Current Research
Project

Mayors and their city council members assume the responsibility of creating and maintaining laws and policies that benefit residents by providing public goods and services. These elected officials serve in positions that allow them to be accessible to their constituents, enabling civically engaged members of the community to be actively involved in the policies that are considered and passed. Given the recent rise in justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion initiatives, more individuals from underrepresented backgrounds have been elected to government roles.

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This project will analyze the policies and executive orders passed from 2019 through 2022 by mayors in United States major cities. The first phase will begin with analyzing cities whose residential populations are estimated to be over 1 million per 2020 U.S. census data. Each policy and executive order will be coded categorically to identify the types of issues the policy seeks to address, and whether the policies have an  impact on a group of individuals in their constituency. The analysis of these policies aims to understand if the types of policies within this 4-year time span change, and whether differences can be seen as isolated within cities or collective changes within the country as a whole. Additionally, this project plans to assess if the policies in cities with mayors from underrepresented backgrounds differ from cities with mayors from historically represented backgrounds in politics.