News

As misinformation and “Fake News” proliferates via social media, so too do the campaigns aimed to stop them. As the negative consequences of “Fake News” taint the content of public and private debate, the urge to regulate social media companies...

When it comes to the patent system, the U.S. and Europe are having very different conversations. As Professor Shobita Parthasarathy explains in her new book, Patent Politics, patents for biotechnology such as gene editing are approached from a...

Faculty from the Ford School and around the University joined an expert roundtable with Senator Gary Peters (D-MI) on Wednesday. Sen. Peters called on faculty to provide insight into some of the rapidly-moving emerging technologies that intersect...

Shobita Parthasarathy, professor of public policy at the Ford School, is keeping tabs on the upcoming International Summit on Human Gene Editing in Hong Kong. In her October 23, 2018 piece for Nature titled “Use the patent system to regulate gene...

Molly Kleinman, the Ford School’s Program Manager of the Science, Technology, and Public Policy program, is the most recent addition to the 11-member Ann Arbor Transportation Commission (AATC). The diverse group of commision members advise the city...

The Times of India published a Q&A with Shobita Parthasarathy titled, "Indian-Americans need more role models in public policy, says Indian-origin professor at University of Michigan." The interview, written by Mandira Banerjee from Michigan News,...

Professor Shobita Parthasarathy’s book, Patent Politics: Life Forms, Markets, and the Public Interest in the United States and Europe, has been awarded the prestigious Robert K. Merton Book Award. The award, given by the Science, Knowledge, and...

In a recently published piece for Michigan Alumnus, the magazine of the University of Michigan Alumni Association, 20 Michigan graduates are recognized as Detroit “Movers and Shakers,” including four Ford School grads.  Lisa Nuszkowski (MPP ’03)...

This month’s Nonprofit Quarterly highlights Shobita Parthasarathy’s work in “Patents and profits in a public setting: Who should benefit financially?” The article quotes from Parthasarathy’s recent Conversation piece, “How to make sure we all...

In a July 19 piece for The Conversation, Shobita Parthasarathy encourages research universities and nonprofits to establish “intellectual property governance committees.” These committees--comprised of patent lawyers; ethicists; citizens; and...

On March 24th, 1965 at 8:00PM, about 3,500 faculty and students at the University of Michigan launched the first ever “teach in,” despite bomb threats and condemnation by the Michigan state legislature and Governor George Romney. For twelve hours,...

David Sehat, host of the Mindpop podcast, talks with Joy Rohde about big data for the December 4 episode: “Is big data a force for good?” Rohde recounts the history of projects that use large datasets to try to solve policy problems – from the Cold...

We are pleased to announce a new director of the University of Michigan's Science, Technology, and Public Policy (STPP) graduate certificate program and to welcome applications from interested students. Associate Professor Shobita Parthasarathy,...

Catherine Hausman’s NBER working paper, “Price regulation and environmental externalities: Evidence from methane leaks,” (with Lucija Muehlenbachs) looks at the unintended consequences of cost-of-service price regulations of privately-owned natural...

Shobita Parthasarathy’s research on grassroots innovation in India is featured on this week’s “The Next Idea,” a Michigan Radio series dedicated to game-changing innovations and ideas. Listen here.In “Fostering grassroots innovation: Lessons India...

On March 9, Megan Blair (MPP ’16) led team "Formativity" to a victory in the U-M School of Public Health’s annual Innovation in Action competition.Innovation in Action is a five-month competition that gives multidisciplinary teams an opportunity to...

(left to right) Giorgi Tsimintia, Kenny Fennell, Diego Garcia Montufar, Maureen Lackner, Arman Golrokhian, Benjamin Morse, Harry WolbergLast month, seven accomplished Ford School students were awarded 2016 Dow Sustainability Fellowships, out of 39...

Professor Shobita Parthasarathy has received a 2016 seed grant from Michigan's Institute for Research on Women and Gender (IRWG), which supports individual research activities and collaborative projects in the field of women, gender, and...

How does the creative sector contribute to economic and community development in Michigan? As the director of creative industries at Creative Many, Ford School alum Cézanne Charles (MPA ’15) makes the case using data. Charles leads the...

In the lead up to the UN Climate Change Conference in December, the U.S. will organize a task force to incorporate climate and security analysis into its foreign policy agenda. Secretary of State John Kerry announced the new group at a speech in...

Shobita Parthasarathy has called for serious patent system reforms in a July 31 article she authored in The Conversation. Such reforms, she said, could "include increasing opportunities for the public to participate in patent decision-making,...

Former U.S. Congressman Dr. Joe Schwarz (R-7) and former Michigan Senate Minority Leader Gretchen Whitmer (D-East Lansing) pen MLive op-ed, “New energy plan for Michigan is opportunity to find common ground for cleaner water.” Together, Schwarz and...

Andrew Schroeder (MPP ’07) knows disaster relief. As director of research and analysis for Direct Relief International, Schroeder has helped shape responses to dozens of calamities. He recites the biggies. Haiti, Sandy, Nargis, Tohoku, Haiyan, and...

On August 18, Dr. Dan Kelly published an op-ed in the San Francisco Gate. His friend and colleague, a medical doctor, had died in Sierra Leone after serving an Ebola patient without protective gear. It wasn’t negligence, wrote Kelly, an infectious...

In an August 26 Policy Points video, Carl Simon argues that quarantine is the key to containing and eliminating the recent outbreak of the Ebola virus—the most deadly to date. “The first Ebola outbreak was noted about 40 years ago in small...

When Superstorm Sandy struck the northeast coast last October, it struck with a vengeance. It cascaded over seawalls; knocked a roller coaster into the ocean; yanked out chunks of the Atlantic City boardwalk; felled trees and power lines; flooded...

Shobita Parthasarathy's book on the development and implications of gene testing and patenting has been re-released in paperback by The MIT Press.The book, Building Genetic Medicine: Breast Cancer, Technology and the Comparative Politics of Health...