Research

Rooney Center faculty and students research a range of topics in American politics, advancing our understanding of American democracy across campus and around the world.  This important work is disseminated broadly through academic journals, books, talks and workshops, and through public engagement with the press.

While the Center’s research addresses American politics broadly, it has four focal areas of inquiry:

• The politics of democratic inclusion: The political incorporation and representation of an increasingly diverse population in the United States, especially Latinos.
• The politics of democratic participation: Public opinion, civic engagement, and political behavior in the United States.
• Institutions, leadership, and public service: The dynamic relationship between how governing institutions are designed and how leaders and public servants in those institutions influence democratic outcomes in the United States.
• Religion and American democracy: The role of religion—especially Catholicism, evangelical Protestantism, and minority religions, as well as America’s growing non-religious population—in the U.S. political system.