Office: 3140L Tydings Hall
Phone: 301-405-4120
Email: kkaufma1@umd.edu

Curriculum Vitae

Karen M. Kaufmann is Associate Professor of Government and Politics at the University of Maryland.  She received her B.A. (1981), M.B.A (1985), M.A. and Ph.D. (1998) in political science from the University of California, Los Angeles.

Professor Kaufmann’s research interests pertain to electoral behavior in American politics. Her research focuses on various aspects of the electoral process including campaign effects, voting behavior, and party attachments.  One of the central themes of her research looks at the role that group identities and group interests play vis-à-vis political behavior.  She is well known for her work on the gender gap and for her research in the area of Black and Latino politics. Her current work focuses on the prospects for multiracial coalition formation under varying conditions of local diversity.

She is the author of The Urban Voter: Group Conflict and Voting Behavior in American Cities (University of Michigan Press) and a co-author of Unconventional Wisdom: Facts and Myths about American Voters (Oxford University Press).  Her research also appears in a many peer review journals including the American Journal of Political Science, The Journal of Politics, Public Opinion Quarterly, Political Behavior, Political Research Quarterly, The Du Bois Review, Polity, Urban Affairs Review, and Political Science Quarterly.

Professor Kaufmann (with Co-PI Thomas Holbrook) is a recent recipient of a National Science Foundation grant to conduct a multi-city study of contextual influences on group relations and voting behavior in urban mayoral elections.  She is also a two time recipient of the College of Behavioral and Social Sciences Excellence in Teaching Award.