The Carey McWilliams Award is presented annually by the American Political Science Association (APSA) to honor major journalistic contributions to society’s understanding of politics.
California native Steve Lopez began his professional journalism career in the San Francisco Bay Area in 1975. The L.A. Times columnist has worked for Time magazine, The Philadelphia Inquirer, Oakland Tribune, and San Jose Mercury News, primarily as a metro columnist, but also as a news reporter and sportswriter. At the L.A. Times his areas of interest have included homelessness, housing and poverty; coastal governance and politics; and in his most recent beat — Golden State — he writes about the social, political, and policy challenge of serving the needs of the world’s rapidly aging population. He is a four-time Pulitzer Prize finalist for commentary. His national journalism awards include the Mike Royko, the Ernie Pyle, the H.L. Mencken, the Damon Runyon, and the Shorenstein Center David Nyhan awards. He is the winner of multiple Southern California Emmys and Golden Mic awards for his public affairs reporting on public television, and he shares a Columbia University DuPont award for that work. His books include three novels, two collections of columns, and the recent “Independence Day,” an Amazon retirement planning bestseller; and “The Soloist,” a New York Times bestselling work of non-fiction about his relationship with a homeless Juilliard-trained musician. The book won a PenUSA award for literary non-fiction and was the subject of a Dreamworks movie by the same name. He is learning to play the guitar and hoping to join a band before he turns 70, which happens in October.
Citation from the Award Committee:
We are pleased to present the 2023 Carey McWilliams Award to Steve Lopez, a columnist for the Los Angeles Times since 2001 and a four-time Pulitzer Prize finalist for commentary. His nomination letter notes that he “is a model of a regionally rooted journalist whose work, like that of McWilliams, speaks to and about broader national and international debates” and the committee agreed. Amid a decline of local news, Lopez’s work highlights the power of reporting on local, unique communities and the power of that contribution to shed light on inequality, regional disparities, and public policy problems in our own neighborhoods. From his work on homelessness in Los Angeles County, the effects of income inequality, the challenges facing Spanish-speaking immigrants, to his more recent work on aging, Lopez’s writing demonstrates his talent for listening to those at the margins and giving them voice. Beyond his work as a columnist, Lopez is the author of multiple books, including “The Soloist,” which won the PEN USA Literary Award for Non-Fiction, and most recently, “Independence Day.”
APSA thanks the committee members for their service: Dr. Bethany Albertson (chair) of the University of Texas, Austin, Dr. Annelise Russell of the University of Kentucky, and Dr. Babak Bahador of George Washington University.