Jim Read wins Best Paper Award from American Political Science Association

Jim Read, professor of political science and the Joseph P. Farry professor of public policy at the College of Saint Benedict and Saint John’s University, recently received the 2010 Wilson Carey McWilliams Best Paper Award by the Politics, Literature, and Film section of the American Political Science Association (APSA).



Read’s paper was titled, “The Limits of Self-Reliance: Emerson, Slavery, and Abolition” and examined Ralph Waldo Emerson’s ideal of individual self-reliance as it confronted the seemingly intractable problem of slavery. Read, who presented his paper at the 2009 APSA annual meeting, has been on the faculty at CSB and SJU since 1988.

Read is the second CSB/SJU faculty member to receive an award from APSA. Matt Lindstrom, Ed Henry professor of political science at CSB and SJU and director of the Eugene J. McCarthy Center for Public Policy & Civic Engagement at Saint John’s University, won a Best Paper Presentation Award in the Undergraduate Education section at the 2002 ASPA annual meeting. The title of Lindstrom’s paper was “What's a Bus Ticket Got to Do with My American Politics Class? Experimenting with a Political Treasure Hunt.”