Manchester United with Harvard in Transatlantic Study

A star professor at the Kennedy School of Government is joining forces with scholars at the University of Manchester to explore social change in the United States and the United Kingdom.

Robert D. Putnam, the Malkin professor of public policy, served as dean of the Kennedy School from 1989 to 1991 and has advised leaders including Bill Clinton and Tony Blair. His newest undertaking, “Social Change: A Joint Project of Harvard and Manchester,” announced yesterday, involves transatlantic comparisons of civic engagement given the evolving workplace, increased immigration, and changing attitudes to religion, among other topics.

A member of both the British Academy and the U.S. National Academy of Science, Putnam was recently awarded the 2006 Johan Skytte Prize in Political Science, one of the most prestigious honors in the field. At a ceremony last Satuday in Uppsala, Sweden, Putnam was lauded for his interpretation and popularization of the theory of social capital, which describes the advantages that a person can gain through social networks. In his main works, including his 2000 book “Bowling Alone,” Putnam argues that social cohesiveness is on the decline in America.

Putnam, who will assume part-time teaching duties as a visiting professor at the University of Manchester, said that one impetus for his project was rising concern in Britain that the country is experiencing a similar phenomenon.

“Several members of the British cabinet—I don’t want to name names, but these are people named as Blair’s possible successors—contacted me to urge me to take this project on because they thought there was the opportunity for lots of learning in policy terms,” he said.

Thomas H. Sander, executive director of The Saguaro Seminar: Civic Engagement in America, a Kennedy School program to identify ways to strengthen America’s civil connectedness, said that although civic involvement is thought to be greater in Britain, the program’s findings may prove otherwise. Differences in religiosity and immigration patterns have not yet been studied in depth, he said.

“Certainly Britain is far more secular than the U.S.—the U.S. is an anomaly as far as developed countries are concerned in terms of our religiosity,” he said.

The new initiative will also involve Zukerman Professor of Sociology Mary C. Waters. Waters and Putnam will lead a summer program at Manchester focusing on immigration. Sander said that program funding will also cover additional Harvard faculty involvement and research trips for graduate students.

Putnam said that the two countries’ varying experience with social issues will be illuminating. The U.S. has been “forced to deal with the issue of immigration longer than the British have,” he said. “But in terms of the workplace, the British are ahead of us. They have much more enlightened work-life policies. Most of the learning will be westward on that issue, but I suspect that much of the learning will be eastward on immigration.”

On the relevance of his research, Putnam said, “I want to do work that speaks to the concerns of ordinary people in both Britain and America. It’s like writing your senior thesis on something you can explain to your mother.”