Stephen C. Phillips, PhD

Stephen C. Phillips is a lecturer in the Department of Political Science at Clemson University, where he teaches courses on U.S. political institutions. His research and teaching interests focus on American political development, political strategy, and the scholarship of teaching and learning.

Stephen is currently working on a book project examining public policy debates on civil rights during the post-war period to study how political actors produce policy change on items long-stalled on the institutional agenda. For his research on the civil rights movment and second-wave feminism, Stephen earned the James W. Button Memorial Award for scholarship focused on race relations, poverty, or diversity issues.

His research has been published in Public Choice and the Journal of Political Science Education, and is heavily influenced by constitutional law, history, philosophy, and public policy & administration. The thread linking Stephen's research is the desire to understand the connections between political strategy and the evolving framework of American government and democracy. He is particularly interested in how policy entrepreneurs provoke and sustain institutional, ideational, and policy development.

Stephen received his doctoral degree from the University of Florida. He earned his master's and bachelor's degree from the University of Central Florida. Prior to entering academia, he worked on federal political campaigns as well as for a local affiliate of the AFL-CIO. His experience in politics and organized labor sparked his interest in political action and civil rights.