Schedule:

11:30am-12:15pm: Political Science reception with beverages and sandwiches

12:15-2:30pm: Diploma Ceremony

Location: Kennedy Grove

For information on the university commencement ceremony at the Stanford Stadium, please visit the Stanford commencement webpage or view the Stanford commencement brochure.

More questions?  Call Hana Meckler at 650-723-1608, or send her an email at hmeckler [at] stanford [dot] edu.

The Department of Political Science is excited to announce the new Research Honors Track to begin in the 2011-12 academic year. The program, which leads to a BA degree with honors, will give participants the analytical tools they need to write top-notch honors theses and collaborate with Stanford faculty and Ph.D. students.  Through a specially designed program of study and research, students will develop the foundation for successful careers in academia, law, government, business, and other fields.

Click here to download the application.

The Right to Free Choice of Occupation

May 18, 2012 - 1:15pm - 3:00pm

Lucas Stanczyk joined the MIT faculty in the spring of 2012 as Assistant Professor of Political Science, after finishing his Ph.D. in Harvard’s Government Department. A political theorist by training, his research ranges across a variety of topics in political philosophy, constitutional and legal theory, and the history of moral and political thought.

His doctoral dissertation investigates the implications of the value of social justice for the organization of economic production in contemporary societies. He is also at work on a history of the modern concept of distributive justice and ideas of redistribution.

"Mapping the Ideological Marketplace"

May 16, 2012 - 12:15pm - 1:30pm

 

ABSTRACT: I develop a method to measure the ideology of candidates and contributors using campaign nance data. Combined with an expansive dataset of over 81 million contribution records from state and federal elections, the method recovers ideal points for a wide range of political actors. The common pool of contributors that give to campaigns across institutions and levels of politics makes it possible to recover a unied set of ideal points for candidates for Congress, the presidency, state legislatures, governor, and other state-wide o ces, all in a common-space with the interest groups and individual donors that fund their campaigns.

May 21, 2012 - 4:15pm - 6:05pm

Co-sponsored: Stanford China Program

Lily L. Tsai is an Associate Professor of Political Science at MIT. Her research focuses on issues of accountability, governance, and political participation in developing countries with a particular emphasis on Chinese politics. Her book, Accountability Without Democracy: Solidary Groups and Public Goods Provision in Rural China, was published in Cambridge University's Studies on Comparative Politics and received the 2007-08 Dogan Award from the Society of Comparative Research for the best book published in the field of comparative research. Tsai has also published articles in The American Political Science Review, Studies in Comparative International Development, The China Quarterly, and The China Journal. Tsai is a graduate of Stanford University, where she graduated with honors and distinction in English literature and international relations. She received a M.A. in political science from the University of California, Berkeley, and a Ph.D. in government from Harvard University in 2004. She is the recipient of fellowships from the Fulbright program and the Harvard Academy for International and Area Studies.