Eric Patashnik

Julis-Rabinowitz Professor of Public Policy, Professor of Political Science, Chair, Department of Political Science
111 Thayer Street, Room 304
Areas of Expertise Bureaucracy, Democracy & Elections, Global Health, Health & Welfare, Tax Policy, Welfare Policy
Areas of Interest The politics of policymaking, health policy, fiscal politics, policy reform, implementation, the welfare state, Congress

Biography

Eric M. Patashnik is Julis-Rabinowitz Professor of Public Policy, Professor of Political Science, and Chair, Department of Political Science.

Patashnik is also a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution and a Fellow of the National Academy of Public Administration. Before coming to Brown, Patashnik held faculty positions at the Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy at the University of Virginia, the Luskin School of Public Affairs at UCLA, and the Department of Political Science at Yale University.  During his time at UVA, he served as associate dean and acting dean at the Batten School. Patashnik is the author and editor of several books including "Unhealthy Politics: The Battle over Evidence-Based Medicine" (with Alan Gerber and Conor Dowling, Princeton University Press, 2017)  and "Reforms at Risk: What Happens After Major Policy Changes Are Enacted" (Princeton University Press, 2008). He has twice won the Louis Brownlow Book Award of the National Academy of Public Administration and also won the Don K. Price Book Award of the American Political Science Association. He was a Research Fellow at the Brookings Institution during 1995-96, served as President of the Public Policy Section of the American Political Science Association during 2017-18, and was the editor of Journal of Health Politics, Policy and Law during 2016-2019.

Patashnik received his Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley. 

Research

Currently working on a book manuscript on the politics of policy backlash.

Publications

A Practical Guide for Policy Analysis: The Eightfold Path to More Effective Problem Solving, 6th edition (with Eugene S. Bardach). (Washington: CQ Press, 2019)

Unhealthy Politics: The Battle over Evidence-Based Medicine (with Alan S. Gerber and Conor M. Dowling). (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2017)

Congress and Policy Making in the 21st Century (co-edited with Jeffery Jenkins). New York: Cambridge University Press, 2016.

A Practical Guide for Policy Analysis: The Eightfold Path to More Effective Problem Solving, 5th edition (with Eugene S. Bardach). (Washington: CQ Press, 2016)

Living Legislation:  Durability, Change, and the Politics of American Lawmaking (co-editor with Jeffrey A. Jenkins) (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2012).

Reforms at Risk: What Happens After Major Policy Changes Are Enacted (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008).  

Promoting the General Welfare: New Perspectives on Government Performance (co-editor with Alan S. Gerber) (Washington: Brookings Institution Press, 2006)

Putting Trust in the U.S. Budget: Federal Trust Funds and the Politics of Commitment (Cambridge:  Cambridge University Press, 2000).  [Chinese translation, 2009]

Teaching

MPA 2445  Introduction to Public Policy

MPA 2765  System Dynamics: Policy Analysis for a Complex World

MPA 2160 Management and Implementation in Public and Nonprofit Organizations

POLS 1825E Health Care Politics and Policy

Recent News

News from Watson

Entrenchment and Health Equity

Eric Patashnik recently edited the volume Entrenchment and Health Equity in the Journal of Health Politics, Policy and Law.
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Eric Patashnik recently authored an essay titled, "Backlash Politics in America's Disunited and Polarized State" for the Studies in American Political Development Journal published by Cambridge University Press.
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Eric Patashnik recently co-authored "How Voters Use Contextual Information to Reward and Punish: Credit Claiming, Legislative Performance, and Democratic Accountability," a study focused on how voters use contextual information to evaluate the performance of legislators.
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