{"id":4461,"date":"2026-02-19T22:21:57","date_gmt":"2026-02-19T22:21:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/connect.apsanet.org\/centennialcenter\/?page_id=4461"},"modified":"2026-02-20T19:08:48","modified_gmt":"2026-02-20T19:08:48","slug":"2022-special-projects-fund-recipients","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/connect.apsanet.org\/centennialcenter\/grants-awards\/special-projects-fund\/previous-special-projects-fund-winners\/2022-special-projects-fund-recipients\/","title":{"rendered":"2022 Special Projects Fund Recipients"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

2022 Special Projects Fund Recipients<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The American Political Science Association has awarded a total of $248,538 in Special Projects Fund<\/a><\/strong> grants to twelve projects. The thirty-two scholars who make up the twelve project teams collectively represent twenty-six institutions ranging from research universities to community colleges in eight different countries. Each of these projects seeks to push the Political Science discipline forward by advancing best practices in teaching and research ethics, supporting members of underrepresented groups who wish to join the profession, championing digital research methods, and creating partnerships between APSA and scholars across the globe. The strength of Political Science as a discipline has always been its diversity, both in terms of methods and approaches, as well as the people who make up the discipline. APSA is confident that these projects will continue to grow the discipline\u2019s strength and we look forward to supporting the work these twelve teams will do to improve Political Science.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This announcement provides details for each of the twelve Special Projects Fund winners in the pages that follow. Each project team has provided an abstract that summarizes the work they will be carrying out as well as the names and photographs of individual project members. A table listing out the project announcements in order is on the next page, and we encourage you to learn more about each of these projects.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Congratulations to the 2022 Special Projects Fund recipients: <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Research Enterprise in the Middle East and North Africa: Ethics & Advising<\/strong><\/summary>\n

How should doctoral students and early career scholars be sensitized to the ethical concerns that attend research in communities under duress\u2014among refugees, in conflict zones or autocracies? Drawing on work underway by an interdisciplinary team of social scientists who work in and on the Middle East and North Africa (REMENA: https:\/\/www.mei.columbia.edu\/remena-about<\/a> ) as well as on APSA\u2019s own MENA section and program, this project will hold two workshops to explore mechanisms to support Political Science faculty advisors in this effort. The first workshop, to be held in conjunction with the planned APSA-MENA conference in Jordan in July 2022, will engage political scientists associated with REMENA in exploring navigating ethical challenges in designing and conducting research with workshop participants. The second workshop, to be held at the 2022 APSA Annual Meeting in Montreal, will bring together PhD candidates anticipating or already conducting work on the Middle East with experienced faculty researchers and invited Directors of Graduate Studies to examine advising and mentoring processes that facilitate awareness of ethical obligations in research. Reports on the workshops will be published by the APSA-MENA newsletter, posted on the REMENA website and disseminated in the region through Al-Fanar, an online newsletter on higher education in the region.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Amount: $25,000<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Team Members:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Dr. Lisa Anderson (Columbia University)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Dr. Rabab El-Mahdi (The American University in Cairo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Dr. Stacey Philbrick Yadav (Hobart and William Smith Colleges)<\/figcaption>\n<\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n<\/details>\n\n\n\n

Just Telling It Like It Is: Descriptive Work and Social Science Research<\/strong><\/summary>\n

What is the role of descriptive research in Social Science? How can description, either on its own or in complementing causal work, contribute to the aims of Political Science? For the past 60 years, descriptive work has been relegated to the sidelines of Political Science, yet it is a necessary component across sub-fields and crucial for qualitative and quantitative work in conceptualization, measurement, and theory-building.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We will host an iterated two-part workshop series that includes discussion and presentations on description as a method and a tool of social scientific inquiry. These conversations involve examining best practices for scholars across sub-fields and methods who employ descriptive work in their research. More broadly, we seek to expand the scope of participation in the conversation on the value and contributions of descriptive work, both on its own and in combination with causal inference.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our proposed two workshops begin a discussion regarding the role and merits of descriptive work in Political Science with the intention of expanding that discussion through publications and a series of follow-up panels with APSA\u2019s Political Methodology section<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Amount: $25,000<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Team Members:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Dr. Mary Ann Mendoza (California State Polytechnic University, Pomona)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Carolyn E. Holmes (Mississippi State University)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Dr. Michelle Jurkovich (University of Massachusetts, Boston)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Dr. Meg Guilford (University of Pennsylvania)<\/figcaption>\n<\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n<\/details>\n\n\n\n

Geopolitics of Knowledge in the Covid-19 Era: A Policy Window for Epistemic Tension and Self-Determination in Africa?<\/strong><\/summary>\n

The Covid-19 pandemic is a critical juncture in how knowledge is created and disseminated globally with different implications and outcomes for different geographies. It provides an opportunity to question how knowledge is gained or lost on subjects and objects in different social and geopolitical spaces with focus on Africa as both a consumer and producer of knowledge. To be clear, emerging studies show that the Covid-19 pandemic and its dynamics have been a signpost of a distributive unfairness, inequality and discrimination in creating and disseminating epistemic goods. This conference therefore intends to explore the covid-19 era as both a moment of global epistemic tension and a powerful policy window for epistemic freedom. This tension is based on a plural temporality of knowledge and truth regimes articulating covid-19 to other health crisis and reflecting on the origins, the construction, and the circulations of knowledge. From a trans-disciplinary and interdisciplinary perspective, the geopolitics of knowledge creation, dissemination and acceptance can be explored around three key questions:<\/p>\n\n\n\n