Pamela Herd to discuss administrative burden, policy, and inequality

Government has the power to do good and ill. Public services can make families more secure and help people during times of need. But those very same services can be disrupted, confusing, and difficult to access. When that happens, ordinary people who rely on the government face severe burdens created by cumbersome administrative processes. Pamela Herd, a prominent sociologist from the University of Michigan, will come to Cornell at the end of this month to detail the broader public implications of administrative burden-from policy spaces to public understanding-including what it means to be a public sociologist who directly engages policy to make government better.

The in-person talk, "Administrative burden, politics, and inequality in the Trump Era," will take place on Thursday, April 30, at 2:30pm in Corson-Mudd Hall, room A106.

"We are living in a distinct and unprecedented moment as far as administrative burdens are concerned. Many of the policies and practices that have unfolded over the last year place heavy weights on the backs of ordinary Americans, risking the stability and well-being of our most marginalized denizens, and undermining our democracy. In this context, there is much to learn from scholars like Pamela Herd, who not only study the consequences of administrative burdens but who also engage policy processes to do something about them." said Jamila Michener, Professor of Government and Public Policy, Senior Associate Dean for Public Engagement at the Brooks School of Public Policy, and Inaugural Director of the Center for Racial Justice and Equitable Futures.

Pamela Herd is the Carol Kakalec Kohn Professor of Social Policy at the University of Michigan Ford School of Public Policy, and faculty associate at the Institute for Social Research Population Studies Center and Survey Research Center. Her research focuses on administrative burden, especially how it is both shaped by and further reinforces inequality. Professor Herd also studies social determinants of health, especially how inequality intersects with health, aging, and policy. She frequently writes and speaks on these topics to media outlets such as the New York Times, Washington Post, Slate, NPR, and the PBS NewsHour.

Her book, Administrative Burden, Policymaking by Other Means, has received numerous awards, was reviewed in the New York Review of Books, and has helped influence state and federal policy reforms, including executive orders by the Biden Administration. In addition to her book awards, Professor Herd has received the Outstanding Public Engagement in Health Policy Award from the American Political Science Association, the Kohl Award, the AARP Innovation Award, and the Wilder School Award for Scholarship in Social Equity in Public Policy Analysis, given by the National Academy of Public Administration.

Professor Herd's talk is sponsored by the Jeb E. Brooks School of Public Policy as part of its commitment to public policy engagement.