Dr. Michael Neblo will travel to Philadelphia as Co-Chair for the 120th APSA Annual Meeting & Exhibition, alongside Dr. Danielle Allen of Harvard University. The American Political Science Association (APSA) is the leading professional organization for the study of political science and serves more than 11,000 members in over 100 countries. This year’s conference theme is “Democracy: Retrenchment, Renovation, & Reimagination.” Dr. Neblo will lead a roundtable discussion focused on responses to democratic retrenchment, with special attention to the recent surge in democratic innovations worldwide. He will also present his paper titled “Testing the Benefits of Public Deliberation.”

Joining Dr. Neblo from the Institute for Democratic Engagement and Accountability (IDEA) are Research Director Dr. William Minozzi and Assistant Research Director Dr. Laura Moses, along with IDEA Fellows Bear Brown, Euchan Jang, and Jungbae An of The Ohio State University, and Marco Castradori of Princeton University. Together, they will highlight their work on the following topics:

• “From Sensation to Persuasion: Rethinking Media’s Role in Democratic Innovation” – Euchan Jang
• “Deliberative Congress: Analyzing the Congressional Speeches” – Jungbae An
• “Seeing Beyond Clientelism: An Experiment on Constituent Consultation in Nigeria” – Marco Castradori

IDEA’s work with the Connecting Classrooms to Congress initiative will also be featured in a panel titled “Addressing Democratic Backsliding through Innovative Youth Engagement.”

Dr. Neblo and the IDEA team are excited to share the lab’s recent work with a diverse community of scholars, educators, students, and practitioners. Their participation reflects IDEA’s ongoing commitment to advancing democratic resilience through public engagement and evidence-based innovation.