Biography
Professor Krassa
joined the University of Illinois in 1984 after receiving a PhD from
Washington University. He is the chair of
the Human Dimensions of
Environmental Systems program, and a faculty member in
the
political science department. He has held past appointments with UIUC’s
Sociology department,
American University, and the
University of Cambridge. He was an
affiliate of the Merriam Laboratory
for Analytic Political Research, the Institute of Government, and the
Survey Research Laboratory at UIUC, and served as the Graduate Director
from 1992-2002.
At the university he currently serves on the
Faculty Senate
and
the Educational Policy
Committee. He also serves on the University Civic Outreach Committee. In recent years he also has served on the University
Student Discipline
Committee,
and the
Conference on Conduct
Governance;
and chaired the LAS
Courses and Curriculum Committee
and the
Committee on Student Internships.
He also is the Illinois coordinator for the
social science program in Malta, and the acting director of the
Civic Engagement Program.
He also is the campus coordinator of the interdisciplinary
Environment and
Behavior Workgroup
Outside the University setting, he serves as the chair of the Council on
Urban Habitat's
Committee on Social and Political Impacts
and is a member of the British
Royal Commission for Poundbury.
He is a nonpartisan political consultant and a member of
IAPC and
AAPC ; he has been a campaign advisor to numerous congressional,
senatorial, and gubernatorial candidates; he has worked on issues of
neighborhood development, and given expert testimony in legislative
redistricting issues and voting rights cases. He testified before Congress
on election reform. He is a registered
lobbyist who has worked on behalf of the
ADA, the
LWW, the CCB, the
LGA, the
NGA, the NAC, the
LAANC, the
AAUP, and other nonprofit organizations.
In recent years he has lectured at Cambridge.
Berkeley,
Chicago,
Princeton,
Kings College, and the
London School of Economics. He served as
Director of Graduate Studies for the UI political science department from
1992-2002. He has served on the editorial boards of university presses
and journals, including the
Journal of Politics,
the
American Political Science Review,
and the
American Journal of Political Science.
Professor Krassa has published in journals such as the American
Political Science Review,
the
American Journal of Political Science, Social Networks,
American Politics Review, Contexts,
the
American Sociological Review,
Political Behavior, Contemporary Anthropology,
and the
Journal of Mathematical Sociology.
He has authored texts on American government, the social and political
context, and has a forthcoming book examining the interrelations among
social networks, the physical environment, and civic engagement. He is
author of several textbooks including
Understanding American Government, a basic introduction to American
government for high school students and a college level text,
American Democracy: From theory into practice,
which focuses on the successes and failures in the ways that America has
implemented democratic ideals and the ideas of the Founders. A forthcoming
textbook,
Structuring Governance: An introduction to political science
offers an introduction to political science text that focuses on how
institutional arrangements and rules affect the qualities of governance.
His current research examines the impact on people and politics of the
changing character of social interaction in modern societies. It explores
how social connections are formed and how they influence political opinions,
attitudes, and the individual's role in government and civic life. The
main emphasis of his recent work explores how the physical environment
shapes social networks and individual attitudes toward other citizens,
government, and one's attachment to place. In
Fight versus Flight
he examined how the physical realm shapes the individual's willingness to
participate in neighborhood based collective action efforts, and in
Public Space, Community Engagement, and Social Groups
he demonstrates how the configuration of space shapes the kind of impact
that formal and informal groups can have on civic engagement.
In other work he also studies the career patterns of legislators and in a
recent project has interviewed new, continuing, and retiring members of
congress in order to understand how the institution, rules, and election
affect their careers. Other research interests include campaigns and
elections, especially the way that different citizen groups respond to
various campaign tactics, and how citizens use religious values to inform
their electoral choices and when and why they choose to ignore portions of
their religion’s values.
The Myth of the Catholic Voter
(forthcoming, with Professors Davison and Reagan) illustrates the
conflicting impacts of Catholic theology on different types of voters
claiming to be Catholics.
Research Interests
The interdependence of social sustainability, political sustainability, and
environmental sustainability;
Neighborhood design and the local business climate;
Social dimensions of physical health;
New Urbanism;
The civic life of the neighborhood;
Urban form and social behaviors;
Neighborhood design and social networks;
Civic engagement and democracy;
Suburbanization and sustainable suburban development;
The impact of architecture, urban form, and the physical environment on
political and social life;
The role of the Public Square and Public Space in civic life;
Creating functional and sustainable public spaces in contemporary societies;
Social Context theories;
The interdependence of physical spaces and social networks;
Electoral reforms
Electoral behavior;
Elite behaviors;
The political behaviors of religious groups;
Teaching Interests
Impact of the local environment.
Zoning, development, urban form, and civic life.
Civic engagement.
Politics and the civic realm
Public spaces and human behaviors.
The closing of the commons.
Neighborhoods and politics.
Social Ecology.
Architecture and politics.
Human dimensions of environmental systems.
American politics
Electoral behavior.
Social Context Theory
Social Movements.
Comparative political behavior.
Comparative electoral behavior.
Survey research.
Statistics and econometrics.
Quantitative research methods.
Qualitative research methods.
Miscellaneous Information (from various presentations and talks, just to
give you an idea of what I do):
Networks and Neighborhoods. Presentation on research about how urban
form influences social networks.
Slight variations were presented at
Human Dimensions of Environmental Systems,
the
Builders Council,
and the
Conference of Illinois Mayors.
These works were primarily dated 2005 and 2006.
A Quick Tour of our research sites that fall in the “new
urbanism”
category. This was
for a class
I teach (Neighborhoods and Politics), just to give them an idea of what new
urban neighborhoods look like.
Of course, our research also includes many neighborhoods that are not “new
urban,” including some quite old neighborhoods and very new neighborhoods.
These are just the new urban neighborhoods we look at.
2008.
Better Together: Lively Main Streets, Vital Neighborhoods, and Engaging
Public Spaces. Presentation
on the mutual interdependence of neighborhoods, local commerce, and public
spaces. This work is an attempt
to place past works into an integrated theory.
Cornelius O’Brien Conference,
2008.
The Catholic Voter Myth:
Theology
and ideology in the voting behavior of
Catholics.
Paper, in progress, with Don Davison, 2010.