Government


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Government

The goal of Hamilton's Government Department is to engage students in discussion pertaining to the political dynamics of human life through research and intensive writing. Students emerge prepared to shape, analyze and fully participate in civic life.

Overview

Societies are not just groups of individuals. Each has a political dimension — a collective identity, a structure of power and a system of public values. This dimension is the focus of the study of government at Hamilton. How do societies organize collective effort? Do they achieve the public good? Are individual citizens included in the decision-making process? More ...

Academic Program

Research Opportunities

The Hamilton Washington, D.C. Program offers a combination of rigorous academic study and real-world experience in national government to the 16 juniors and seniors who participate each fall. Students do research and attend seminars led by a resident member of Hamilton's Government Department while working full time in a Washington, D.C., office. In recent years, students have worked in the White House Communications Office, the Senate Judiciary Committee, the State Department and the Department of Justice's Civil Rights Division.

Created in 1969, the  provides a combination of academic study and experience in national government to the 16 juniors and seniors who participate in the program each fall. Students conduct research and attend seminars led by a resident member of the department while working full time in Congressional and/or executive offices. In recent years, students have worked in the White House Communications Office, the Senate Judiciary Committee, the Department of Justice Civil Rights Division, and in the State Department.


The Senior Program

Senior majors in government complete a senior thesis and a research paper, working closely with a faculty member in the department. In the Senior Program, students draw on their accumulated skills and knowledge to produce focused, high-level scholarship on a specific topic or problem. More ...


Resources

Hamilton's Arthur Levitt Public Affairs Center is one of the College's most active and important resources. Government majors and other students engage in the civic life of the region through the center's Community Outreach Office, service learning projects, and numerous field trips and conferences. Students and faculty members collaborate on community-based research directed by the Levitt Center, while the Levitt Scholars Program sends Hamilton students to high schools to speak on a variety of civic topics. And the center's Think Tank, a student-led discussion group, provides an informal forum for students and faculty members to discuss current issues.

The department's Linowitz Professorship in International Affairs — named for the late Sol Linowitz, a Hamilton alumnus, presidential advisor and ambassador — brings a series of eminent diplomats to Hamilton as visiting professors. Recent Linowitz Professors include Edward S. "Ned" Walker Jr., former ambassador to Israel, former assistant secretary of state and a Hamilton alumnus; Brandon H. Grove, former ambassador to Zaire and 35-year veteran of the U.S. Foreign Service; and Bernard Kalb, former assistant secretary of state and a veteran diplomatic journalist for The New York Times, CNN, NBC and CBS.

The Levitt Center Lecture Series also brings well-known civic servants and public-affairs scholars to Hamilton each semester. Recent visitors include Alice Rivlin, founding director of the Congressional Budget Office and former vice chair of the Federal Reserve Board; Nobel Prize recipient in economics Joseph E. Stiglitz; Lawrence J. Korb, former assistant secretary of defense; Catholic and feminist scholar Elizabeth Fox-Genovese; former Planned Parenthood President Gloria Feldt; and former presidential advisor, author and conservative commentator Dinesh D'Souza.