McClain Elected President of Leading Political Science Association

Paula D. McClain, dean of The Graduate School and professor of political science and public policy, has been elected president of the Midwest Political Science Association.

The association, second only to the American Political Science Association as the most prestigious academic organization in the discipline, has a national membership. Its journal, The American Journal of Political Science, is among the top three journals in the discipline.

Duke is also well-represented in the American Political Science Association, where fellow political scientist John Aldrich is president.

McClain will spend 2014 and part of 2015 as president-elect before taking a year's term as president in 2015-2016. She also committed to a third year serving as past president in 2017.

"I was quite surprised when I received an email from the chair of the nominating committee in January that I was the nominee for president," McClain said. "The MPSA is an important national organization and I am pleased to be able to lead and serve it as president."

McClain was appointed dean of The Graduate School in 2012. A member of the Duke political science faculty since 2000, McClain also holds an appointment in the Sanford School of Public Policy. She has been active on the Academic Council, which she chaired in 2007-09. 

Her research has focused on racial minority group politics, particularly inter-minority political and social competition. Her recent work has focused on the effects of Latino immigration into the South.

McClain is co-author, with Steven Tauber, of "American Government in Black and White," a textbook honored by the American Political Science Association that has just been reprinted in a new second edition by Oxford University Press. She and Joseph Stewart Jr. co-authored "Can We All Get Along? Racial and Ethnic Minorities in American Politics," a study of coalition and competition between racial and ethnic groups. The sixth edition was just published. McClain also has written numerous scholarly articles, served on more than a dozen professional editorial boards and spoken at multiple conferences and other settings.