2007 Summer Institute in Political Psychology, Stanford University

随着世界进入21世纪，民主在世界各地的传播和运作是许多国家的政治领导人和公民所关心的问题。一些国家刚刚开始实行民主政府；其他国家正处于实施这种政府的早期阶段；还有一些几个世纪以来一直实行民主的国家正面临新的挑战（例如，担心公众对美国和其他国家选举过程的信心）。为了让政府内外的领导人在管理所有这些国家的民主进程方面做出明智的选择，他们必须了解公民如何看待政治，了解他们的责任，选择何时以及如何在政治领域采取行动，公民群体如何以及何时聚集起来组织集体努力来影响历史进程，等等。所有这些问题的核心都是社会心理学问题——它们涉及到人们如何看待自己，他们与其他个体的关系，以及他们与所在集体的关系。因此，为了帮助政府和私营部门领导人了解他们的国家和选民，研究政治的社会心理学是非常有价值的，因为它将帮助领导人预测公众对他们的行动、对世界、国家和地区事件的反应，以及如何追求国家的最大利益。这笔拨款将通过培训和激励新一代学者在政府内外研究这些问题，加强对政治社会心理学的研究。政治心理学暑期学院（SIPP）是一个为期三周的暑期培训项目，将来自世界各地的60人聚集在一起，与一些世界领先的专家就政治领导人和普通公民的政治思想和行为背后的心理学进行互动。SIPP将在斯坦福大学举行，斯坦福大学和其他大学的教师将进行一整天的讲座，并举行讨论小组会议，详细阐述讲座中涉及的材料。此外，参与者将向他们的同伴展示他们正在进行的研究项目，以获得反馈和建议。额外的会议将介绍政府和私营部门的政治社会心理学家的就业机会。自1991年SIPP成立以来，已经举办了16届，吸引了越来越多的来自全国和世界各地顶尖高校的申请者，每年都超过了可容纳的人数。SIPP的参与者一直包括来自联邦机构（如中央情报局、国防情报局）、帮助美国政府开展工作的私营部门组织、非政府组织以及希望在政府开展工作时提供帮助和信息的学术界（本科生、研究生和教师）的研究人员。

As the world heads into the 21st century, the spread and operation of democracy around the world is on the minds of political leaders and citizens of many nations. Some countries are just embarking on democratic government for the first time; others are in the early years of implementing such government; and still other nations that had been practicing democracy for centuries are facing new challenges (e.g., concerns about public confidence in the electoral process in the U.S. and other nations). In order for leaders in governments and outside to make wise choices in managing the democratic process in all such nations, it is vital for them to understand how citizens think about politics, understand their responsibilities, choose when and how to take action in the political sphere, how and when groups of citizens come together to organize collective efforts to influence the course of history, and much more. At their core, all of these questions are matters of social psychology - they involve issues of how people think about themselves, their relations to other individuals, and their relations to the collectivities in which they exist. So to help government and private sector leaders understand their nations and constituents, study of the social psychology of politics is terrifically valuable, because it will help leaders to anticipate how the public will respond to their actions and to world, national, and regional events and how to pursue the best interests of the nation.This grant will enhance the study of the social psychology of politics by training and energizing a new generation of scholars to work on these problems, both inside and outside of government. The Summer Institute in Political Psychology (SIPP) is a summer training program that lasts three weeks and brings together a group of 60 people from around the world to interact with some of the world's leading experts on the psychology underlying the political thinking and behavior of political leaders and ordinary citizens. To be held at Stanford University, SIPP will involve full days of lectures by faculty from Stanford and other universities and meetings of discussion groups to elaborate on the material covered in the lectures. In addition, participants will present their own ongoing research projects to their fellows to get feedback and suggestions. Additional sessions will describe job opportunities for political social psychologists in government and the private sector.Since 1991, when SIPP was founded, it has been held 16 times and has attracted growing numbers of applicants from top colleges and universities around the nation and the world, many more than can be accommodated each year. SIPP participants have always included research personnel from federal agencies (e.g., the CIA, the DIA), from private sector organizations that help the US government carry out its work, from NGOs, and from the academic world (undergraduates, graduate students, and faculty) who wish to help and inform government as it carries out its work.