Humanities & Society

When it comes to curbing gun violence in America, the field of public health should consider focusing less on the guns themselves and more on the human emotions that make people reach for guns in the first place, says a researcher from the Brown School at Washington University in St. Louis.

Dan Butler, a political scientist in Arts & Sciences, brings civic lessons to life through Lego bricks. He created a series of stop-motion videos that turn pop culture into lessons on the U.S. government for high school students.

A new paper from Andrea Katz, associate professor of law at Washington University in St. Louis and expert on constitutional law and presidential power, disputes a long-standing claim that America’s founders agreed the president holds an unrestricted power to fire executive officials.

Research from a psychologist at Washington University in St. Louis has found that anger is the emotion that can drive abrupt shifts in political attitudes.

The Missouri Legislature has passed a plan to redraw the state’s congressional maps, potentially handing a Democrat-leaning seat to Republicans and giving Republicans a 7-1 district advantage. Partisan mid-decade redistricting, once very rare, could become the new normal, says an expert on voting rights at Washington University in St. Louis.

From politics on college campuses to the economy and AI, the fall events series presented by the Weidenbaum Center at Washington University in St. Louis will address many of the most pressing policy issues facing America and the world today.  

Covering everything from social media to bitcoin to AI, a timely and all-too-topical political science course challenges students to think differently.

A new federal government interpretation allowing churches to endorse political candidates will cause division in churches and sets the stage for the U.S. government to favor politically aligned religions, says Mark Valeri, an American religious historian at Washington University in St. Louis.

Betsy Sinclair, who studies how politics influence social relationships, was installed recently as the Thomas F. Eagleton University Professor of Public Affairs and Political Science in Arts & Sciences.

As Congress weighs $715 billion in Medicaid cuts, WashU’s new Medicaid Policy Analysis Lab offers timely briefs showing how policy changes impact real people — especially in Missouri.