Texas A&M University political scientist William Roberts Clark, the Charles Puryear Professor of Liberal Arts and head of the Department of Political Science, is among the researchers recognized by the British Academy for the Humanities and Social Sciences. Dr. Clark, along with Matt Golder and Sona N. Golder, both associate professors of political science at Penn State, received the Brian Barry Prize in Political Science for their study, “An Exit, Voice, and Loyalty Model of Politics.”
The study provides a game-theoretic model that captures the key elements common to most, if not all, political situations. The model emphasizes the strategic interdependencies in the use of power and explains which actors have power and why they have it. To highlight the commonalities that exist in the use of power across apparently disparate political phenomena, the authors use their model to examine how economic development, natural resources, inequality, and foreign aid affect the democratization process.
In partnership with Cambridge University Press and the British Journal of Political Science (BJPolS), the British Academy awards an annual prize in honor of Brian Barry, a distinguished Fellow of the Academy and founding editor of the journal.
Brian Barry was a distinguished moral and political philosopher whose work fruitfully combined analytic philosophy and political science, political theory, and social choice theory. The prize is awarded annually for excellence in political science, as displayed in an essay submitted for the prize that has not been previously published and is not under consideration for publication elsewhere. The essay can address any topic in political science, as covered by BJPolS, but essays in fields related to the work of Brian Barry are especially welcome.
On Sept. 1, 2022, the Department of Political Science became part of the Bush School of Government & Public Service.
