The Andrew Carnegie Fellows Program provides philanthropic support for scholarship in the humanities and social sciences that addresses important and enduring issues confronting our society. After a one-year pause in 2022, the 2024 Class of Andrew Carnegie Fellows marks the start of the program’s focus on developing a body of research around political polarization in the United States.
The award is for a period of up to two years and its anticipated result is a book or major study. The criteria prioritize the originality and promise of the research, its potential impact on the field, and the scholar’s plans for communicating the findings to a broad audience.
Meet the 2024 Andrew Carnegie Fellows
These scholars are working to help Americans understand how and why our society has become so polarized and what we can do to strengthen forces of cohesion.
The winning proposals comprise a wide range of research projects, including analyzing the largest dataset ever obtained from Meta to understand social media’s impact on polarization; developing civic education to decrease partisan prejudice among high school students; identifying conspiracy theories that lead to radicalization; and learning about democracy from the Asian American perspective.
- David Broockman, Associate Professor, University of California, Berkeley, The Nature and Origins of Political Polarization in America
- Lisa A. Bryant, Associate Professor and Chair of Political Science, California State University, Fresno, Polarizing the Process: Partisan Effects on Election Officials and Trust in Elections
- Joshua D. Clinton, Abby and Jon Winkelried Professor of Political Science, Vanderbilt University, Divided We Vote: Exploring the Crisis of Election Legitimacy in a Polarized America
- Johanna Dunaway, Professor of Political Science and Research Director, Syracuse University Institute for Democracy, Journalism and Citizenship, Nationalized News Increases Polarization and Weakens Democratic Norms
- Bernard L. Fraga, Associate Professor of Political Science and Faculty Coordinator of the Latinx Studies Initiative, Emory University, Why We Won’t Vote: Polarization, Non-Voting, and the Future of American Democracy
- D. Sunshine Hillygus, Professor of Political Science, Duke University, Redesigning Social Media to Reduce Partisan Animosity
- Taeku Lee, Bae Family Professor of Government, Harvard University, Reimagining America: What the Asian American Experience Can Tell Us about the Health of Democracy in the United States
- Neil Malhotra, Edith M. Cornell Professor of Political Economy, Stanford Graduate School of Business, Does Social Media Increase Political Polarization?
- Lilliana Mason, Associate Professor of Political Science, Johns Hopkins University, Addressing Polarization by Prioritizing Pluralistic Democracy
- Angie Maxwell, Diane Blair Endowed Chair in Southern Studies and Professor of Political Science, University of Arkansas, The Polarization of White Women in American Politics
- Jennifer McCoy, Regent’s Professor of Political Science, Georgia State University, Mitigating Pernicious Polarization through Innovative Civic Educational Interventions
- Elizabeth McKenna, Assistant Professor of Public Policy, Harvard Kennedy School, Grassroots Organizing to Strengthen Multiracial Democracy
- Neil A. O’Brian, Assistant Professor of Political Science, University of Oregon, Partisan Prescriptions: The Polarization of Health Outcomes
- Molly Offer-Westort, Assistant Professor of Political Science, University of Chicago, Digital Dialogues: Understanding Political Polarization through Online Discourse
- Julianna Pacheco, Professor of Political Science, University of Iowa, The Deadly Effects of Partisanship
- Markus Prior, Professor of Politics and Public Affairs, Princeton University, What Do They Want and When Do They Want It? Political Patience and Its Role in Partisan Polarization
- Brian F. Schaffner, Newhouse Professor of Civic Studies, Tufts University, American Mosaic: The Social Identities That Define Our Politics and a Path to Bridge the Divide
- Chris Tausanovitch, Associate Professor of Political Science, University of California, Los Angeles, Why Do Moderate Voters Elect Polarized Candidates?
About the Fellowship
The Andrew Carnegie Fellows Program supports high-caliber scholarship and research in the social sciences and humanities that address important and enduring issues confronting our society. Established in 2015 as the most generous stipend of its kind, the Corporation has named more than 270 Andrew Carnegie Fellows, representing a philanthropic investment of more than $54 million.
To be eligible, you must be a U.S. citizen or have permanent U.S. residency status. You must also be nominated by one of a designated group of individuals, who include leaders of universities, think tanks, and publishers. The criteria for their selection prioritized the originality and potential impact of the proposal, as well as the capacity to communicate the findings to a broad audience. The fellows were selected by a distinguished panel of jurors, chaired by John J. DeGioia, president of Georgetown University, and comprised of scholars and academic and intellectual leaders from some of the nation’s most prominent educational institutions, foundations, and scholarly societies.
The Andrew Carnegie Fellows Program is a continuation of the mission of Carnegie Corporation of New York, as founded by Andrew Carnegie in 1911, to promote the advancement and diffusion of knowledge and understanding. Today the foundation works to reduce political polarization through philanthropic support for the issues that Carnegie considered most important: education, democracy, and peace.