About this Event
Please join us on Friday, April 3rd, for a book talk with Professor Matt Grossmann on his latest book, Policymaking for Realists.
American politics is likely to remain a closely divided, highly polarized two-party system for the foreseeable future. That changes which strategies reliably work, where progress is still achievable, and how reformers should think about their goals. Instead of treating today’s partisan environment as an abnormal detour likely to end soon or reasoning that only a sweeping institutional overhaul can fix things, Policymaking for Realists argues that we can accept durable polarized parity as the baseline and learn how to govern effectively inside it.
The most viable route to sustained policy progress continues to be incremental, coalition-based change that can survive implementation, legal challenges, and partisan turnover. That can include traditional bipartisan deals, behind-the-scenes strange bedfellow coalitions, building up from the states, or policy designs that reduce backlash and lock in benefits over time. The most durable changes in American life—from the clean energy transition to building affordable housing to criminal justice reform—have not come from partisan revolutions, but from boring, slow-moving, state-federal partnerships and bipartisan work. The presumed alternative—that voters choose a side, give them a mandate to pass and implement policy on their own—is imaginary. It produces stalemate or statutes that die in implementation, in court, or in the next administration.
Policymaking for Realists is written for advocates, staffers, officials, funders, journalists, and engaged citizens as well as scholars who want a synthesis of what political science implies for real-world strategy. It is informed by academic literature without being trapped by it: the goal is to translate what research and on-the-ground experience suggest about how policy still actually gets made.
Governance in the second Trump administration serves as a stress test for the book’s argument: when national politics becomes more confrontational and when seemingly stable policy regimes are threatened, the premium rises on strategies that can withstand conflict while producing tangible gains. The book shows where policy is proving resilient and where new constraints are apparent.
About the Speaker:
Matt Grossmann is Director of the Institute for Public Policy and Social Research and Professor of Political Science at Michigan State University (currently on sabbatical at the University of Chicago). He also serves as a Senior Fellow at the Niskanen Center and host of the Science of Politics podcast. He is the author of The Not-So-Special Interests, Artists of the Possible, Asymmetric Politics (with David Hopkins), Red State Blues, How Social Science Got Better, and Polarized by Degrees (also with Hopkins). He is co-owner of Hooked (bookstore/cafe). He received his doctorate in Political Science from Berkeley in 2007.
This event is presented by the Institute of Governmental Studies, and is co-sponsored by the Berkeley Economy and Society Initiative.
This is an accessible event. If you require an accommodation for effective communication (ASL interpreting/CART captioning, alternative media formats, etc.) or information about campus mobility access features in order to fully participate in this event, please contact IGS at [email protected] with as much advance notice as possible and at least 7-10 days before the event.
Event Venue & Nearby Stays
Social Sciences Building, 820 Social Sciences Building, Berkeley, United States
USD 0.00
