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MAILINC ADDRESS

8888 University Dri\'e

Burnaby DC Canada

VSA IS6

TEL: 77N.782.4152

FAX: 77N.782.4860

vpres@sfu.ca

www.sfil.ca!vpresearch

SFU

SCUP 10-29

OFFICE OF THE VICE-PRESIDENT, RESEARCH

ATTENTION Sarah Dench, Secretary

Senate Committee on University

PLannin...9-.JSC_U_P....:..) ___

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FROM

B.

Mario Pinto, Vice-President. Research

RE Centre for the Study of Public Opinion and Political Representations

DATE March 11, 2010

Attached is a proposal from Dr. D. Laycock, for the establishment of the Centre for [he

Study of Public Opinion and Political Representation.

I recommend approval

as a research Centre according to Policy 40.01. Once approved

by

SCUP the proposal should be sent to Senate and the Board of Governors for

infonnation.

Motion:

That SCUP approves the "Centre for the Study of Public Opinion and Political

Representation"

as a Research Centre for a 5 year te

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r. B. Mario Pinto

Vice-President,

Research

Attachment

C:

Dr.

P. McFetridge, Associate Dean of Arts and Social Sciences

Dr.

D. Laycock, Political Science

'ING OF THE \

---

MEMO

Paul McFetridge

Associate Dean

.

.

SFU

JAN 2 9 2010

ATTENTION

Arts and Social Sciences

Dr. Jon Driver, Vice-President Academic

778-782-4957

mcfetRlsfu.ca

FROM

Paul McFetridge

RE

Proposal for Centre for the Study of Public Opinion and

Political Representation

DATE January 27, 2010

TIME 1:31 PM

I am attaching a proposal from Dr. David Laycock of the Department of Political Science for a

new Centre

for the Study of Public Opinion and Political Representation. In his accompanying

memo,

Dr. Laycock provides the rationale for the new Centre.

It

will provide a locus for an active

group

of researchers in quantitative studies and a point of reference for those in the community

interested

in this area of political research. The Office of the Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Social

Science supports this new initiative.

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---

Simon Fraser University

Thinking of the World

Professor David Laycock

Dr. Paul McFetridge,

Associate Dean,

FASS

Simon Fraser University

Dr. Jon Driver,

Vice-President Academic,

Simon Fraser University

Dr. Mario Pinto,

Vice-President Research,

Simon Fraser University

Dear Paul, Jon and Mario,

Department of Political Science

8888 University Drive

Burnaby, B.C. VSA

1S6

Tel:

(778) 782-3089

lavcock@sfu.ca

I am writing to provide you with some context for the application I submitted

earlier today to Paul with respect to creation of a new "Centre for the Study of

Public Opinion and Political Representation" at SFU. For your convenience, I

have attached an electronic copy of this application,

Several motivations lie behind this initiative. The first is our department's good

fortune in having young colleagues with tremendous expertise and wide-ranging,

well-funded research agendas in the study of public opinion and political

representation, both with respect

to Canada and a host of other [primarily DECO]

countries. Here I am referring to Mark Pickup, Eline de Rooij, Steven Weldon,

Genevieve Fuji Johnson and Jean-Francois Godbout [ now a faculty member at

McGill, who plans to remain closely connected to a variety of our projects and to

our young colleagues]. These young colleagues build on what was already a

substantial collection of senior colleagues in Political Science with interests in

---

2

either or both of public opinion or political representation: Andrew Heard, Paul

Warwick, Lynda Erickson [now Emeritus, but still active in a SSHRC project],

Patrick Smith and me. The proposed Centre will be an active force in bringing

together

all of these colleagues in collaborative projects, often extending well

beyond SFU, as the application indicates.

A second

and related motivation for the Centre's creation is the success of the

above-noted

colleagues in obtaining major and 'standard' external grant funds for

our research. We have been very successful with SSHRC in the last few years,

and have excellent prospects for future success, give the impressive publication

records of all concerned. We have also obtained major multi-year grant monies

for collaborative research projects, from not just the

SSHRC, but also from

Genome

BC and Genome Canada, and recently from Elections Canada for Dr.

