Congratulations to Christopher Muller, who won the 2015 ASA Dissertation Award. His prize-winning dissertation, "Historical Origins of Racial Inequality in Incarceration in the United States," was selected as the ASA members' best PhD dissertation from among those submitted by advisers and mentors in the discipline. Congratulations, Chris!

The issue of African American and police relations, and, indeed, race relations in the United States as a whole, have dominated the news in the last few years after protests in Ferguson, MO, Baltimore, MD, and New York City. Muller's research suggests that racial disparity in imprisonment is not solely a product of the recent history of the prison boom. Applying the tools of causal inference to data gathered from archives and historical administrative records, Muller demonstrates that African Americans' distrust of the police has deep historical roots reaching back to the 1930s in the North and the 1880s in the South. 

Previous ASA Dissertation Award Winners include the following Harvard faculty and department alumni:
2014: Ya-Wen Lei, "Uncovering the Roots of the Nationwide Counter-public Sphere in China”
2008: Helen Beckler Marrow, "Southern Becoming: Immigrant Incorporation and Race Relations in the Rural U.S. South"
2007: Wendy Roth, "Caribbean Race and American Dreams: How Migration Shapes Dominicans' and Puerto Ricans' Racial Identities and Its Impact on Socioeconomic Mobility"
2006: Jason Beckfield, "The Consequences of Regional, Poiltical and Economic Integration for Inequality and the Welfare State in Western Europe" 
2003: Devah Pager, "The Mark of a Criminal Record"