WPSA AWARDS TO BE ANNOUNCED AT THE
2025 ANNUAL MEETING
The 2025 awards will be presented at the Awards Ceremony on Thursday, April 17, at the Seattle Hyatt Regency. The ceremony will be held in the room Elwha A of the Seattle Hyatt Regency. A reception follows in the Gallery right outside Elwha A.
The Betty Moulds Lifetime Service Award was created in 2015-16 to honor the remarkable contributions of the longtime Executive Director of WPSA, Betty Moulds.
Andrea Y. Simpson
WPSA President, 2008-2009
Associate Professor Emerita, Univeristy of Richmond
The 2025 Western Political Science Association Committee on the Betty E. Moulds Lifetime Service Award is honored and pleased to announce this year’s winner--Dr. Andrea Simpson, Associate Professor, Emerita, of the University of Richmond who retired in May, 2024 after 31 years of distinguished service in the professoriate. In her years of outstanding service to the WPSA, including as president (2009), program chair (2008), and council member (2001-2004), Dr. Andrea Simpson has exemplified the traditions of service, integrity, and inclusiveness which have been WPSA’s core values, meriting recognition with this award named for Betty E. Moulds. Giving her time and energy selflessly, Andrea served our association with the same empathy and personal attention that characterized her broader career as a scholar, teacher, and mentor. Her leadership helped sustain WPSA’s commitment to innovative and inclusive scholarship, resisting the discipline’s methodological inertia while encouraging new approaches in fields as diverse as racial and ethnic politics, feminist theory, and environmental justice. Most importantly, Andrea has demonstrated extraordinary care for the people around her, approaching the most challenging tasks with a cooperative spirit and a sense of joy.
2025 WPSA Betty E. Moulds Lifetime Service Award Committee:
Jason Casellas, Louis Desipio, and Pei-te Lien (chair)
BEST PAPER IN ASIAN PACIFIC AMERICAN POLITICS ($250)
To:
Chinbo Chong, Northeastern University, and Dorainne Green, Indiana University Bloomington
Paper Title:
“The Role of Stereotypes and Emotions on Asian American Political (In)Activism”
BETTY NESVOLD WOMEN AND POLITICS AWARD ($250)
To:
Jane Junn, University of Southern California; Laura Brisbane, University of Southern California; and Kayla Wolf, University of Southern California
Paper Title:
“Patriarchy Across Gender and Race: How a Patriarchal Worldview Shapes Abortion Attitudes in the United States”
BLACKS AND POLITICS AWARD ($250)
To:
LaGine Gause, University of California, San Diego; and Maneesh Arora, Wellsley College
Paper Title:
“Unaligned Activists: How Digital Technologies, Decentralized Leadership, Post-Materialism, and Self-Identification Facilitate Unaligned Participation in Contemporary Social Movements”
CLAY MORGAN AWARD FOR BEST BOOK IN ENVIRONMENTAL POLITICAL THEORY
To:
Sharon R. Krause, Brown University
Book Title:
Eco-Emancipation: An Earthly Politics of Freedom
DISSERTATION AWARD ($250)
To:
Tongtong Zhang, Stanford University
For dissertation completed at University of Alberta:
“The Discursive and Commemorative Construction of Iranian Identity in Post-revolutionary Iran”
DON T. NAKANISHI AWARD FOR DISTINGUISHED SCHOLARSHIP AND SERVICE IN ASIAN PACIFIC AMERICAN POLITICS
To:
Claire Jean Kim, University of California, Irvine
ENVIRONMENTAL POLITICAL THEORY AWARD ($250)
To:
Christine Winter, University of Otago
Paper Title:
“Ozone as Relationships”
LATINA/LATINO POLITICS ($250)
To:
Jordin Tafoya, Arizona State University; Dayne Saldana, Arizona State University; Kaitlyn Navarrette, Arizona State University; and Angie M. Bautista-Chavez, Johns Hopkins University
Paper Title:
"Revisiting Representation and the Role of Latino Intermediaries: Intersectional Constituencies and Placed-Based Politics"
POLITICAL RESEARCH QUARTERLY BEST ARTICLE AWARD ($1000)
To:
Sam Zacher, University of Southern California
For December 2024 article:
“What Forms of Redistribution Do Americans Want? Understanding Preferences for Policy Benefit-Cost Tradeoffs”
POLITICS, GROUPS, AND IDENTITIES BEST ARTICLE AWARD ($500)
To:
H. Hannah Nam, Brooklyn College; Katherine Sawyer, SUNY Stony Brook; and Hillary K. Style, Coastal Carolina University
For 2024 (Issue 2) article:
“Understanding Anti-Asian Sentiment and Political Behavior in the Wake of COVID-19”
WILLIAM E. CONNOLLY AWARD FOR BEST PAPER IN POLITICAL THEORY ($250)
To:
Emma Rodman, University of Massachusetts, Lowell
Paper Title:
"An Equality of Oneness’: King on Constitutive Equality”
Honorable Mention To:
Char Miller, George Mason University
Paper Title:
“Warming Oceans and Turbulent Bodies: Paul, Melville, Serres, and the Sea”
WPSA BEST PAPER AWARD
To:
Jacob Garrett, Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, and Valeria Ottonelli, University of Genova
Paper Title:
“Democratic Prudence: The Philosophical and Empirical Grounding of Citizen Competence”
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