The Academy is pleased to announce that former Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP), John P. Holdren, has been named the recipient of the 2018 Daniel Patrick Moynihan Prize. He will deliver the annual Moynihan Lecture on May 17, 2018, at 4:00pm, at the Willard Intercontinental Hotel in Washington, D.C.
AAPSS President Kenne
th Prewitt said of Holdren, “His commitment to advocating for the social sciences from the very top of the federal policymaking apparatus has been most welcome, and his clear-eyed actions to bring social science fully into national science policymaking have earned him this recognition. He is a uniquely suited Moynihan Prize winner.”
While heading the OSTP, Holdren established the Social and Behavioral Sciences Team within the office, which supported the application of the behavioral sciences in public policy. This included connecting veterans with educational opportunities and helping student loan borrowers understand loan repayment options.
Holdren also contributed to the Academy’s flagship journal, The ANNALS, in 2010, writing, “to make public policy on the basis of bad data or no data is almost always a serious error.” In this piece, he advocates for the importance of the federal statistical system and the need for the government to link survey and administrative data to support more effective policy.
Holdren was the Director of the OSTP from 2009 to 2017—the longest serving Science Advisor to a president in the history of the position. Prior to that position, he was the Teresa and John Heinz Professor of Environmental Policy at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, where he returned after his time in the Obama administration. He is also the Director of the Science, Technology, and Public Policy Program at Harvard’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, and Director of the Woods Hole Research Center.
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