Peter K. Enns

Professor, Cornell University

Peter K. Enns is a Professor of Government and Professor of Public Policy at Cornell University and Robert S. Harrison Director of the Cornell Center for Social Sciences. He is also Co-founder and Chief Data Scientist at Verasight. His research focuses on public opinion and political representation, mass incarceration and the legal system, and data analytics.

RESEARCH

Read and discover the research pieces written by Peter K. Enns.

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MEDIA APPEARANCES

Check out Peter’s op-eds, select news coverage, and television/radio appearances.

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TEACHING

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Welcome

Thanks for visiting my website! On this site, you can learn about my research, teaching, and media appearances. If you would like to learn about Verasight, click here.

Books

By Peter K. Enns

I have published three books: Hijacking the Agenda (with Chris Witko, Nate Kelly and Jana Morgan), Incarceration Nation, and Who Gets Represented? (edited with Chris Wlezien). All three books seek to better understand political representation, inequality, and social outcomes in the United States.

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Congratulations to our former executive director and current board member, Peter Enns, on winning the 2024 AAPOR book award with Incarceration Nation! pic.twitter.com/H9eVusu1fP
— Roper Center (@RoperCenter) May 7, 2024

And the 2022 Gladys M. Kammerer Award goes to…

Hijacking the Agenda: Economic Power and Political Influence

It's the APSA's award for best book on US nat'l policy.

Big congratulations to authors @Cmwitko, @prof_jmorgan, @ProfNateKelly, and @pete_enns!https://t.co/T3PeYigZ9M
— Russell Sage Foundation (@RussellSageFdn) June 20, 2022

@pete_enns kicking off the amazing conference on the 2022 Midterm and the Collaborative Midterm Survey, hosted in NYC by @cornell_tech @CornellCCSS @CornellBPP @RoperCenter https://t.co/xL2mVLg3Yb pic.twitter.com/t0BIxuPHYO
— http://AliCirone.bsky.social (@AliCirone) January 20, 2023

In the eye-opener of 2022, @pete_enns & @jake_rothschild unpacked where survey data come from https://t.co/E1IyF0W0Uz
— Heath Brown (@heathbrown) December 26, 2022

Recent article with @JuliusLagodny, @jonesyjpg, & Julianna Koch presenting a new measure of state policy mood now open access: https://t.co/0VbXx0lAbO pic.twitter.com/ihLiNvvMXy
— Peter K. Enns (@pete_enns) December 14, 2022

Released at a Jan. 20 event at @cornell_tech: results of the 2022 Collaborative Midterm Survey. “Even at a time of extreme political polarization, on some issues the opinions of most Americans are aligned,” said survey PI, @cornellgov
professor @pete_enns https://t.co/2vyJyAOCN9 pic.twitter.com/3Q42t3hG2u
— CornellArts&Sciences (@CornellCAS) January 24, 2023

MUST READ of the week — @pete_enns @JonathonSchuldt "Despite party differences, Democrats & Republicans overwhelmingly say they’ll help each other" new @3Streamsblog cc @NathanKalmoe @LilyMasonPhD
https://t.co/pHeUfg0zLA
— Heath Brown (@heathbrown) February 21, 2023

Now reading @pete_enns "Incarceration Nation" (2016). The central argument of the book is that public punitiveness predated politicians' turn to mass incarceration in the 60s and 70s, and media coverage played a big role in public opinion change. Useful figure below >> pic.twitter.com/iQ4g59mdcM
— jon ben-menachem (@jbenmenachem) March 4, 2023

Thanks to Joe Peschek for this thorough review of Hijacking the Agenda written with ⁦@prof_jmorgan⁩ ⁦@pete_enns⁩ and ⁦@ProfNateKelly⁩ in ⁦@NPS_Journal⁩ https://t.co/o9zyaeo6hm
— Big Data Kane (@Cmwitko) May 26, 2023

Check out more than 18,000 results on a broad range of topics on the CMS data visualization tool. https://t.co/d0u4KEZgiv
— Peter K. Enns (@pete_enns) August 10, 2023

Here's our rejoinder (https://t.co/A8MFULqYqZ) that introduces the U.S. Partisanship and Presidential Approval Dataset (>1.1 M observations available from @RoperCenter). https://t.co/EfgGqOGJNi
— Peter K. Enns (@pete_enns) October 6, 2023