Pickup's participation in the Canadian Election Study. This is the highest-profile

collaborative research project

in the Canadian Political Science community. The

CES has been conducted by a team of researchers for every federal election

since 1962, and is now funded for $850,000 over the next two elections. With

these and other substantial external research funds [eg., over $600,OOOfrom

Genome Be and Genome Canada], Centre members will be able to hire large

numbers of graduate students as RAs. We'll do a great deal to provide a variety

of activities and services - colloquia, visiting scholars, working paper series,

conference paper experiences, among others - of great value to these graduate

students. These colloquia, conference

and paper series will also bring

considerable positive attention to SFU.

A third motivation for the Centre is our desire to bring together colleagues from a

variety of academic units

in FASS - the Public Policy Program, International

Studies, Women's Studies, Urban Studies, and Political Science - who share of

have clearly complementary research interests. As you

can see from the

provisional list of such colleagues in our application, we are starting with a

---

...

J

modest inter-disciplinary group, but fully intend to extend it as the Centre finds its

footing.

A fourth motivation stems from our visit by

Dr. Hans-Dieter Klingemann in 2008-

09 as the Canada Council's Diefenbaker Visiting Professor in Political Science.

As you know, we were fortunate to win the national competition for the sole

Diefenbaker Award that year by recruiting and presenting Dr. Klingemann's

application. While Dr. Klingemann was here, we came to understand that

attracting other top-flight international

political science scholars to SFU as visitors

would not be particularly difficult. And Dr. Klingemann assured us that our

department would be an especially attractive sabbatical home for many scholars

studying public opinion or political representation, given the strong concentration

of high-profile and high-performing young

colleagues, and more established

colleagues, that we have in these areas. Our Centre will provide an attractive

institutional home for such visiting scholars,

especially insofar as it conducts the

range of activities we propose, and maintains affiliate memberships for external

colleagues such as Dr. Klingemann [who is keen to return to SFU!], Dr. Godbout,

and non-academic practitioners

like Angus Reid.

The final motivation for the Centre's creation that I'll note at this time concerns

Angus Reid. While

I was department Chair, I worked to build strong connections

between our department and Angus Reid Strategies, a major international public

opinion firm headquartered in downtown Vancouver. Dr. Reid has sought strong

links to a local university over the past decade, with previous but ultimately

unsuccessful approaches to both

USC and SFU. I've known Angus for much of

the last decade, so last year I brought Angus together with five of our young

colleagues. Angus and his senior

colleagues were greatly impressed by Dr.

Pickup, Dr. de Rooij, Dr. Weldon, Dr. Godbout and Dr. Chinard. Among other

things,

he is keen to involve these colleagues as occasional advisors on some of

his firms' initiatives, and intends to hire SFU graduates who have been trained by

Dr. Pickup, Dr. de Rooij, Dr. Weldon and others here. Angus is convinced that we

---

4

provide some of the best training in quantitative political analysis in the country.

And Dr. Reid's firm has assisted with two national surveys for the Genome

BC/Genome Canada research projects,

so we've built a professional relationship

with him.

I know from speaking to Angus that he would like to support our new

Centre

in a variety of ways, including - when the economy improves - bursaries

for visiting

fellows, or post.docs, or graduate students. Our Centre, then, will

provide

an attractive point of contact through which Dr. Reid can provide direct

and indirect support to SFU. And I suspect that it will become an important

magnet for other non-academic [as well

as academic] forms of external support

for our research.

In closing, I should note that we do not anticipate that SFU will provide anything

other than 'in-kind' resources

in support of the Centre. Administrative expenses

incurred for part.time administrative assistants will

be covered from external

grant or other sources. We do not intend

to offer courses or anything else that

would require semesterly financial transfers from

FASS or the senior

administration. All we'll need

is two offices [one for visiting fellows, and one for

post-doctoral fellows or advanced PhD research assistants), very occasional

administrative support from Political

Science office staff, a continuation of

standard service support from the V-P Research office,

and the standard

extension of library and computer privileges to our visitors.

