COSSA HOLDS 30^th ANNIVERSARY COLLOQUIUM AND CELEBRATION

On November 2 and 3, the Consortium of Social Science Associations (COSSA) held its 30^th Anniversary Colloquium and Celebration in Washington, DC. The largest audience in COSSA meeting history heard talks from key federal officials and distinguished social scientists.  Click here for full coverage.

The day began with a welcome from COSSA Executive Director Howard J. Silver in which he explained the organization's origins as an advocacy group - the need to fight severe cuts proposed by the Reagan Administration in 1981 to the social and behavioral science budgets at the National Science Foundation and elsewhere in the federal government. He also noted that in the subsequent 30 years, COSSA has dealt with five presidential administration and sixteen congresses.

Mann: Political Landscape

Tom Mann of the Brookings Institution, who served as the first chair of COSSA's Executive Committee, gave the keynote address examining the political landscape of the last thirty years.   He also congratulated COSSA for becoming "a serious Washington player" through its advocacy for the social sciences.

Reflecting on a theme that would be repeated throughout the colloquium, Mann suggested that the past 30 years have seen the enhancement of the social and behavioral sciences (SBS) with increased respect and more interaction with other sciences.   Although new assaults on the SBS sciences remain part of the political landscape, they are mainly idiosyncratic in character and less systematic than they were in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Turning to the overall political picture, Mann noted that the emphasis on shrinking budgets, particularly for domestic spending, will have a much more profound effect on the SBS than specific assaults on those sciences.   The budget situation has been exacerbated Mann suggested, by the problems of the U.S. political system, including the utter dysfunction of one branch of our government, notably the U.S. Congress.

Although the seeds for the difficulties with the political system were planted in the 1960s and 1970s, it took a long time for them to flourish. This has led to unprecedented current levels of pessimism in the country and the lowest levels for "trust in government" in the many years that phenomenon has been measured. The current level of approval for Congress is at eight or nine percent, Mann indicated, expressing surprise that it is that high!

He cited the example of the Debt Ceiling Crisis as unprecedented "hostage taking" and the "worst, irresponsible episode" of policy-making in his over 40 years of watching Washington. "It's worse than it looks," Mann suggested. He also told the crowd not to take the Deficit Reduction Committee (or Super Committee or Gang of Twelve as it is also known) too seriously.   "We are not about to reach a Kumbaya moment," Mann declared, since we have a "political war going on in Washington," with a take-no-prisoners approach. He, as well as observers from abroad, is also aghast at the current nomination contest in the Republican Party.

What has led us to this point in our political system? Mann explained that there is a mismatch between a party system that is ideological, parliamentary, and homogeneous, and a governance system that is based on separation of powers, with established norms that leads to compromises. In addition, in this era, majorities do not rule and extreme partisanship and polarization dominate. In Mann's view, the Republicans have become an "insurgent, radical, conservative, outlier" party.   What also makes this era so difficult, Mann bemoaned, is that facts, evidence and science are sacrificed for the need to challenge the legitimacy of the political opposition.

For full coverage click here.

For presenters' powerpoints click here.