NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY
Department of Political Science
History
Somit & Tanenhaus Department Rankings

TABLE 3: Ranking of Political Science Departments, 1957 and 1963a
1957 Keniston Survey of Department Chairsb
1963 Survey of APSA Membersc
1

Harvard

1

Harvard

2

Chicago

2

Yale

3

Calif. (Berk.)

3

Calif. (Berk.)

4

Columbia

4

Chicago

5

Princeton

5

Princeton

6

Michigan

6

Columbia

7

Yale

7

Michigan

8

Wisconsin

8.5

Stanford

9

Minnesota

8.5

Wisconsin

10

Cornell

10.5

Calif. (U.C.L.A.)

11

Illinois

10.5

Cornell

12

Calif. (U.C.L.A.)

12

Johns Hopkins

13

Stanford

13

Northwestern

14

Johns Hopkins

14

Indiana

15

Duke

15

Illinois


aThis is an abbreviated version of Table 3 in Albert Somit and Joseph Tanenhaus, American Political Science: A Profile of a Discipline (New York: Atherton Press, 1964), p. 34. It differs from the original by dropping rankings for 1925 and by only listing the top fifteen departments in 1963.
bHayward Keniston's 1957 survey of opinions of 25 departmental chairs, reported in Graduate Study and Research in the Arts and Sciences at the University of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1959), p. 142.
cSomit and Tanenhaus report sending 832 questionnaires to every fifth faculty member of the American Poltiical Science Association listed in the 1961 Directory. A total of 431 usable questionnaires were returned. This ranking is based on responses to the question, "How would you characterisze the over-all quality of the doctoral program in political science now offered at each of these universities? (Check 'excellent,' 'good,' 'fair,' 'poor,' or 'can't say.')"