I'll be happy to meet with any of you to discuss prospects for this new "Centre for

the

Study of Public Opinion and Political Representation" at SFU. Should there

be any questions that

J can address briefly bye-mail, please don't hesitate to

contact me at laycock@sfu.ca.

Sincerely,

David Laycock

---

Simon Fraser University

Centre for the Study of Public Opinion

and

Political Representation

The name of this unit is the "Centre for the Study of Public Opinion and Political

Representation.

"

I. Purpose

This new Centre at SFU will support social science research into matters of

public opinion and political representation, with regional, national and

comparative international objects

of study. The major initial research themes will

include:

• Elections, political parties and public opinion: Canadian and Comparative

perspectives

• Changing dynamics and challenges in representation and deliberation in

civil society and the broader political community

• Interactions between public opinion, interest mobilization and public policy

To support the Centre's mandate, a variety of activities are planned from the

outset:

• One inter-university conference per year

• Financial support for, and supervision of, Graduate research

assistantships associated with Centre research projects

• Faculty and graduate student exchanges, particularly with affiliated

research centres

• Visiting Fellow position

» Our first Visiting Fellow will be Dr. Francois Petry, Professor,

Departement de science politique, and Director, Le Centre

d'analyse des politiques publiques, Laval University [September

2010 - August 2011].

• Post-doctoral fellowships, funded through external grants

• Website

• Participation by Centre members in ongoing and prospective collaborative

research projects, including:

» Genome BC and Genome Canada-funded projects on the

Canadian wine industry [David Laycock, Michael Howlett, Anil Hira

and Steven Weldon]

» "The Canadian Cooperative Campaign Analysis Project" [Mark

Pickup, in conjunction with the Polling Observatory and

Department

of Politics and International Relations, Oxford

University]

);>

"The Canadian Election Study" [Mark Pickup, in conjunction with

Patrick Fournier ( U de Montreal, Fred Cutler (UBC), Stuart Soroka

(McGill), Dietlind Stolle (McGill), Daniel Rubenson (Ryerson), Peter

Lowen

(U of Toronto), Amanda Bittner (MUN), Scott Matthews

(Queen's), and

Allison Harell (U of Connecticut). $850,000 funding

8

---

2

for this project through at least the next two federal elections, from

SSHRC and Elections Canada.

~

"Canadian Social Democracy and the Fourth Party System"

{SSHRC standard grant, David Laycock, Lynda Erickson and

Steven

Weldon]

~

"Federalism and representation in the European Union and

Canada"

{Michael Howlett, David Laycock and Steven Weldon,

with John Eric Fossum, Research Director, ARENA, Oslo, as part

of ARENA's Transformation and Sustainability

of the European

Political Order' research project. See

http://www.arena.uio.no/aboutlcoreareas/coreareas08-11.xml

J

?

"European Integration and Multiculturalism" {Steven Weldon with

Hans-Dieter

Klingemann, Berlin Social Science Research Centre]

~

"The Role of the Centre in Democratic Politics: Re-Assessing the

'Median Mandate'

" {SSHRC Standard Grant, Paul Warwick]

~

"How Published Campaign Polls Affect Elections from a

Comparative Perspective"

{SSHRC standard grant, Mark Pickup

with Fred Cutler,

UBC, and Scott Matthews, Queen's University]

After

several years of operation, in addition to new externally funded research

projects,

involving Genome BC, Genome Canada and SSHRC, among others,

we will

be featuring the following additional activities:

~

Speaker series

~

Visiting Fellows

~

Public forums

~

Working paper series

The Centre will

establish a range of formalized and informal national and

international collaborations. These will assist its members' efforts to undertake

and publish

results from state of the art investigations into a wide range of

contemporary issue areas, electoral and civil society site of political

representation. Initial research liaisons will be established with:

• Le Centre d'analyse des politiques publiques, Laval University Le Centre

d'analyse des politiques publiques, Laval University

• La Chaire de recherche du Canada en etudes electorales, Universite de

Montreal

•

The Centre for the Study of Democratic Institutions, University of British

Columbia

•

The Center for the Study of Democracy, University of California, Irvine

•

The Centre for European Studies {ARENA]. University of Oslo

•

The Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin fur Sozialforschung (Social Science

Research Center

Berlin)

• Faculty

of Social Sciences, Politics and Economics, Universite Libre de

Bruxelles

•

The Polling Observatory, Oxford University

...,

---

3

The Centre also intends to build on the working relationship already established

in Genome BC and Genome-Canada projects with Vancouver-based Angus Reid

Strategies. This should lead to employment opportunities for graduate students

associated with the Centre, as

well as some financial support by Angus Reid

Strategies for Centre activities.

