Does the prima facie contradiction between the Declaration of Independence's description of the separate and unique “creation” of human beings and Darwin's evolutionary account indicate a broader contradiction between theories of human rights and Darwinian evolution? While similar troubling questions have been raised and answered in the affirmative since Darwin's time, this article renews, updates and significantly fortifies such answers with original arguments. If a “distilled” formulation of the Declaration's central claims, shorn of complicating entanglements with both theology and comprehensive philosophical doctrines, may still be in contradiction with Darwinian evolutionary theory, this should be cause for substantial concern on the part of all normative political theorists, from Straussians to Rawlsians. Despite the notable recent efforts of a few political theorists, evolutionary ethicists and sociobiologists to establish the compatibility of Darwinian evolutionary theory with moral norms such as the idea of natural or human rights, I argue that significant obstacles remain.

Much of the American debate over physician assisted death (PAD) is framed as an ideological split between conservatives and liberals, pro life and pro choice advocates, and those who emphasize morality versus personal autonomy. Less examined, but no less relevant, is a split within the ranks of progressives—one that divides those supporting a right to die in the name of human rights from disability rights activists who invoke human rights to vehemently oppose euthanasia. This paper reviews how “dignity” serves both as a divisive wedge in this debate but also as a value that can span the divide between groups and open the way to productive discourse. Supporters of legalized euthanasia use “dignity” to express their position that some deaths might indeed be accelerated. At the same time, opponents adopt the concept to argue that physician assisted suicide stigmatizes life with a disability. To bridge this divide, the worldviews of two groups, Compassion & Choices and Not Dead Yet, are studied. The analysis concludes that the two organizations are more parallel than contrary—a finding that offers opportunities for dialogue and perhaps even advances in public policy.

This study examines the cognitive and affective factors of candidate appraisal by manipulating candidate attractiveness and levels of issue agreement with voters. Drawing upon research in evolutionary psychology and cognitive neuroscience, this analysis proposes that automatic processing of physical appearance predisposes affective disposition toward more attractive candidates, thereby influencing cognitive processing of issue information. An experimental design presented attractive and unattractive candidates who were either liberal or conservative in a mock primary election. The data show strong partial effects for appearance on vote intention, an interaction between appearance and issue agreement, and a tendency for voters to assimilate the dissimilar views of attractive candidates. We argue that physical appearance is important in primary elections when the differences in issue positions and ideology between candidates is small.

Last fall, the Association for Politics and the Life Sciences (APLS) celebrated its 30th anniversary by holding the annual meeting on the picturesque campus of Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana. The event was highlighted not only by a keynote address from Nobel Prize Laureate Elinor Ostrom but also featured several roundtables comprised of those most responsible for the establishment and growth of APLS over the past three decades. This Founders' Forum likewise celebrates 30 years of the journal's publication and provides the opportunity to reflect on where the field and the association have been, and where they are headed.

Thirty years ago there were at most only a handful of political scientists who were interested in or publishing about policy issues in the life sciences, concentrated primarily in the health or environmental policy areas. As a result, political science was notably absent as a discipline either in the literature, at conferences, or as members of state or national commissions, advisory bodies, or institutional review boards involving the life sciences.

This essay explores efforts to establish interdisciplinary research associations by comparing two organizations that were founded in the early 1980s. One has focused on the field of politics and the life sciences and the other on health services research. Both are involved in securing recognition for a research area—or “field of research”—that had not previously been conceptualized as a coherent academic or professional enterprise. The motivation for this paper is my interest in politics and the life sciences (the field), the organization—the Association for Politics and the Life Sciences that was established in 1980 to foster scholarly study of the field—and its journal Politics and the Life Sciences. (For the sake of clarity I adopt the convention of signifying a field entirely in lower-case orthography, beginning an organizational name with capital letters and naming the related journals in italics.)

I think it is fair to say that synergy is an idea whose time has finally come. It seems that every week another new example of synergy is reported in some scientific journal, and articles about synergy are nowadays routinely accepted for publication in various disciplines. This was certainly not the case 30 years ago. Back then using the term “synergy” in a journal submission was an almost certain kiss of death. I speak from personal experience. So times have changed. However, the theory proposed in my 1983 book, The Synergism Hypothesis: A Theory of Progressive Evolution^ has had a more complex journey, and herein lies a bit of intellectual history and some lessons about the culture and politics of science.

Reviewing the work of Lynton Caldwell, Robert Blank, and Andrea Bonnicksen is both a privilege and a challenge. These three scholars rank among the key figures in the development of biopolicy as a legitimate research and teaching subfield within political science. Each of them worked in academia, on significant bioethical advisory boards, and with policymaking entities, and also contributed to numerous externally funded research projects. Across long and prolific careers, Caldwell, Blank, and Bonnicksen engaged seriously with the political, social and ethical issues raised by significant advances in many bio-scientific domains. This essay analyzes several of their works across two broad themes: 1) the development of the subfields of biopolitics and biopolicy, and 2) the tension between science policy and democratic governance. While each of them wrote significant and well-received books, the focus here is on insights to be gleaned from an idiosyncratic selection of their scholarly articles across the time period, 1966 to 2007. To borrow Michel Foucault's term, this brief and necessarily selective archaeology of the published journal record nevertheless demonstrates the significance, durability and prescience of the authors' insights. (I expect that at least one, if not all three, of these authors might raise objections to the mention of Foucault, but the term “archaeology” in this instance is apt.)

