Larry Bartels, the Donald E. Stokes Professor of Public and International Affairs and Director of the Center for the Study of Democratic Politics at the Woodrow Wilson School, is the recipient of the American Political Science Association's (APSA) 2009 Gladys M. Kammerer Award for his book Unequal Democracy: The Political Economy of the New Gilded Age (Princeton University Press, Russell Sage Foundation, 2008). The award is given each year for the best political science publication in the field of U.S. national policy.

In the book Bartels analyzes the political causes and consequences of America's growing income gap, and shows that increasing inequality is not simply the result of economic forces, but the product of broad-reaching policy choices in a political system dominated by partisan ideologies and the interests of the wealthy.
 
By way of example, Bartels demonstrates that elected officials respond to the views of affluent constituents but ignore the views of poor people. The author shows that this has been particularly true of Republican presidents, who have consistently produced less income growth for middle-class and working-poor families than for affluent families.
 
Bartels also presents several case studies of key policy shifts that have contributed to inequality, including the Bush tax cuts of 2001 and 2003 and the erosion of the minimum wage.
 
In addition, Michael Doyle, an emeritus Princeton faculty member who was jointly appointed to the Woodrow Wilson School and the University’s Department of Politics, will receive APSA’s Charles E. Merriam Award, which honors published work and a career representative of a significant contribution to the art of government through the application of social science research. Doyle, now at Columbia University, is a political scientist and expert on comparative peacekeeping.
 
Founded in 1903, APSA seeks to promote scholarly research in the field of political science, as well as support high quality teaching and education about politics and government.