Abstract
Public policy that advances the common good should be informed by evidence and by the best possible scientific analyses. For well over a century, The American Academy of Political and Social Science (AAPSS) has taken that proposition as axiomatic, commissioning and encouraging academic work that addresses our most pressing social concerns. Much of that work has been published through the years in The ANNALS. Sound analysis, though, can get short shrift in public discourse and in political debate, sometimes because policy-makers are unaware of its existence or persuaded by other concerns, and often because academics are unable to convey their findings in ways that are sufficient to compel political action.
With the Daniel Patrick Moynihan Prize, the AAPSS recognizes individuals who are champions of social science in the public realm—women and men whose careers have demonstrated how social research can make our public policies more effective and our politics better. In 2013, we asked the winner of that year’s Prize—William Julius Wilson—to deliver a major public policy address in Washington, D.C. in conjunction with the award, thereby inaugurating the Daniel Patrick Moynihan Lecture on Social Science and Public Policy. This practice continued in 2014, with Moynihan Prize recipient Joseph Stiglitz giving a talk on the campus of the George Washington University. We asked him to prepare a written version of that address for publication in this volume of The ANNALS, which he was kind enough to do.