• My curriculum vitae (a .pdf file).
• My Statement of Teaching Experience and Philosophy.
• My academic interests
• A summary of current and future research work (A more detailed Statement of Research Interests is also available: Statement of Research Interests and Plans )
• Publications, Working Papers, and Draft Dissertation Chapters
• Contact information

A graphical example from my dissertation:

• social policy
• population aging
• pensions and benefits
• economic sociology
• inequality
• contentious politics and social movements
• social networks
• law and society

• Dissertation Title: "Cooperation and Collusion: The Social Ambivalence of Lobbying in America."
  Dissertation Committee: Victor G. Nee (Chair), Douglas Heckathorn, Richard Swedberg, Sidney Tarrow
  Abstract: My dissertation examines a community of policy actors who are governed by trust-based norms specific to their community. Using a unique longitudinal dataset of lobbyists' social networks as well as qualitative interviews with political insiders and social movement activists, I focus on a specific policy domain of lobbyists and activists. I trace the development of social networks of lobbying, the content of such networks, and their effects on political interactions over time. These effects are underwritten by social norms of cooperation, reciprocity, and confidentiality among embedded lobbyists, which norms enable information-thick exchange and joint activity. I also focus on how the social norms among lobbyists exclude outside activists, who in response characterize lobbyists' social norms and relationships as collusive. This research has been funded in part by a National Science Foundation Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant.



• Related to my dissertation is a current project that examines Internet-based linkages among activists and compares these linkages with connections among opposing lobbyists. Using unique or underutilized data sources and techniques, I find that both groups exhibit dense social linkages but of different kinds.



• A third area of policy-related research concerns the diffusion of public policies. For example, one project in which I am involved is a study of the spread of same-sex policies around the globe from the 1970s to the present. With my collaborators, we identify and model the diffusion of several dimensions of same-sex policies, including military service, hate crimes and civil unions. I am also involved in a project that is examining environmental politics, lobbying, and protest in order to see how these factors affect environmental policy both individually and in interaction.



• I also have an interest in population aging and its effects on social welfare systems and labor market institutions. Specifically, in a couple of papers with my co-authors, I look at the phenomenon of phased retirement, which is the gradual reduction of hours worked or job responsibilities as one approaches full retirement. My co-authors and I completed a report on phased retirement for the AARP (a copy of which can be obtained at the AARP website).



• Another aging-related focus in my current work is connecting the erosion of retirement income security with changes in political and economic institutions. I argue that the system of tax laws and institutions governing private pensions both directs political change as well as responses to such change in a way that has facilitated the erosion of old age income security for workers.

• Draft manuscript for the dissertation, "Cooperation and Collusion: The Social Ambivalence of Lobbying in America."

Chapter 1: Introduction
Chapter 2: Lobbying in Washington, D.C.
Chapter 3: Research Site, Data, and Methods
Chapter 4: The Policy Domain and Coalitions
Chapter 5: Influence
Chapter 6: Cooperative Norms (partial draft only)


• "'We are not alone': Virtual Strong Ties of Activists Over Time." A working paper on Internet-based ties among social movement activists and lobbyists. Presented at the 2007 Midwest Political Science Association Annual Meeting in Chicago, IL, April 12, and at the Collective Behavior and Social Movement Workshop at Hofstra University, August 2007.



• "Bad Jobs on the Way to Retirement? Phased Retirement and the Transition from Work to Retirement." With Yung-Ping Chen and Jie Chen.



• With Stephen L. Morgan, I have completed an article, "Intergenerational Transfers and the Prospects for Increasing Wealth Inequality", that is in press in Social Science Research and discusses wealth inequality among older Americans and how such inequality may or may not perpetuate inequality in future generations.



• "The Social Embeddedness of Lobbying." A working paper that will be presented at the 2007 Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, Chicago, IL.



• "Baltimore Bricolage: Networks, Entrepreneurs, Social Movements, and Institutional Actors." A working paper on social network innovation among elites and social movement groups in 1960s Baltimore over the issue of urban freeway development.



• "Does Phased Retirement Extend the Worklife? Evidence from Event History and Growth Curve Analysis." A working paper on the phenomenon of phased retirement and whether it extends or shortens the working lives of older Americans.



• "Private Pensions, the Tax Code, and the Erosion of Retirement Income Security." A working paper presented at the Graduate Student Workshop of the Thunder of History: Taxation in a Comparative and Historical Perspective, Northwestern University, May 2007.








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Contact Information:
John C. Scott
323 Uris Hall
Department of Sociology
Cornell University
Ithaca, N.Y. 14853
Email: jcs86@cornell.edu
Telephone: (607) 351-3344



Last Updated on
September 20, 2007

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