Bruce E. Cain

Bruce Cain

Bruce E. Cain

  • Charles Louis Ducommun Professor, Humanities and Sciences
  • Director, Bill Lane Center for the American West
  • Professor, Political Science
  • CDDRL Affiliated Faculty

Jerry Yang & Akiko Yamazaki
Environment & Energy Building
473 Via Ortega, First Floor
Stanford University
Stanford, CA 94305-4225

Biography

Bruce E. Cain is a Professor of Political Science at Stanford University and Director of the Bill Lane Center for the American West. He received a BA from Bowdoin College (1970), a B Phil. from Oxford University (1972) as a Rhodes Scholar, and a Ph D from Harvard University (1976). He taught at Caltech (1976-89) and UC Berkeley (1989-2012) before coming to Stanford. Professor Cain was Director of the Institute of Governmental Studies at UC Berkeley from 1990-2007 and Executive Director of the UC Washington Center from 2005-2012. He was elected the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2000 and has won awards for his research (Richard F. Fenno Prize, 1988), teaching (Caltech 1988 and UC Berkeley 2003) and public service (Zale Award for Outstanding Achievement in Policy Research and Public Service, 2000). His areas of expertise include political regulation, applied democratic theory, representation and state politics. Some of Professor Cain’s most recent publications include “Malleable Constitutions: Reflections on State Constitutional Design,” coauthored with Roger Noll in University of Texas Law Review, volume 2, 2009; “More or Less: Searching for Regulatory Balance,” in Race, Reform and the Political Process, edited by Heather Gerken, Guy Charles and Michael Kang, CUP, 2011; and “Redistricting Commissions: A Better Political Buffer?” in The Yale Law Journal, volume 121, 2012. He is currently working on a book about political reform in the US.

publications

Working Papers
June 2024

Restoring Confidence in American Elections

Author(s)
cover link Restoring Confidence in American Elections
Books
November 2023

Under Fire and Under Water

Author(s)
cover link Under Fire and Under Water
Journal Articles
October 2015

Transparency and Governance

Author(s)
cover link Transparency and Governance

In The News

Bruce Cain presented his research during a CDDRL seminar on May 30, 2024.
News

The Challenge of Climate Change in the American West

Bruce Cain argues that the federalist nature of the U.S., along with regional history and idiosyncratic human behavior, have made resolving collective action problems uniquely difficult.
cover link The Challenge of Climate Change in the American West
olympia yt photo
News

Former Senator Snowe lays out plans to restore the U.S. Senate

cover link Former Senator Snowe lays out plans to restore the U.S. Senate