
Format Paperback
Page Count 280
Imprint University Press of Kansas
Publisher University Press of Kansas
Weight(grams) 363g