II. Membership

The Centre for the Study of Public Opinion and Political Representation will

initially draw its membership primarily from SFU's Department of Political

Science.

Initial full members will include Political Science faculty Kina Chenard,

Laurent Dobuzinskis, Lynda Erickson, Andrew Heard, Anil Hira, Michael Howlett,

Genevieve Fuji Johnson, David Laycock, Mark Pickup, Eline de Rooij, Paul

Warwick and Steven Weldon.

We plan to ask a variety

of other SFU faculty to partiCipate as members,

including Catherine Murray, Communications; Shane Gunster, Communications;

Kennedy Stewart, Public Policy Programme; Douglas MacArthur, Public Policy

Programme; Tamir Moustafa, School

of International Studies; Jeffrey Checkel,

School

of International Studies; and, Lara Nettelfield, School of International

Studies.

We will include all interested graduate students, especially those working with

faculty members on Centre-sponsored projects, as affiliate members and active

partiCipants in Centre activities. We will seek additional full members in SFU's

School

of Communications, the Public Policy Program, the School of

International Studies, and the Department of Sociology and Anthropology. And

we will encourage affiliate membership by non-academics who work

professionally in the areas of public opinion research, political communication,

political party and

NGO activity, and government policy analysis and

development.

The Centre will also provide a variety

of external scholars with 'research

associate' member status, to encourage their collaboration and visits.

III. Governance

1. The Centre for the Study of Public Opinion and Political Representation will be

within the administrative purview of the Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Social

Sciences.

2. This Centre's governance will be undertaken by a Steering Committee for the

Centre for the Study of Public Opinion and Political Representation.

---

4

3. Centre for the Study of Public Opinion and Political Representation policies will

be

established by majority vote among full members of the Centre.

4. This Centre's Director shall be selected by majority vote among members of

Steering Committee for the Centre for the Study of Public Opinion and Political

Representation.

5. New members of the Steering Committee shall be selected by a majority vote

of the Committee, but to Approval by the Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Social

Sciences.

6. Within two years of its creation, the Centre for the Study of Public Opinion and

Political Representation will establish an Advisory Committee, allowing the

Centre to benefit from the expertise and support

of academics and non-

academics with professional interests

in the Centre's activities.

IV. Steering Committee for the Centre for the Study of Public Opinion and

Political Representation

Provisional list:

Genevieve Fuji Johnson, Department

of Political Science, SFU

David Laycock, Department of Political Science, SFU

Douglas MacArthur, Public Policy Programme, SFU

Catherine Murray, Women's Studies and Communications

Mark

Pickup, Department of Political Science, SFU

Eline

de Rooij, Department of Political Science, SFU

Paul WalWick,

Department of Political Science and School of International

Studies, SFU

Steven Weldon, Department of Political Science, SFU

V. Other Matters

1. The Director and Steering Committee of the Centre for the Study of Public

Opinion

and Political Representation will be responsible for administration of the

Centre's funds and employment

of any staff. This, and use of the Centre's name,

will be undertaken in keeping with relevant University policies.

2. An annual report shall be prepared by the Director, approved by the Steering

Committee, and submitted to the Dean, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences.

3. Contracts and grants involving the Centre shall be administered consistent

with the relevant

SFU policies and procedures.

/I

---

5

4. Project funding for research conducted under the auspices of this Centre has

been and will be obtained through external grant competitions. Exceptions to this

rule will involve provision of ' in kind' resources by SFU, such as office space and

access to library and computer facilities for visiting faculty and post-doctoral

associates

of the Centre.

5. The University will be recognized in all publications stemming from research

projects conducted with Centre for the Study

of Public Opinion and Political

Representation sponsorship or support.