Every year the section awards the Theda Skocpol Dissertation Award to the best doctoral dissertation in the area of comparative and historical sociology. Eligible dissertations must have been defended and filed two years prior to which they are nominated. Dissertations may be nominated by dissertation chairs, advisors, or current department chairs. Self-nominations are not allowed for this award. Dissertations may be nominated by sending a letter or email to each member of this prize committee.
2025
Mary Shi, UC Berkeley, “Settlers’ Republic: Land, Infrastructure, and the Emergence of New Technologies of Government in the United States, 1789–1862”
Honorable Mention:
Youbin Kang, University of Wisconsin-Madison, “Underground Labor and the Politics of Circuits: Public Transit Systems of New York and Seoul, 1974-2022”
2024
co-winner
Shay O’Brien, “Dallas: Kinship, Mobility, and Inheritance in an Elite Population, 1895-1945. (Princeton University)
co-winner
Rahardhika Utama, “Embedded Peasantry and Economic Transformation in the Asian Rubber Belt.” (Northwestern University)
2023
Martin Eiermann, “American Privacy: Diffusion and Institutionalization of an Emerging Political Logic, 1870-1930.” (UC- Berkeley)
2022
Wan-Zi Lu, “Body Politics: Morals, Markets, and Mobilization of Organ Donation.” (University of Chicago)
2021
Benjamin H. Bradlow, “Urban Origins of Democracy and Inequality: Governing Sao Paolo and Johannesburg, 1985-2016.” (Brown University).
2020
Johnnie Lotesta, “Rightward in the Rustbelt: How Conservatives Remade the GOP, 1947-2012,” (Ph.D. diss., Brown University)
2019
Sefika Kumral “Democracy and Violence: Social Origins of Anti-Kurdish Riots in Turkey,” (Johns Hopkins University)
Honorable Mention:
Isabel Perera, “States of Mind: A Comparative and Historical Study on the Political Economy of Mental Health.” (University of Pennsylvania)
2018
Charles Seguin (Univ. of Arizona): “Making a National Crime: The Transformation of U.S. Lynching Politics, 1883-1930” (University of North Carolina).
2017
Robert Braun “Religious Minorities and Resistance to Genocide: Christian Protection of Jews in the Low Countries during the Holocaust” (Ph.D., Cornell University)
Honorable Mention:
Shai Dromi. “The Religious Origins of Transnational Relief: Calvinism, Humanitarianism, and the Genesis of Social Fields” (Yale University)
2016
Hillary Angelo. “How Green Became Good: Urban Greening as Social Improvement in Germany’s Ruhr Valley”. (Ph.D. New York University)
2015
Alena K. Alamgir. “Socialist Internationalism at Work: Changes in the Czechoslovak-Vietnamese Labor Exchange Program, 1967-1989.” (Rutgers University).
2014
Şahan Savaş Karataşlı. “Financial Expansions, Hegemonic Transitions, and Nationalism: A Longue Durée Analysis of State-Seeking Nationalist Movements.” (John Hopkins University)
2013
Jaeeun Kim, “Colonial Migration and Transborder Membership Politics in Twentieth-Century Korea” (University of California, Los Angeles)
Honorable Mention:
Kevan Harris, “The Martyrs Welfare State: Politics of Social Policy in the Islamic Republic of Iran”, (Johns Hopkins University)
2012
Stephan Bargheer, “Moral Entanglements: the Emergence and Transformation of Bird Conservation in Great Britain and Germany, 1790-2010.” (University of Chicago)
Honorable Mention:
Damon Mayrl, “Secular Conversions: Politics, Institutions, and Religious Education in the United States and Australia, 1800-2000.” (University of California, Berkeley)
2011
Robert S. Jansen, “Populist Mobilization: Peru in Historical and Comparative Perspective.” (University of California Los Angeles)
Honorable Mention:
Besnik Pula “State, Law and Revolution: Agrarian Power and the National State in Albania, 1850-1945.” (University of Michigan.)
2010
Dan Lainer-Vos, “Nationalism in Action: The Construction of Irish and Zionist Transatlantic National Networks.” (Columbia University)