Beth A. Rosenson

Professor Rosenson received her Ph.D. in Political Science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2000. She also worked as a journalist in the Boston area. Her research and teaching interests include political ethics and corruption, legislative behavior, media and politics, comparative state politics, and American political development. The main theme animating her research is an interest in understanding democratic accountability, particularly with reference to legislators. She has a special interest in the role that political reform measures and the media play in constraining and shaping legislative behavior. Her book Shadowlands of Conduct: Ethics and State Politics(Georgetown University Press, 2005) examined the enactment (and limitations) of conflict of interest laws for legislators in the American states.

Her work has also been published in various journals, including Legislative Studies Quarterly, Social Science Quarterly, Political Research Quarterly, Public Choice, and State Politics and Policy Quarterly. In addition to her book, Professor Rosenson has published on media bias and media coverage of state legislatures; the effects of conflict of interest laws, campaign finance laws, and the initiative process; who gives and who gets privately sponsored Congressional travel; variation in Congressional support for Israel; and U.S. House ethics investigations from 1798-2011.