Thanks to the generous support of the National Research Initiative, the Boston College Political Science Department and American Enterprise Institute's Federalism Project are pleased to announce a new workshop series on the topic of federalism. Each workshop addresses a salient political or legal issue that affects state-to-state, or state to national, citizen and government relations. Marc Landy and Shep Melnick of Boston College and Michael Greve of the American Enterprise Institute are directing the project.

The purpose of this series is twofold. First, we hope to stimulate increased academic interest in federalism in its constitutional, political, and economic dimensions. In particular, we believe that an understanding of constitutional structure can, and should, inform academic and policy debate. Second, we look as these workshops as an opportunity to establish connections among federalism experts across disciplines and interests. The different backgrounds of our participants will, we expect, provide attendees with new insights about their work, future contacts, and unexplored resources.

Attendance is by invitation only. We welcome participant and speaker suggestions. Papers will be available, on line, following each session.

Presentations

Jonathan Rodden (MIT)

The Promise and Peril of Fiscal Federalism

January 2004

R. Shep Melnick (Boston College)

Deregulating the States: Federalism in the Rehnquist Court

February 2004

Kim Hendrickson (AEI)

Antebellum Reformers and the Creation of  Moral Federalism

March 2004

Michael Greve (AEI)

Preemption in the Rehnquist Court

April 2004

Craig Volden (Ohio State University)

Political Competition Between States and the Federal Government

May 2004

As a part of this BC/AEI collaboration, Michael Greve was a guest instructor at Boston College during the 2004 spring semester. The syllabus for American Federalism: Politics and Political Economy is available here.