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Department of Political Science

David E. Lewis

Professor
Rebecca Webb Wilson University Distinguished Professor
Professor of Leadership, Policy, and Organizations, Peabody College of Education
Professor of Law (by courtesy)

David E. Lewis is the Rebecca Webb Wilson University Distinguished Professor in the Department of Political Science and the Department of Leadership, Policy, and Organizations (Peabody College) at Vanderbilt University. His research interests include the presidency, executive branch politics and public administration. He is the author of two books, Presidents and the Politics of Agency Design (Stanford University Press, 2003) and The Politics of Presidential Appointments: Political Control and Bureaucratic Performance (Princeton University Press, 2008). He has also published numerous articles on American politics, public administration, and management in journals such as the American Political Science Review, American Journal of Political Science, the Journal of Politics, and Public Administration Review. His work has been featured in outlets such as the Harvard Business Review, New York Times, and Washington Post.

In 2022, he was appointed as a public member of the Administrative Conference of the United States. He is a member of the National Academy of Public Administration and he is a past president of the Southern Political Science Association and Midwest Public Administration Caucus.  He has earned numerous research and teaching awards, including the Herbert Simon Award for contributions to the scientific study of the bureaucracy and the Madison Sarratt, Jeffrey Nordhaus, and Robert Birkby awards for excellence in undergraduate teaching.

Before joining Vanderbilt’s Department of Political Science, he was an assistant professor of politics and public affairs at Princeton University. He began his academic career at the College of William and Mary, where he was an assistant professor in the Department of Government. He serves on the editorial boards of the Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, Public Administration Review, and Presidential Studies Quarterly. PhD. Stanford University.

Representative publications

  • “Presidential Investment in the Administrative State,” (with Nick Bednar) American Political Science Review 118(1):442-57(2024).
  • “The Independent Agency Myth,” (with Neal Devins), Cornell Law Review 108(6):1305-74 (2023).
  • “Deconstructing the Administrative State,” Journal of Politics, 81(3):767-89 (2019).
  • The Politics of Presidential Appointments: Political Control and Bureaucratic Performance. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press (2008).
  • Presidents and the Politics of Agency Design: Political Insulation in the United States Government Bureaucracy, 1946-1997. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press (2003).
  • View Curriculum Vitae