Theda Skocpol

Theda Skocpol
Theda Skocpol speaking about the Tea Party at the Munk School
Born (1947-05-04) May 4, 1947
Detroit, Michigan
Residence Cambridge, MA
Nationality American
Citizenship U.S.A.
Alma mater Michigan State University (B.A.)
Harvard University (M.A.) and (Ph.D.)
Known for  • States and Social Revolutions
 • Diminished Democracy
 • State Autonomy Theory
Awards Johan Skytte Prize
Scientific career
Fields Civic engagement,
Comparative sociology,
Historical institutionalism
Institutions Harvard University
Academic advisors Barrington Moore, Jr.

Theda Skocpol (born May 4, 1947) is an American sociologist and political scientist, who is currently the Victor S. Thomas Professor of Government and Sociology at Harvard University. An influential figure in both disciplines, Skocpol is best known as an advocate of the historical-institutional and comparative approaches, as well as her "state autonomy theory." She has written widely for both popular and academic audiences.

In historical sociology, Skocpol's works and opinions have been associated with the structuralist school. As an example, she argues that social revolutions can best be explained given their relation with specific structures of agricultural societies and their respective states. Such an approach differs greatly from more "behaviorist" ones, which tend to emphasize the role of "revolutionary populations," "revolutionary psychology," and/or "revolutionary consciousness," as determinant factors of revolutionary processes.

According to her profile on the Harvard Department of Sociology website, her current research agenda focuses on “U.S. social policy and civic engagement in American democracy, including changes since the 1960s. She has recently launched new projects on the development of U.S. higher education and on the transformations of U.S. federal policies in the Obama era.”[1]

Biography

Theda Skocpol was born in Detroit, Michigan on May 4, 1947. She earned her B.A. at Michigan State University in 1969. She then went on to earn her M.A. (1972), and Ph.D. at Harvard University (1975). While attending Harvard University, Skocpol studied with Barrington Moore Jr.

From 1975-1981, Skocpol served as an Assistant and Associate Professor of Sociology, at Harvard University. During this time, Skocpol published her first of many books, States and Social Revolutions: A comparative Analysis of Social Revolutions in Russia, France and China (1979). Some of her subsequent work focused on methodology and theory, including the co-edited volume Bringing the State Back In, which heralded a new focus by social scientists on the state as an agent of social and political change.

In 1981, Skocpol moved on to work at the University of Chicago. For the next five years, Skocpol would serve as an Associate Professor of Sociology and Political Science, and of Social Science, Professor of Sociology and Political Science, and Director for the Center for the Study of Industrial Societies.[2]

In the early 1980s, Prof. Skocpol publicly alleged that Harvard University had denied her tenure (1980) because she was a woman. This charge was found to be justified by an internal review committee in 1981.[3] In 1984, Harvard University offered Dr. Skocpol a tenured position (its first ever for a female sociologist), which she accepted.

From 1986 to the present, Skocpol has held various positions at Harvard University to include: Professor of Sociology; Director for the Center for American Political Studies; Dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences; and presently is the Professor of Government and of Sociology, Victor S. Thomas Professor of Government and Sociology.

Honors and titles

Throughout her career, Dr. Skocpol has held many positions at various academic, and professional organizations, some of which include: President of Politics and History Section, Chairperson, and later Council member of the American Political Science Association (1991–96). Out of over one hundred past presidents, since 1903, only about ten women have held that office. Skocpol is also Founder and Co-Editor, Princeton Studies in American Politics: Historical, Comparative, and International Perspectives (1993 – present); and Senior Advisor in the Social Sciences, Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study (2006-2008).

According to her Curriculum Vitae Skocpol has been distinguished by over twenty awards and honors, some of which are: C. Wright Mills Award of The Society for the Study of Social Problems in 1979; elected to the American Philosophical Society in 2006; and she was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2008. Her book Protecting Soldiers and Mothers (1992) was awarded the 1993 Woodrow Wilson Award for best book in political science by the American Political Science Association.[1]

In 2007, she was awarded the Johan Skytte Prize in Political Science, one of the world's most prestigious prizes in political science for her "visionary analysis of the significance of the state for revolutions, welfare, and political trust, pursued with theoretical depth and empirical evidence."[4][5]

In 2015, she was named an Andrew Dickson White Professor-at-Large at Cornell University.

