Political polarization — when public opinion goes to two extremes, without moderates or a real middle ground — is the focus of a lecture series that kicks off Monday, Sept. 28, with a talk by Steven S. Smith, PhD, director of the Weidenbaum Center on the Economy, Government and Public Policy at Washington University in St. Louis.
Smith, the Kate M. Gregg Distinguished Professor of Social Science, will lecture on the “Causes and Consequences of Polarization in Modern American Politics” at 7:30 p.m. Monday, Sept, 28, in Anheuser-Busch Hall’s Bryan Cave Moot Courtroom, on the university’s Danforth Campus.
Other lectures in the series, all free and open to the public, are:
- Caroline Tolbert, PhD, professor of political science at the University of Iowa, will speak on “Campaign Quality Under Preferential Plurality Voting in U.S. Cities” Oct. 27; and
- Frances E. Lee, PhD, professor in the Government & Politics Department at the University of Maryland, will give a lecture on “Political Competition and Partisan Polarization in the United States” Feb. 10, 2016.
For more information, visit the Weidenbaum Center website or call 314-935-5652.