Prof. Michelle Miller-Adams

Contact

    Assistant Professor
    Department of Political Science
    1105 Au Sable Hall
    Grand Valley State University
    1 Campus Drive
    Allendale, MI 49401-9403
    616-331-2864
    millmich@gvsu.edu

Education

    Ph.D., Political Science, Columbia University, New York, 1997.
    Masters of International Affairs, Columbia University, New York, 1982.
    B.A., University of California, Santa Barbara, 1980.

Courses

    PLS 211 - International Relations
    PLS 284 - Latin American Politics
    PLS 315 - International Political Economy

Publications

The Origins and Impact of the Kalamazoo Promise (working title), W.E. Upjohn Institute(forthcoming 2008)

Owning Up: Poverty, Assets, and the American Dream, Brookings Institution Press, 2002

The World Bank: New Agendas in a Changing World, Routledge, 1997

"A Simple Gift?  The Impact of the Kalamazoo Promise on Economic Revitalization," Employment  Research, W.E. Upjohn Institute, July 2006.

“Breaking Into the Bank: The Challenge of Gaining Meaningful Access to the World Bank” (with Charles T. Myers). In Gaining Access: A Practical and Theoretical Guide for Qualitative Researchers, Martha S. Feldman, Jeannine Bell, and Michele Tracy Berger, eds., Walnut Creek, CA:  Altamira Press, 2003.

“Financial Markets in 1986: The Paradox of Liberalization.” In Italian Politics: A Review, vol. 2, Nanetti, Leonardi and Corbetta, eds. London and New York: Pinter Publishers, 1988.

“The World Bank and Private Capital” (with John F.H. Purcell). In Between Two Worlds: The World Bank's Next Decade, Richard E. Feinberg, ed. Washington: Overseas Development Council, 1986.

Selected Presentations

Panel Discussion on Media Coverage of Persistent Poverty, "Grassroots and Groundwork: What Communities are Doing to Get Out and Stay Out of Poverty" the annual conference of the  Northwest Area Foundation, St. Paul, MN, September 17, 2006.

“Beyond Bricks and Mortar: Building Social Capital in Poor Communities,” Keynote Address, and Workshop on Asset-Building, New England Resident Service Coordinators 6th Annual Conference, Groton, CT, May 6, 2004.

“Social Capital and Poverty,” public forum sponsored by the Kalamazoo Community Foundation, November 18, 2004.

Chair and Discussant, panel on policy reforms and performance of the international financial institutions, International Studies Association annual convention, Chicago, February 2001.

"The Challenge of World Bank-NGO Collaboration: Pursuing People-Oriented Development in a  Technocratic Culture." Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, Washington, DC, August 1997.

"The World Bank in the 1990s: Understanding Institutional Change." Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, San Francisco, August 1996.

Other Activities and Interests

In addition to my teaching position at GVSU, I am currently a visiting scholar at the W.E. Upjohn Institute in Kalamazoo, where I am working on a book about the Kalamazoo Promise as an asset-building strategy. I have taught previously at Western Michigan University and Kalamazoo College. My professional career has spanned the fields of non-profit management, finance, research, and academia; positions have included strategic planning consultant at the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, vice president for programs at the Twentieth Century Fund (now the Century Foundation), and vice president for research at Salomon Brothers. A native of Los Angeles, I live in Kalamazoo with my husband, composer Richard Adams, my 4-year old daughter, Eliana, and our black Lab Gioia. My extracurricular interests include music (I serve on the board of the contemporary music ensemble Opus 21 and the New York Youth Symphony), reading, and various crafts.