There was a lot of excitement at the Dean Dome on Saturday.The men’s basketball team won in overtime against Virginia Tech 72-60. Among the fans cheering on the Heels were three Political Science faculty members.

Jason M. Roberts, Associate Professor of Political Science at UNC-Chapel Hill, and Jamie L. Carson, Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Georgia, have published a new book, Ambition, Competition, and Electoral Reform: The Politics of Congressional Elections Across Time, with the University of Michigan Press (2013)

The Department of Political Science has joined in the celebration of Rachel M. Myrick of Charlotte, a senior at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill majoring in political science and global studies, who recently won a Rhodes Scholarship, the world’s oldest and best known award for graduate study. She was one of 32 Americans selected for the prestigious award, which funds study at the University of Oxford in England.

Professor Timothy McKeown provides expert commentary on “Clouds Over Cuba,” a new interactive documentary.

Evelyne Huber, Morehead Alumni Professor of Political Science and Chair of the Department of Political Science at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and John D. Stephens, Gerhard E. Lenski, Jr., Distinguished Professor of Political Science and Sociology and Director of the Center for European Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, have just published their new book, Democracy and the Left: Social Policy and Inequality in Latin America (University of Chicago Press, 2012).

The latest issue of the Department of Political Science newsletter is now available. In this issue we celebrate our recent graduates, recognize faculty and graduate students receiving awards this past year, as well as recent faculty publications and much more.

Georg Vanberg, Professor of Political Science, has been awarded the2012 Richard F. Fenno, Jr. Prize for the best book on legislative politics published in 2011 for Parliaments and Coalitions, which he co-authored with Lanny Martin of Rice University and published by Oxford University Press.

Jim Stimson, the Raymond Dawson Professor of American Politics, has been awarded the American Political Science Association’s Philip E. Converse Award for the book he co-authored with Edward G. Carmines, Issue Evolution: Race and the Transformation of American Politics, published by Princeton University Press in 1989.  The Converse Award recognizes an outstanding and influential book that was published at least five years ago.

Jeff Spinner-Halev, the Kenan Eminent Professor of Political Ethics in the Department of Political Science at UNC-Chapel Hill, has just published his new book, Enduring Justice, with Cambridge University Press (2012).  Professor Spinner-Halev argues that there are enduring injustices, injustice that began in the past, continue today, and will continue into the future unless the injustice is specifically addressed.

Mark Crescenzi, an Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science, has been appointed as the Bowman and Gordon Gray Term Associate Professor, beginning July 1, 2013 through June 30, 2018. The Gray Professorships, established in 1980, and among the University’s most recognized awards for excellence in outstanding undergraduate teaching, includes an annual supplement to faculty salaries, a research/teaching fund, and a one-semester sabbatical.

Professor Kevin T. McGuire, Department of Political Science at UNC-Chapel Hill, is the editor of the recently published New Directions in Judicial Politics (Routledge, 2012). The book is part of the series, New Directions in American Politics, covering key areas of study in the field of American politics and government.

Ph.D. candidate, Rebecca Best, will begin a position as an Assistant Professor in Political Science at the University of Missouri at Kansas City in August of 2012. She will teach courses on terrorism, civil war, conflict in the Middle East, and international relations.

Frank Baumgartner, the Richard J. Richardson Distinguished Professor of Political Science in the College of Arts and Sciences, received the Samuel J. Eldersveld Career Achievement Award from the APSA section on political organizations and parties. It honors a scholar whose lifetime professional work has made an outstanding contribution to the field.

Baumgartner, who joined the UNC faculty in 2009, is a leading expert on democratic politics, especially the impact of interest groups and government institutions.

Ph.D. candidate, Jeff Harden, has recently accepted a position as an Assistant Professor in Political Science at the University of Colorado-Boulder. He will begin in January of 2013 and will teach courses focused on quantitative methods and American politics.

Justin Kirkland has recently accepted a position as an Assistant Professor in Political Science at the University of Houston. He will begin in August of 2012 and will teach courses focused on state politics, legislative politics, and research methods in political science. Justin specializes in research focused on legislative behavior, organized interest environments, public opinion towards institutions of government, and methods of social network analysis.