Professor of Political Science and Department Chair

Dr. Mary Segers earned her B.A. in History at the College of Mount St. Vincent and her Ph.D. in Political Science from Columbia University. She teaches courses in Political Theory, Ethics in Public Policy and Administration, Religion and Politics, Ethics and Global Politics, and Women and Politics. She is a faculty member of the Liberal Studies Graduate Program and a faculty associate of the Center for Global Change and Governance. She is a member of the Women's Studies Council at Rutgers-Newark and served as Director of the Women's Studies Program from 1982-1985.

Professor Segers has written widely about religious and ethical values underlying public policy. Her books include A WALL OF SEPARATION? DEBATING THE ROLE OF RELIGION IN AMERICAN PUBLIC LIFE (1998); ABORTION POLITICS IN AMERICAN STATES (1995, co-edited with Timothy Byrnes); THE CATHOLIC CHURCH AND ABORTION POLITICS: A VIEW FROM THE STATES (1992, co-edited with Timothy Byrnes); CHURCH POLITY AND AMERICAN POLITICS: ISSUES IN CONTEMPORARY CATHOLICISM (1990); AND ELUSIVE EQUALITY: LIBERALISM, AFFIRMATIVE ACTION, AND SOCIAL CHANGE IN AMERICA (1983). Her most recent books are: PIETY, POLITICS, AND PLURALISM: RELIGION, THE COURTS, AND THE 2000 ELECTION (Rowman & Littlefield, 2002) and FAITH-BASED INITIATIVES AND THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION: THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE UGLY (with Jo Formicola and Paul Weber).

Dr. Segers served as a Fulbright Senior Specialist at the University of Warsaw in October 2001, and gave six lectures on the 2000 Election in the United States and on the September 11th attach on the World Trade Center. In 1999 Professor Segers served as Fulbright Distinguished Chair in American Studies at the University of Warsaw. In 1998 she received the Charles Pine Award for Excellence in Teaching at Rutgers-Newark. She held a Henry Luce Fellowship in Theology at Harvard Divinity School form 1987 to 1989. In addition, she served as Visiting Lecturer in the Women's Studies Program at Harvard Divinity School in the l985-86 academic year.

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