Major works and contributions

States and Social Revolutions (1979)

Dr. Skocpol’s most famous book, States and Social Revolutions: A comparative Analysis of Social Revolutions in Russia, France and China (1979), discusses how most theories account only for direct action in bringing about revolutions. Social Revolutions are fast-paced foundational transformations of society's state and class structures. She includes the structure involved in creating a revolutionary situation that can lead to a social revolution - one that changes civic institutions and government once the administration and military branches collapse.

In her text, Skocpol "offers a framework of reference for analyzing social-revolutionary transformations in modern world history" and discusses and compares the causes of The "French Revolution" of 1787-1800, The Russian Revolution of 1917-1921, and The Chinese Revolution of 1911-1949.

According to Skocpol, there are two stages to social revolutions: a crisis of state and the emergence of a dominant class to take advantage of a revolutionary situation. The crisis of state emerges from poor economy, natural disaster, food shortage, or security concerns. Leaders of the revolution also have to face these constraints, and their handling of them affects how well they re-establish the state.

Skocpol uses Marxism’s class struggle to assert that the main causes of social unrest are state social structures, international competitive pressures, international demonstrations, and class relations. Critics suggest that Skocpol ignores the role of individuals and ideology[6] and uses varied comparative methodological strategies.

State Autonomy Theory

Before she wrote Protecting Soldiers and Mothers, Skocpol first devised what she termed State Autonomy Theory. This theory underlined the idea that state bureaucracies could have the potential for autonomous operations, and that this potential was ignored by scientists who were focused on society-centric studies. Skocpol considers the idea that parties are more important in America than the government, and that class dominance plays heavily into American politics.[7]

Protecting Soldiers and Mothers (1992)

In this book, Skocpol considers increased benefits for Civil War veterans and their families resulting from competitive party politics, as well as greater actions taken in women's movements. Soldiers and mothers benefited from social spending, labor regulations, and health education through reformative women's clubs across the nation. Simultaneously, Skocpol refutes her claim that theorists had ignored states' independent power in her state autonomy theory, explaining "my state-centered theoretical frame of reference had evolved into a fully 'polity-centered approach,' meaning that social movements, coalitions of pressure groups, and political parties must be given their due in understanding power in America."

Dr. Skocpol explains how clubs and associations fill the vacuum left by fewer bureaucracies and an official church throughout the country, offering a case study in how women succeeded in gaining labor rights, pensions, minimum wage, and subsidized natal health clinics. Further, Skocpol points out that women were able to overcome class disparity to achieve these goals, working at a national level, influencing representatives with books, TV, magazines, and meetings.[8]

Diminished Democracy (2003)

Diminished Democracy discusses the changes in US public involvement and its recent concerning decline. Skocpol talks about how to reverse it in explaining how the U.S. became a civic nation, the organizers of that movement, management of civic organizations, changes in them, the harmful effects of that change, and how to recreate a sense of citizenship.

Since fewer and fewer Americans join voluntary groups that meet frequently, there has been a proliferation of nonprofit groups led by elites who can interact with the government, but not the people. Dr. Skocpol provokes the reader with the idea that civic involvement will one day become another job rather than a civilian responsibility.

Personal life

In 1967, while studying at Michigan State University, she married Bill Skocpol, a physicist who taught at Boston University. Her last name is sometimes quoted as Skočpol. She has one son.

