Title: Hawkins Chair of Political Science Office: 322A North Hall Office Hours: Wednesdays 2:00 - 4:00 or By Appointment Phone: 608.263.1909 Has Voicemail: Yes E-Mail: bshafer@polisci.wisc.edu Keywords: Elections, Political Orders, Political Parties, Presidency, Public Opinion, Public Policy, Religion, Structural Change

Research and teaching in American politics, broadly construed. Particular interests include: political parties, institutional reform, social cleavages, policy conflict, issue evolution, political orders, American political development, national party conventions, cultural issues, electoral campaigns, American exceptionalism, British politics, comparative politics of the G-7, empirical theory, classical political science, sociology of knowledge. Concerned with the ‘big picture’ in American political life, and with locating further research within this larger framework.

Major monographs on reform politics (Quiet Revolution:The Struggle for the Democratic Party and the Shaping of Post-Reform Politics), on institutional change (Bifurcated Politics: Evolution and Reform in the National Party Convention), on policy cleavages (The Two Majorities: The Issue Context of Modern American Politics), and on structural influences (The End of Southern Exceptionalism: Class, Race, and Partisan Change in the Postwar South). Many recent article-length pieces collected in The Two Majorities and the Puzzle of Modern American Politics. Click on Current CV for more detail.

Presently working on three further monographs: 1) The American Public Mind: The Issue Structure of Mass Politics in the Postwar United States, with William J.M. Claggett (forthcoming from Cambridge University Press). 2) What Did They Value and When Did They Care?: A New Technique for Mapping the Political Landscape and the Understanding of American Politics That Follows From It, with Richard H. Spady (contracted to Harvard University Press). 3) Social Structure and Policy Preference in the Transformation of the American Party System, with Richard G.C. Johnston.

Undergraduate lectures supported by an extensive library of campaign ads. For a current undergraduate class, click on PS 184. For the larger enterprise of which these ads are a part, click on Wisconsin Advertising Project and go to Historic Campaign Ads. Graduate classes taught in modified master-class format. For a current example, click on PS 904. For other recent examples, click on Current CV and go to Selected Teaching Experience. I am also Editor of The Forum: A Journal of Applied Research in Contemporary Politics. 

Recent Publications

Current Courses taught for Fall 2009-2010