The American Political Science Association’s (APSA) Section on Science, Technology, and Environmental Politics (STEP) awards the Caldwell Prize annually. Our book co-authored with Michael Kraft and Mark Stephan Coming Clean: Information Disclosure and Environmental Performance won in 2012. Almost six decades ago, Indiana University and professor of government Lynton K. Caldwell published and article asking this simple question. “Environment: a new focus for policy?” This 1963 Public Administration Review article planted an important seed.

In 1968, Washington Senator and chair of the Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs, Henry “Scoop” Jackson and the Conservation Foundation’s director Russell E. Train were beginning discussions on what would become the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) two years later. The discussion led to, according to Train, the Senate’s hiring of Indiana University’s Lynton Caldwell, a political scientist and leading architect of the Environmental Impact Statement (EIS). He wrote the following. ““Fragmented action and politics affecting natural resources and the human environment have brought waste and confusion in their train and are a result of the lack of recognition of environment as a general subject for public action. . . to change this. . . to obtain integrated planning and action, and to get coordination among the agencies. . . a new policy focus will be required” (Caldwell 1963, 132).

Still proud of our Caldwell Prize win.