WSU’s Lance LeLoup Receives Lifetime Achievement Award

PULLMAN, Wash – Lance T. LeLoup, vice provost of International Programs and Edward R. Meyer Distinguished Professor of Political Science, was awarded the Aaron Wildavsky Lifetime Achievement Award for Research in Public Budgeting by the Association for Budgeting and Financial Management, the largest section of the American Society for Public Administration.

The award was presented in Washington D.C. Oct. 26 at the association’s national conference where LeLoup presented the keynote address to several hundred attendees. The award is named in honor of Aaron Wildavsky, one of the most influential scholars in political science and public administration of the last 50 years, who died in 1995.

In presenting the award, Robert Eger from Florida State University, president of the association, described the scope of LeLoup’s record and his influence on the field. He noted LeLoup’s thirteen books and more than fifty articles with 600 plus citations, and how many of them have become seminal works in the field.

“Lance LeLoup helped reconceptualize how scholars look at budgeting,” he said, “focusing on multiyear changes shaped by macrobudgetary trends and institutions.” In his letter of support, Professor Aman Khan of Texas Tech University wrote: “One of the most recognized names in public budgeting, Professor LeLoup has a distinguished record of research and publications that span over thirty years covering a wide range of areas. There are very few people in the field today who can claim the same level of distinction and authority over such a long period of time.”

In his acceptance speech, LeLoup recounted the research experiences he has enjoyed throughout his career that included being present at the creation of the congressional budget process in the 1970s, and playing a role in democratization and budget transformation in Central and Eastern Europe after the collapse of communism in the 1990s. His most recent book, “Parties, Rules, and the Evolution of Congressional Budgeting” (2005), found that budget rules have strengthened the hands of party leaders in Congress and helped foster greater partisanship in voting. He currently is writing a book on comparative budgeting around the world and represents the state of Washington at the annual Western States Budget Roundtable.

LeLoup has a bachelor degree from Georgetown University and a master’s and doctoral degree from Ohio State University. He served as the legislative assistant to the minority leader of the Ohio Senate before taking a faculty position at the University of Missouri in St. Louis where he taught and held various leadership positions for 22 years. He came to WSU in 1996 to Chair the Department of Political Science. He also served as director of the Thomas Foley Institute at WSU before taking over the leadership of International Programs in 2005.