Melanie Bowers, PhD

Assistant Professor

Research Interests

  • Urban Politics and Policy, Housing and Homelessness Policy, LGBT+ Politics and Policy

Current Courses

Fall 2023

  • PLSC 366 – Research in Politics

Winter 2024

  • PLSC 427 – Politics of the Policy Process

 

Spring 2024

  • PLSC 101 – Government and Politics in the Modern World

Selected Publications

Peer Reviewed Articles

Bowers, Melanie and Robert R. Preuhs. 2009. Collateral Consequences of a Collateral Penalty:The Negative Effect of Felon Disenfranchisement Laws on the Political Participation of Non-Felons. Social Science Quarterly 90(3), 722-743.

Hula, Richard.C., Melanie Bowers, Cameron Whitley. and William Issac. 2017. Science, Politics and Policy: How Michiganders think about the Risks Facing the Great Lakes. Human Ecology, 45(6), pp.833-844.

Bowers, Melanie and Cameron Whitley. 2018. Voting While Trans: Assessing US Voter Registration Among Transgender Individuals. Political Behavior. Available online first https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11109-018-9489-x.

Bowers, Melanie. 2019. Show me what You’re Thinking: Using Student-Generated Photography to Flip the Political Science Classroom. Journal of Political Science Education 15(4), 498-506. https://doi.org/10.1080/15512169.2018.1509007.

Bowers, Melanie and Cameron Whitley. 2020. Is it Biology?: Assessing the Effects of Biological Attribution on Public Opinion of Transgender Rights. Accepted. Sex Roles. Available online first https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11199-019-01118-9.

Book

Melanie Bowers. Compassion or Criminalization?: Exploring Local Homelessness Policy in the US (Under Contract with NYU Press)

Book Reviews

Bowers, Melanie. 2020. Review of The One Way Street of Integration: Fair Housing and the Pursuit of Racial Justice in American Cities by Edward Goetz. Public Administration Review: Available online first https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/puar.13168.

Articles Under Review

Melanie Bowers and Galadrial Thoman. What Does Science have to do with It ?: An Examination of Public Opinion on Social Scientists’ Role in Poverty Policy