About
Larry Sabato“Politics is a good thing!” … is the slogan of Dr. Larry J. Sabato.
According to the Wall Street Journal, Dr. Sabato is “probably the
most quoted college professor in the land,” while the Washington Post
called him “the Mark McGwire of political analysts” and he is dubbed by Fox
News Channel as “America’s favorite political scientist.” More
recently, the Washingtonian magazine called him the “Dr. Phil of
American politics.” As founder and director of the University of
Virginia’s Center for Politics, Dr. Sabato bridges the gap between the ivory
tower and the real world on issues of critical importance to American
democracy and the challenges facing our political process.
The Robert Kent Gooch Professor of Politics at the University of Virginia
and Director, Sabato is at home in both in the classroom and in the anchor
booth. He is just one of a dozen “University Professors” at U.Va and
is a former Rhodes Scholar and Danforth Fellow. After he received his B.A.
in government from the University of Virginia as a Phi Beta Kappa in 1974,
he did a year's graduate study in public policy at Princeton University's
Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. Upon receipt of
the Rhodes scholarship in 1975, he left Princeton to begin study at Queen's
College, Oxford University. In less than two years he received his doctorate
in politics from Oxford and was invited to become an instructor for students
in the Politics, Philosophy, and Economics (PPE) program. In January 1978 he
was elected Lecturer in Politics at New College, Oxford. He joined the
faculty at the University of Virginia in September 1978.
Dr. Sabato's latest book is A MORE PERFECT CONSTITUTION: 23
Proposals to Revitalize Our Constitution and Make America a Fairer Country.
Previously, Sabato released THE SIXTH YEAR ITCH: The Rise and
Fall of the George W. Bush Presidency (Longman, 2007) detailed
the 2006 mid-term Congressional election. DIVIDED STATES OF
AMERICA: The Slash and Burn Politics of the 2004 Presidential Election
(Longman, 2005), which broke down the 2004 races and provided a jumping off point
for the 2006 and 2008 contests. Dr. Sabato is also regularly updating "Sabato's
Crystal Ball," a critically acclaimed election analysis website founded in
2002, which recorded the most accurate election predictions in the country,
correctly predicting every contest for the U.S. Senate, all but one
gubernatorial race, and a net party change of 29 seats in the U.S. House (www.centerforpolitics.org/crystalball).
The author of over twenty books and countless essays on the American
political process, other recent books are Get in the Booth! A
Citizen's Guide to the 2004 Election (Longman, 2004),
Midterm Madness: The Elections of 2002 (Rowman &
Littlefield 2003), Overtime: The Election 2000 Thriller
(Longman, 2001), and Dangerous Democracy: The Battle
Over Ballot Initiatives in America (Rowman & Littlefield,
2001). Others include Peepshow: Media and Politics in an Age of
Scandal (Rowman & Littlefield, 2000), Toward the
Millennium: The Elections of 1996 (Allyn and Bacon, 1997), and
Dirty Little Secrets: The Persistence of Corruption in American
Politics (Random House/Times Books, 1996).
Prior to the publication of these volumes, Dr. Sabato’s best known book was
entitled Feeding Frenzy: Attack Journalism & American Politics.
Originally published in 1991 and again in 1993 by the Free Press/Macmillan,
the book made the now universally used phrase a part of the political
lexicon and is required reading for anyone involved in politics today.
An updated edition was published by Lanahan Press in 2000.
Five of Dr. Sabato’s other well-known books are: PAC Power:
Inside the World of Political Action Committees, which focuses
on the phenomenal growth of PACs and their influence on American elections);
The Party’s Just Begun: Shaping Political Parties for America's
Future (Little Brown and Co., 1988), which examines the
condition of the political parties and proposes ways to strengthen them;
Paying for Elections (The Twentieth Century Fund,
1989), which advocates reforms in the financing of campaigns;
Campaigns and Elections (Scott, Foresman, 1989), a source book
of the new techniques used in American politics; and American
Government: Continuity and Change (Addison Wesley Longman),
co-authored with Karen O'Connor of American University (5th Edition - 2002).
Dr. Sabato’s earlier books include an investigation of the influential corps
of American political consultants and their new campaign technologies (such
as polling, direct mail, and television advertising) entitled,
The Rise of Political Consultants: New Ways of Winning Elections
(New York: Basic Books, 1981); and a study of American state governors over
thirty years, Goodbye to Good-Time Charlie: The American
Governorship Transformed (Washington, D. C.: Congressional
Quarterly Press, 1983-Second Edition). Other books and monographs have been
written about Virginia politics, including a study of the rise and fall of
the Democratic machine in Virginia, The Democratic Party
Primary: Tantamount to Election No Longer (Charlottesville:
The University Press of Virginia, 1977). He is the author of the nine-volume
Virginia Votes series chronicling all state elections, as well as many
articles on national and state politics.
Dr. Sabato has served on many national and state commissions, including the
National Commission for the Renewal of American Democracy, the U.S. Senate
Campaign Finance Reform Panel, the Governor's Commission on Campaign Finance
Reform, Government Accountability, and Ethics, and the Governor's Blue
Ribbon Commission on Higher Education. Far more importantly,
however, he has had the privilege to teach over 13,000 students during his
career.
Dr. Sabato is the recipient of more than two-dozen major scholarships,
grants, and academic awards, including a National Endowment for the
Humanities Fellowship, the Outstanding Young Teacher Award from the
University of Virginia, and Outstanding Professor Award from the Virginia
State Council of Higher Education, the U.Va. Outstanding Professor Award of
2000, and inclusion among the “Top-Ten-All-Time Favorite Teachers” by
U.Va.’s Alumni Association. His visiting appointments include that
of Guest Scholar at the Brookings Institution and Thomas Jefferson Visiting
Fellow at Downing College, Cambridge University, England. In 2002,
the University of Virginia conferred upon Dr. Sabato its highest honor, The
Thomas Jefferson Award, given annually to one individual since 1955.
At the University of Virginia Center for Politics (www.centerforpolitics.org),
founded in 1998, Dr. Sabato brings his years of academic study together with
an equally long career as both a political practitioner and commentator on
local, state and national elections. The Center represents Dr.
Sabato’s mission: to improve civic education and the political process, and
in doing so make government more relevant, more accessible and more
meaningful for the average American. The Center has a dedicated staff
of over a dozen, and its signature program, the National Youth Leadership
Initiative, currently involves over 800,000 middle and high school students
in all 50 states. In six years, Sabato has raised over $7 million in public
and private funds to support the Center's many programs, conferences, and
publications.
MEDIA APPEARANCES
Larry J. Sabato has been making national media appearances since the 1970s.
Both the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post have
noted that Dr. Sabato is the most cited college professor in any field in
the United States by national and regional news organizations, electronic
and print. For example, Lexis/Nexis lists over 400 citations by the media
during just the last two years. Every major national newspaper is included,
repeatedly. In 2004-2005, Sabato logged nearly 200 television appearances,
including multiple appearances on the following national TV
shows/networks:
