On September 11, 2005, Koizumi Junichiro and his Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) achieved a stunning victory in the 44th House of Representatives election. In stark contrast with the previous election, just two years earlier, in which the LDP had only managed 237 seats, the LDP captured an impressive 296 seats. This meant that together with their coalition partner, the Komeito, the LDP now controlled two thirds of the seats in the House of Representatives (the more powerful of the two houses that comprise Japan's Diet, or parliament).

Once again, I am pleased to report that our Association's financial condition remains healthy, providing a resource base sufficient to continue current operations, while expanding the Association's activities in new directions as needed. Since my last annual report, we have seen our endowment and real estate holdings grow in value to about $30 million (as of August 2007), against which we are carrying just $1.6 million in mortgage debt. For the fiscal year that ended June 30, 2007, we estimate that total operating income ($4.7 million) was slightly above budget, with expenditures slightly below. Our broad membership base continues to be the most important reason for our healthy financial condition, while the Annual Meeting and APSA publications also provide substantial income. In short, we are in the enviable position of enjoying stable membership, while holding substantial income- and growth-producing assets with minimal long-term liabilities. All of these factors combine to produce an operating budget which hews closely to anticipated income and expenses, year after year.

Washington Insider.

My last two annual reports sounded a theme of continuity from year to year in the number and variety of the papers that we received and the articles that we published and in the pace of our review process. This year, too, many of these elements have differed only slightly from those of past years. In some important respects, though, 2005–2006 has been a significant departure from the years immediately preceding it. For one thing, as detailed below, during 2005–2006 we received a record number of submissions. For another, while we were considering more papers than ever before, we were simultaneously faced with the self-imposed challenge of conducting a separate review process for the November 2006 centennial issue of the Review.

Total international membership in APSA continues to reach new highs in absolute and relative terms, surpassing December's record number of 2,031 to reach 2,081 for the first time in August 2007. This represents 14.1% of APSA total membership, also a record high.

With Walter Beach's passing in November 2006, a host of communities lost a valued and dedicated friend. When Walter was presented APSA's Frank J. Goodnow Award in 1998 for his sustained contributions to the discipline, if his political science colleagues who knew him less well were enormously impressed by the vast extent of his civic engagements, they had to be mind-boggled by the depth of his contributions. These contributions went far beyond his 15-year service to APSA as staff associate, director of the Congressional Fellowship Program, and, finally, assistant director; they also included his 10-year engagement at the Brookings Institution, and his 16-year engagement with Heldref Publications and the Helen Dwight Reid Educational Foundation. It was as if Walter never met a worthy endeavor for which he would not become a benefactor—from his life-long commitment to his 1956 alma mater Dickinson College (along with brother Alan, 1955) from which he was given the Distinguished Alumni Award in 1992, to his service as trustee of the Hillwood Museum and Gardens Foundation, to his directorship of the International Eye Foundation, to his endowment of the National Capital Area Political Science Association, to his vigorous support of the Southern Political Science Association, to his service on the board of the Washington Center for Internships, to his fundraising prowess for George Washington University's Gelman Library and Mount Vernon College, among others. These will be the focus of a fuller tribute to be published in the April 2006 issue of PS: Political Science and Politics.

