DC-AAPOR Book Club 2.0: Counting Like a State

Do you love being on top of best practices and latest trends in our field but can’t find time for all that?

When you do tackle your professional reading list, ever wish you could ask the author or editor a direct question?

If you answered “yes!” or even “no, but that sounds intriguing!” to either question, your DC-AAPOR has the must-attend event series for you!

Calling all bookworms! Burrow your way into new or developing survey and public opinion research.

• Hear from the authors or editors themselves
• Take a sneak peek at details you may have missed
• Engage with others of similar interests

From the publisher: In Counting Like a State, Philip Rocco shows how the production of the US Census now crucially hinges not only on what happens in Washington but also on a series of intergovernmental partnerships. State and local officials, though not formally responsible for census taking, figure importantly in the implementation of the decennial count. These officials are essential partners in the construction and maintenance of address lists, as well as in outreach and promotion campaigns in hard-to-count communities.

Rocco’s illuminating study of the 2020 Census pulls back the curtain on the administrative state to reveal how something as complex and centralizing as a census takes place within a decentralized, federalist system. Drawing on analyses of interviews with hundreds of public officials and quantitative analyses of state and local census activities, Counting Like a State allows scholars and practitioners to better understand what facilitates as well as what impedes effective intergovernmental partnerships for census taking.

About the author:

Philip Rocco is an Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Political Science at Marquette University. He is also the co-editor of Publius: The Journal of Federalism. Prof. Rocco's research examines the intersection between federalism, the policymaking process, and the political economy of policy expertise. He teaches courses on American politics, the policymaking process, and the politics of numbers. Prof. Rocco was formerly a postdoctoral associate at the University of Pittsburgh's Health Policy Institute. He earned his Ph.D. and M.A. degrees from the University of California, Berkeley.