Role: Associate Professor, Political Science Faculty Associate of the Center for the Study of Law and Religion, Emory University

  Contact: mowens4@emory.edu

 Scholarship:
Political Behavior of Marginalize Citizens and Communities | Policies and Attitudes towards Felons | Influence of Stigma on Policy Responsiveness | Politics of Punishment | Political Competition among Oppressed Groups

Michael Leo Owens (Ph.D. State University of New York, 2001) is Associate Professor of Political Science and Faculty Associate of the Center for the Study of Law and Religion at Emory University.  The author of God & Government in the Ghetto: The Politics of Church-State Collaboration in Black America (University of Chicago Press, 2007), his current projects include his Prisoners of Democracy project that studies public policies and political attitudes towards people convicted of felonies and political behavior by felons as democratic citizens.

He serves on the Board of Directors of Prison Policy Initiative, the Advisory Board of the Georgia Justice Project, the National Advisory Board of Foreverfamily, Inc., and the Editorial Boards of Politics & Religion and the Journal of Urban Affairs. He is a former Chair of the Governing Board of the Urban Affairs Association.

Before joining the Emory faculty, Dr. Owens conducted public policy research for the Nelson A. Rockefeller Institute of Government and the New York State Temporary Commission on Constitutional Revision. He also served on the legislative staff of the New York State Senate.