See also

Bibliography

Books

  • Skocpol, Theda (1979). States and Social Revolutions: A Comparative Analysis of France, Russia, and China. Canto Classics. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521294997.
  • Skocpol, Theda (1992). Protecting Soldiers and Mothers: The Political Origins of Social Policy in the United States. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. ISBN 9780674717657.
  • Skocpol, Theda (1994). Social Revolutions in the Modern World. Cambridge Studies in Comparative Politics. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521409384.
  • Skocpol, Theda (1995). Social Policy in the United States: Future Possibilities in Historical Perspective. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press. ISBN 9780691037851.
  • Finegold, Kenneth; Skocpol, Theda (1995). State and Party in America's New Deal. Madison, Wisconsin: University of Wisconsin Press. ISBN 9780299147648.
  • Skocpol, Theda (1996). Boomerang: Clinton's Health Security Effort and the Turn Against Government in U.S. Politics. New York, New York: W. W. Norton & Company. ISBN 9780393039702.
  • Skocpol, Theda (1997). Boomerang: Health Reform and the Turn Against Government. New York, New York: W. W. Norton & Company. ISBN 9780393315721.
  • Skocpol, Theda (2000). The Missing Middle: Working Families and the Future of American Social Policy. The Century Foundation. New York, New York: W. W. Norton & Company. ISBN 9780393321135.
  • Skocpol, Theda (2003). Diminished Democracy: From Membership to Management in American Civic Life. The Julian J. Rothbaum Distinguished Lecture Series. 8. Norman, Oklahoma: University of Oklahoma Press. ISBN 9780806150178.
  • Skocpol, Theda; Liazos, Ariane; Ganz, Marshall (2006). What a Mighty Power We Can Be: African American Fraternal Groups and the Struggle for Racial Equality. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press. ISBN 9780691122991.
  • Skocpol, Theda; Bartels, Larry M; Edwards, Mickey; Mettler, Suzanne (2012). Obama and America’s Political Future. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. ISBN 9780674071643.
  • Skocpol, Theda; Williamson, Vanessa (2012). The Tea Party and the Remaking of Republican Conservatism. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780199832637.

Edited volumes

  • Burawoy, Michael; Skocpol, Theda, eds. (1982). Marxist Inquiries: Studies of Labor, Class, and States. American Journal of Sociology supplement. 88. Chicago, Illinois: University of Chicago Press. ISBN 9780226080406.
  • Skocpol, Theda, ed. (1984). Vision and Method in Historical Sociology. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521297240.
  • Evans, Peter B.; Rueschemeyer, Dietrich; Skocpol, Theda, eds. (1985). Bringing the State Back In. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9781107717138.
  • Weir, Margaret; Orloff, Ann Shola; Skocpol, Theda, eds. (1988). The Politics of Social Policy in the United States. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press. ISBN 9780691094366.
  • American Society and Politics: Institutional, Historical, and Theoretical Perspectives (with John L. Campbell), McGraw-Hill (New York), 1995.
  • States, Social Knowledge, and the Origins of Modern Social Policies (with Dietrich Rueschemeyer), Princeton University Press, 1996.
  • The New Majority: Toward a Popular Progressive Politics (with Stan Greenberg), Yale University Press (New Haven, CT), 1997.
  • Democracy, Revolution, and History (with George Ross, Tony Smith, and Judith Eisenberg Vichniac), Cornell University Press (Ithaca, NY), 1998.
  • Civic Engagement in American Democracy (with Morris P. Fiorina), Brookings Institution Press (Washington, DC)/Russell Sage Foundation (New York City), 1999.
  • The Transformation of American Politics. Activist Government and the Rise of Conservatism (with Paul Pierson), Princeton University Press, 2007.

Select articles

  • A Critical Review of Barrington Moore’s Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy. Politics and Society, 4(1), pp. 1–34
  • Review article: "Cultural Idioms and Political Ideologies in the Revolutionary Reconstruction of State Power: A Rejoinder to Sewell," The Journal of Modern History Vol. 57, No. 1, March 1985

References

  1. 1 2 "Theda Skocpol". sociology.fas.harvard.edu. Retrieved 2017-04-15.
  2. ↑ Skocpol, Theda. "Theda Skocpol" (PDF). Harvard University. Retrieved 2016-07-10.
  3. ↑ "A QUESTION OF SEX BIAS AT HARVARD". The New York Times. October 18, 1981. Retrieved 17 July 2014.
  4. ↑ "Theda Skocpol". Theda Skocpol. Harvard University. Retrieved June 26, 2016.
  5. ↑ "SvD: Skocpol går till botten med staten". Svenska Dagbladet. 2007-09-29. Archived from the original on 2007-09-29. Retrieved 2017-12-01.
  6. ↑ Wikisum. "States and Social Revolutions".
  7. ↑ Skocpol, Theda, Peter Evans, and Dietrich Rueschemeyer. "Bringing the state back in." Cambridge (1999).
  8. ↑ Domhoff, G. William (September 2005). "The Death of State Autonomy Theory: A Critique of Skocpol's Protecting Soldiers And Mothers". Who Rules America.
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