Over the past 25 years, my academic and work experiences have involved and intersected with biopolitics, particularly environmental policy, international relations, and ethics. My academic and teaching experience was in political theory and ethics, and my early research interests turned to emerging recombinant DNA issues, involving the complex interaction of biological science, technology and public policy processes. My scholarly contacts included those with similar concerns, and so I joined with a group of scholars creating the Association for Politics and the Life Sciences. Several years later, my interests brought me to work in a federal agency where public policy decisions often raise important ethical choices, and the political and behavioral aspects of the policy process became more evident. My research centered on issues related to environmental protection. This work was also influenced by my professional friendship with Lynton Caldwell, another APLS founder and a remarkable scholar, whose work on environmental politics was internationally recognized. After the implosion of the Soviet Union, teaching environmental policy for the Agency in Eastern Europe renewed my interest in international relations, which had been my undergraduate focus. The topic of environmental security combined all of these interests. This topic gained substantial attention in policy circles, then declined, but is now being discussed again.

Founded in 1980, the Association for Politics and the Life Sciences (APLS) sought to establish biopolitics as a recognized field and to integrate biologically based research methods into mainstream political science. The association's founders established these goals to encourage a generation of scholars and promote the spread of biopolitical knowledge. There was early success when the American Political Science Association (APSA) recognized biopolitics as an organized section. However, this development did not leave an appreciable imprint on the political science profession and the experiment conjoining the two did not last long. The other goal of the founders, to integrate biologically based research methods into mainstream political science, faced more formidable obstacles and still faces challenges, though not without some progress.

Few intellectual battles compare in depth of passion or theatrics to the outrage that greeted the publication of Edward O. Wilson's 1975 path-breaking volume, Sociobiology: The New Synthesis. Within days of publication, opponents organized symposia; wrote critical editorials; picketed in Harvard Square; and, at one meeting, assaulted Wilson with a bucket of cold water before he could deliver his address. Fueling this reaction was Wilson's temerity in asserting that the principles of the new synthetic theory applied no less to humans than to other species—and then to use the penultimate chapter to apply his theory to explaining human mating, aggression, and the development of moral and religious systems. Even some who were sympathetic with sociobiology were taken aback by some of the imperialistic sounding statements made by Wilson and his disciples, like Robert Trivers, who prophesized: “Sooner or later, political science, law, economics, psychology, psychiatry, and anthropology will all be branches of sociobiology.”

“Founders” of new scholarly ideas, perspectives, or paradigms are people who advocate for such ideas before wider scholarly audiences accept them or even know they exist. Such scholars have an uphill battle. They must persuade journal and book editors to publish their work. Those gatekeepers depend on reviewers with established reputations in conventional terms, and these reviewers generally oppose anything that threatens their comfortable intellectual lives. If the idea is as stunningly simple as Darwin's natural selection theory, an innovator might have a somewhat easier time; Thomas Huxley reportedly remarked upon reading On the Origin of Species, “How extremely stupid of me not to have thought of that.” But with conceptually and methodologically broad ideas, such as the application of biologically based psychological thinking to a traditional set of disciplinary problems, it can be tough to even get a foot in the door.

This essay reflects on the past, present, and future of biopolitics, starting with the academic interest in the link between biology and politics. Examples of primitive adumbrations of this approach appear throughout academic history; however, the modern roots of biology and politics began in the 1960s. This reflection traces biopolitics from its modern birth through the 1990s, and considers future research endeavors related to biology and politics.

Although there may be some disagreement about the exact date, I think it safe to say that the biopolitics movement was launched in the 1960s. Now, a half century later, it may be appropriate to pose the rather obvious, if somewhat delicate, question: What has biopolitics contributed to political science? Here, I will try to persuade you that a biopolitical approach may have yielded answers to a couple of the most debated issues in political philosophy—one, the granddady of them all, is “What is the nature of political man?” The other, much more recent, but steadily increasing in importance, is “Why are democracies so rare and so fragile?”

These reflections attempt to revive the IMPPISH perspective; otherwise known as the interaction, mentalist, populational, process, intelligence, self selection, and hypertrophy approach. Despite the clever acronym, the IMPPISH perspective struggles to stay on life support. This essay takes a fresh look at the IMPPISH approach, and breaks down each tenet into three parts: its theoretical proposition, relevance to the Association for Politics and the Life Sciences, and research implications for biopolitics.

To his colleagues and the generations of students who had the privilege of knowing him, Jim Schubert was an inventive scholar, dedicated teacher, and tireless mentor. An innovative political scientist, Jim was skilled at incorporating the latest technologies and methods into his research. Engaging and creative as a teacher and mentor, Jim, according to a student and collaborator, “was maybe the kindest, smartest man you could ever meet.” Jim's pioneering work in the field of biopolitics reflect these qualities—he was truly “one of a kind.” As a scholar of biopolitics, Jim left behind a legacy that reflects what Gary Johnson, former editor of Politics and the Life Sciences, describes as the mission of both the journal and the association: “to advance knowledge of politics and promote better policymaking through multidisciplinary analysis that draws on the life sciences.”

Scholars, scientists, and policymakers converged last fall at the annual meeting of the Association for Politics and the Life Sciences (APLS) held on the Indiana University campus in Bloomington from October 14–16, 2010. Founded in 1980, the association uniquely merges evolutionary, genetic, and ecological knowledge with the study of political behavior, public policy, and ethics. This year's annual meeting celebrated the diversity of scholarship embodied by the association with the theme, “Toward Consilience: Thirty Years of the Association for Politics and the Life Sciences.”