A Look at the Centennial Center for Political Science & Public Affairs

Location and date: Boston, Aug 28–August 31, 2008

Conference theme: Categories and the Politics of Global Inequalities

Program chairs: Jane Junn, Rutgers and Ed Keller, UCLA

Website: www.apsanet.org/2008

In 2006, PS: Political Science and Politics published myriad articles covering a vast range of topics. Symposia alone published in 2006 focused on inequality in American democracy, on the rejection of the EU Constitution, on how the law affects the actions of department chairs, on the methodology of field research in the Middle East, on voting gaps in the 2004 election, on political corruption, and on the politics of Canada. Upcoming symposia will focus on the U.S. military, on how to incorporate the politics of the Iberian Peninsula into your syllabus, on the future of state election reform, on Islamic extremism in Europe, and on the importance of congressional leadership selection. And remember, these are only the symposia. The journal's commitment to publishing articles on pedagogy and on the profession, as well as exemplary topical scholarship on a wide array of topics, calls for an equally broad stable of expert reviewers. PS cannot publish such diverse work without the outstanding work (and open-mindedness) of our peer reviewers. The peer-review process relies on the professionalism and generosity of those who contribute their time to read and evaluate the work of others. The editors of PS thank the following scholars, who served as manuscript reviewers between January 1, 2006, and December 31, 2006. Very special thanks go to those scholars whose names appear in bold; they reviewed for PS in both 2005 and 2006.

Duane Lockard, professor of politics, emeritus, of Princeton University, died on June 19, 2006, from complications from Parkinson's disease. He was born in the poor coal-mining town of Owings, West Virginia; and, by the time he was eight, the Great Depression had increased his community's poverty. One of his childhood chores was to collect lumps of coal that fell from passing ore trains so his family could have heat in their house. As a teenager, he pumped gas at a filling station and, for a time, followed his father into the dark depths of the mines. Although the older men were kind to him, he found it oppressive to work in pitch blackness, hunched over in the small rooms carved out by pickaxes. In an effort to escape, he tried to enroll in Fairmont State Teachers College, planning to live at home and hitchhike the 18 miles to the school. Alas, when he tried to register, he could muster only half of the $30 tuition fee. Fortunately for future generations of scholars and students, a compassionate and perceptive dean recognized talent and allowed him to matriculate.

The following tables display the most frequently downloaded APSA journal articles from the Cambridge University Press web site for each journal's last three volumes.

Call for papers Deadline: December 17, 2007.

Location and date: Boston, Aug 28–August 31, 2008

Conference theme: Categories and the Politics of Global Inequalities

Program chairs: Jane Junn, Rutgers and Ed Keller, UCLA

Website: www.apsanet.org/2008

This is the third in a series of articles about the activities of the French Politics Group (FPG), charting the institutionalization of our research and teaching partnerships with our colleagues in France. In last year's essay for PS (April, 2006: 389–91), we discussed 10 lessons we had learned in pursuing successful international collaboration. Following yet another productive year of ever-increasing collaborative activities on both sides of the Atlantic, it appears that this prescription for success has continued to work. As evidence, one need only look at FPG-sponsored activities at the APSA annual meeting. In Philadelphia in 2006, the group hosted five panels with an average attendance of 25 people. Attendees at our (open bar) Friday, late-night cocktail party declared it to be the toast of the APSA social scene. We have seen an increased attendance of French political scientists as well (20, compared to two in 2001). Finally, an APSA-sponsored roundtable has laid the foundation for a French “State of the Discipline” to be published in collaboration with the Association Fran[,]caise de Science Politique (AFSP). Here, we revisit the top 10 key ingredients to our growing and highly fruitful collaboration in hopes of spurring on others to invest their time and limited resources to contribute to the internationalization of the discipline and APSA.

Editor's Note: The following is reprinted from AAUP's July–August 2007 issue of Academe with the permission of the AAUP. A more detailed history of the censure list can be found on the AAUP web site, 〈www.aaup.org〉.

The excellent papers in this symposium warrant our close attention for the cardinal reason that they teach citizenship in the global world. They arm us with ideas, concrete techniques, and specialized skill sets to reach this goal. The simple importance of learning to function well in a global society belies the complexity of achieving it. These papers give us tools as well as provide motivation to confront this challenge.

APSA international membership and upcoming international events.

APSA Council Meeting final minutes.

APSA international membership.

Committees of the American Political Science Association.

Recognizing excellence in the profession is one of the most important activities of the American Political Science Association. The Association's Annual Awards Ceremony and Luncheon took place on Thursday, August 30 from 12:00 p.m. to 2:00 p.m. The Luncheon is for Award winners and their guest by invitation. The Ceremony was open to all registrants beginning at 12:45 p.m. It was made possible through the generous support of the Policy Studies Organization.