The Society for Political Methodology will award
its 2nd Annual Political Methodology Career
Achievement Award at the 2008 American Political
Science Association's Annual Meeting. This year
we recognize JOHN JACKSON’s outstanding career of
intellectual accomplishment and service to the profession.
John was at the forefront in the establishment of
the field. Long before most were aware of what
political methodology was about, John was
extremely active, bringing scholars together and
laying the foundation for work to come. John was
publishing high quality statistical analyses in
the APSR in the early 1970s, and his influential
text "Statistical Methods for Social Scientists,"
coauthored with Eric Hanushek in 1977, is still
considered one of the best. Likewise, John's
pioneering empirical work showed that party
identification need not be seen as an essentially
permanent identity learned in
childhood. Instead, John demonstrated that
partisanship also reflects an accumulation of
citizens’ adult experiences with the parties – a
perspective that has been built on by many
empirical and theoretical scholars, and that has
become the most widely accepted view of how partisan identity is formed.
John’s record of service to the subfield is
equally impressive. He served as the 2nd
President of the Society for Political
Methodology from 1985-1987, and was instrumental
in securing funding for the early meetings from
the National Election Studies and later the
National Science Foundation. Moreover, John has
always been (and continues to be) known for
reaching out to graduate students, spending time
with them at them at the Political Methodology
Meetings and assisting with their integration
into the discipline. And, John has been
instrumental in the maturation of the subfield in
another way, as he has led the charge when it
comes to the forging of ties between political
methodologists and methodologists in other fields
(both in his own collaborations and in
institutions) – this has been of fundamental
importance to the bettering of the subfield.
John’s work has always brought methodological
insight to important substantive questions, and
he continues to publish state of the art work,
having recently co-authored a book on Polish
elections ("The Political Economy of Poland's
Transition,” with Jacek Klich and Krystyna
Poznanska). In addition, John is still extremely
active in the Society for Political Methodology,
being both a regular at the summer meetings and a
mentor to many. This year, John’s career
achievements were recognized in his election to
the American Academy of Arts and Sciences,
confirming what one eloquent nominator noted:
"John is an icon for political methodology."
I thank all of the letter writers for their
nominations, as well as the other award committee
members: Christopher Achen (Princeton), William
Berry (Florida State University), and Simon
Jackman (Stanford University). Please join us in
congratulating John as the Political Methodology
Society’s 2008 Career Achievement Award Recipient.
Cheers,
Jan Box-Steffensmeier
Janet M. Box-Steffensmeier, Vernal Riffe
Professor of Political Science & Professor of Sociology
Director of the Program in Statistics and Methodology
Mailing address: Department of Political Science
Ohio State University
2140 Derby Hall, 154 N. Oval Mall
Columbus, OH 43210-1373
Phone: (614) 292-9642
Fax: (614) 292-1146
Location: 2049S Derby Hall
E-mail: [log in to unmask]
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