ThePolity.net

Bill Ball is the publisher of ThePolity.net. He is a visiting associate professor of political science at Stetson University. From 1991 to 2009 he was a faculty member in the political science department at The College of New Jersey. He studies deliberative democracy and the civic education of adults while convening community-based deliberative forums. He also conducts local policy research with his students. His academic vita provides more details of these activities. When not doing that he is usually making self-indulgent short movies, buying stuff from Sparkfun electronics and torturing it to pieces, reading Make magazine, or barbecuing.

Stetson University Political Science Professor David Hill is the author of one book and several articles on voter turnout in American elections. He also has participated in the development and implementation of local level election-year surveys. He teaches courses in American Government, Political Parties and Interest Groups, Congress, Elections and Public Opinion.

Stetson University Political Science Professor William Nylen is widely published on Latin American politics and has taught courses in comparative politics, international political economy and the politics of development at Stetson, Northeastern and Harvard universities. He is fluent in English, Spanish and Portuguese.

Paul Lachelier is a political sociologist, and assistant professor in Stetson University’s Department of Sociology & Anthropology. Paul’s work mixes the practice and study of American politics. He has more than fifteen years of experience as a grassroots organizer in labor, environmental and electoral politics, including a 2002 run for State Representative as a Green Party candidate in Cambridge and Somerville, MA. Paul’s research and writing focuses on the theory and practice of citizen participation. He is currently in the early stages of writing a book on how young Americans make sense of politics, community, and citizenship. Courses he teaches include: How Americans Think, Power & Evil, and Community Organizing for Social Change. For more details, see his academic vita. When not working, Paul works out like a fiend.

Steve Frantzich is Professor of Political Science at the U.S. Naval Academy where he was honored as the outstanding instructor. He has a PhD from the University of Minnesota and a B.A. from Hamline University. He has authored over 20 books with a primary emphasis on the impact technology on politics. He serves as a consultant to the U.S. Congress and several foreign governments. He is the president of Books for International Goodwill (www.big-books.org) which has sent over 4 million books to underserved populations.

Kent E. Portney is a profesor of Political Science at Tufts Univeristy, where he teaches courses in methodology, judicial politics, political behavior, public administration, survey research, and environmental politics. He is the author of Taking Sustainable Cities Seriously: Economic Development, the Environment, and Quality of Life in American Cities (MIT Press, 2003), Approaching Public Policy Analysis (Prentice-Hall, 1986), Siting Hazardous Waste Treatment Facilities: The NIMBY Syndrome (Auburn House, Greenwood Publishing Group, 1991), and Controversial Issues in Environmental Policy (Sage Publications, 1992). He is also the co-author of Acting Civically, published in 2007 by Tufts University Press, and The Rebirth of Urban Democracy (Brookings, 1993). More information is available at his Our Green Cities or faculty web sites.