By Rachel Muir
For John Sides, there’s no such thing as politics as usual.
The field is constantly evolving and its reach is pervasive. “Politics touches everyone’s life, and political science helps us understand how politics works,” says Dr. Sides, an assistant professor at GW.
The discipline of political science, he says, examines everything from why certain candidates win and if lobbyists bias the legislative process to what provokes civil war and how to end it.
“Most political scientists are in the game because politics matters,” says Dr. Sides, who counts campaigns, elections, national identity, public opinion and immigration among his areas of expertise.
What does he see as the most important trend in American politics?
“One trend is the growing ideological polarization between the two parties,” says Dr. Sides. “This is most visible among elected politicians. In Congress, the average Democrat and the average Republican are much further apart than they were 40 years ago.”
In the House, he says, the polarization has prompted Democrats, the majority party, to largely exclude Republicans from the legislative process, while in the Senate a rise in obstructionism means that almost any important resolution or legislation must earn 60 votes to overcome the threat of a filibuster. The feuding makes the prospects for legislation on hot-button issues like immigration increasingly unlikely.
But, he says, the growing gulf between parties hasn't alienated Americans from politics. “People’s trust in government is at low ebb, but this is due more to the economy than partisan bickering,” says Dr. Sides. “Americans’ participation in politics--especially in recent presidential elections—has increased sharply. This phenomenon points to a potential paradox: people say they dislike conflict, but perhaps that’s what gets them interested in politics.”
As a college student, Dr. Sides thought he would parlay a degree in political science into a career as an attorney. “I soon realized that the law held no real interest for me,” he says. “But politics did.”
After graduating from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Dr. Sides earned a master’s and doctorate at the University of California at Berkley. He came to GW in 2005 after a few years on the faculty at the University of Texas at Austin.
At GW, Dr. Sides teaches an introductory class in American politics, upper-division classes in the media and politics and in public opinion, and a public opinion course for Ph.D. students. He has also led seminars about campaigns and elections and about the political psychology of prejudice and mass violence.
“One of the great things about GW undergraduates is their own passion for politics,” he says. “Sometimes college students are stereotyped as apathetic and uninformed about political issues and current events. At GW, that stereotype is completely inaccurate.”
In addition to his teaching and research, Dr. Sides is one of the founders, along with four other professors, of the popular blog The Monkey Cage. The blog covers a wide range of political topics and current events with recent posts analyzing the British elections, health care reform and funding for graduate students. The name, he says, comes from an H.L. Mencken quote: “Democracy is the art of running the circus from the monkey cage.”
While Dr. Sides says he could study polls and public opinion just about anywhere, being in D.C. has plugged him into a broader community of journalists, commentators and think-tanks. “This, combined with blogging at The Monkey Cage, has definitely encouraged me to push political science research to others outside of academia,” he says.