William Phillips Shively

William Phillips Shively is Professor of Political Science at the University of Minnesota, with prior teaching appointments at the University of Oregon, Yale University, and the University of Oslo as a visiting professor.

Educational Background

• PhD, University of North Carolina, 1969

His research centers on the comparative study of elections and advanced data analysis methods in political science. He is renowned for authoring The Craft of Political Research and co-authoring Cross-Level Inference with Chris Achen, establishing foundational frameworks for electoral analysis. Specialties include global election systems, democracies, Western Europe, and quantitative methodology.

Shively has held significant leadership roles including Editor of the American Journal of Political Science and Principal Investigator for the multinational Comparative Study of Electoral Systems project. His administrative contributions span various University of Minnesota departments, driving collaborative research initiatives.

Outside academia, he maintains a dedicated interest in natural history as a personal passion.