Program Description
The position of NHIOP Research Associate is reserved for those scholars whose work and contributions to the study of politics in general, and specifically to the New Hampshire political tradition, are deemed of special merit. Appointments may stay in effect for up to ten years. A limited number of shared offices at the Institute are available.

Current NHIOP Research Associates

JOHN CARR
For the last decade, John Carr has served as director of the Department of Social Development and World Peace of the U.S. Catholic Bishops' Conference. In this role, he assists the bishops in sharing and applying Catholic social teaching, advocating on the moral dimensions of key domestic and international issues, and building the Catholic community's capacity to act on social mission.

Mr. Carr oversees the Conference's policy development and advocacy efforts on poverty, health and housing; human rights, religious freedom and development, environment, arms control and peacemaking. He writes frequently on Catholic social teaching and the moral dimension of public issues. He speaks regularly on the social mission and message of the Catholic Church and the demands of faith in public life. He is the editor of Full Employment and Economic Justice and co-author of Housing and Mediating Structures.

He has represented the U.S. Conference at the Vatican and in visits to the Middle East, Northern Ireland, Southern Africa, Russia, Central America and Vietnam.  He is a regular participant in Preaching the Just Word retreats offered to priests around the country. 

Mr. Carr is a graduate of the University of St. Thomas in Minnesota and has received honors and awards from Barry University, University of St. Thomas, Crosier Seminary, the Roundtable of Social Action Directors and the Archdiocese of Washington. Mr. Carr was in residence at the NHIOP in 2000 and in 2008. 

EJ DIONNE
Washington Post columnist, Brookings Institution Senior Research Fellow, Georgetown University Professor, and NHIOP Senior Research Fellow. E.J. Dionne is a graduate of the Benedictine-run Portsmouth Abbey School in Rhode Island.

He holds an A.B. from Harvard University and a D.Phil. from Balliol College, Oxford, where he was a Rhodes Scholar. Dr. Dionne was in-residence at the NHIOP for several days on a bi-weekly basis throughout the Fall 2007 Semester, culminating in a week-long stay during the 2008 New Hampshire Presidential Primary.  

MICHAEL E. DUPRE
Presently, Dr. Dupre is a Senior Research Fellow at the NHIOP. Until 2007, he was Professor of Sociology at Saint Anselm College. 

Dr. Dupre has published and presented papers on the political consequences of domestic immigration into New Hampshire over the last four decades. In particular, he has studied the impact of migration on the New Hampshire Legislature. At present he is taking a socio- historical look at the role of female legislators in the state. 

Through an NHIOP support grant he co-authored the first in the Institute’s series of working papers, a study entitled Assimilation or Transformation? The Effects of Migration on the Political Culture of New Hampshire, 1960-2000. In October 2007 he coordinated the Institute’s inaugural New Hampshire Presidential Primary Poll.

Dr. Dupre regularly offers expert commentary for broadcast and print reporters on New Hampshire’s political culture and how it has changed over the years. He is also a former political strategist and advisor to a number of New Hampshire campaigns.

He holds an A.B. in Sociology from Saint Anselm College and an M.A. and PhD. in Sociology from Boston College.

R. SHEP MELNICK
R. Shep Melnick is the Thomas P. O’Neill, Jr. Professor of American Politics. He teaches a variety of courses on American politics, including Courts and Public Policy, Ideas and Institutions in American Politics, Bureaucracy, Democracy in America, Rights in Conflict, and the American politics graduate field seminar. His research and writing focuses on the intersection of law and politics.

His first book, Regulation and the Courts, examined judicial influence on the development of environmental policy. His second, Between the Lines, investigated the ways in which statutory interpretation has shaped a variety of entitlement programs. His current research project looks at how the Rehnquist Court is reshaping our governing institutions.

Melnick is co-chair of the Harvard Program on Constitutional Government and a past president of the New England Political Science Department. Before coming to Boston College 1997 he had taught at Harvard and at Brandeis, where he served as chair of the Politics Department. Dr. Melnick is a frequent speaker at the NHIOP.

NIALL PALMER
Dr.  Niall Palmer is currently a Professor of American Politics at Brunell University in West London, United Kingdom, where is an Associate Fellow of the Institute for the Study of the Americas. He formerly taught at Bristol University. His research interests include: the U.S. Presidency; American political parties and elections, American political history. 

He has published The New Hampshire Primary and the American Electoral Process and American Politics and Society in the Twenties. Two books on the Republican and Democratic parties are scheduled for publication in the near future.

He is currently writing a study of the congressional relations of the Harding administration.  He has participated in U.S. history and politics-related radio and television work and is a regular contributor to BBC History Magazine. Dr. Palmer was in residence at the NHIOP in January of 2008, and remains a NHIOP Research Associate.