We asked the Verasight survey panel the same questions as the recent @pewmethods, @pewresearch study by @awmercer and @arnoldlcl. See how we did: https://t.co/HHxcTxjvkP pic.twitter.com/MGFNqxqw04
— Verasight (@verasight_data) November 15, 2023

.@pete_enns has a paper on this. Maybe this graph is helpful.https://t.co/iqLOcBJ6AK pic.twitter.com/Qo86MmfjQa
— Jonathan Robinson 🏗🏘👋 (@jon_m_rob) December 15, 2023

Congratulations, @pete_enns—Verasight’s co-founder and Chief Data Scientist— on receiving the 2024 @AAPOR book award for greatly influencing the fields of public opinion research and survey research methodology! #AAPOR24 pic.twitter.com/ERmLS2cnHY
— Verasight (@verasight_data) May 17, 2024

Incarceration Nation. How the #US Became the Most Punitive Democracy in the World https://t.co/SfcIEcrCYm pic.twitter.com/0183X7u7zv
— AFSP (@afspinfos) June 20, 2016

New Book: Incarceration nation : how the United States became the most punitive democracy... https://t.co/DaurJkICZK pic.twitter.com/r7R25rbfCP
— QUSL Law Library (@QUSLlawref) September 15, 2016

.@pete_enns talks with @RichFrenchLive about his book Incarceration Nation, @CornellCAS https://t.co/5gFhrUJde3 pic.twitter.com/79NWTd56Q6
— Melissa Osgood (@MissyOsgood) April 4, 2016

I'm already thinking about new books for the next iteration of #polipuni. (Kudos @elizabhinton and @pete_enns.) pic.twitter.com/kmjHPWKlJy
— Michael Leo Owens (🍋 Grower & Chief Squeezer) (@milo_phd) April 22, 2016

New book by @pete_enns. Seems very impt to the many sociologists studying incarceration. https://t.co/XitzMiUU9U pic.twitter.com/YQU8HGsHi4
— David Brady (@davebrady72.bsky.social) (@DaveBrady72) May 3, 2016

@cornellgov prof. @pete_enns talks "Incarceration Nation" on Wednesday in Olin Library: https://t.co/fTFDg8q3IV pic.twitter.com/Tya8S22Xli
— CornellArts&Sciences (@CornellCAS) September 19, 2016

Peter K. Enns, "Incarceration Nation: How the United States Became the Most Punitive Democracy in the World" (Cambr… https://t.co/S0IaWHazSE
— NB Political Science (@NewBooksPoliSci) May 2, 2016

Cool. Thanks Demetrius. Poor Dominique—I was like an excited schoolboy in the interview. Lol.

Book recommendations: Yes please!
— Dan Kent, hoping God puts this tweet on his fridge (@thatdankent) August 27, 2018

@pete_enns on the Incarceration Nation @SSNScholars pic.twitter.com/aItKwo7Frb
— Jana Morgan (@prof_jmorgan) March 3, 2017

Great thanks @pete_enns of @Cornell for Skyping into my #polipuni seminar 2 discuss your book Incarceration Nation. What a delight! 👏🏿👏🏾👏🏽👏🏼 pic.twitter.com/5sw35Gi98J
— Michael Leo Owens (🍋 Grower & Chief Squeezer) (@milo_phd) October 4, 2017

I enjoyed talking about Incarceration Nation and the criminal legal system with the folks at Democracy Works: https://t.co/FrHLY3WLA2 Thanks @WPSU @McCourtneyInst
— Peter K. Enns (@pete_enns) October 8, 2018

Dr. Peter Enns will be giving a talk on "Criminal Justice Reform in the Trump Era" Tuesday April 2, 2019 at GSU. Dr. Enns is the Executive Director of the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research at Cornell University & author of Incarceration Nation. RSVP:https://t.co/aCTz2FTm0Y pic.twitter.com/qfkvUVxlJu
— Pol Sci @ GSU (@GSUPoliSci) April 1, 2019

Good turnout at today’s event—Peter Enns on mass incarceration. pic.twitter.com/kX70cWo5KB
— Gregg Caruso (@GreggDCaruso) March 21, 2019

2 books (incarceration nation by @pete_enns + fragmented democracy by @povertyscholar) written by 2 profs who deeply impacted my education/life are free to read for the next month!! just downloaded both here: https://t.co/ZLyCWODIUf https://t.co/UJA3RmMjYr
— Claire Liu (@claireliu222) June 12, 2020

Highly recommended - and free to read from @CUP_PoliSci until July 12th - Incarceration Nation by @pete_enns is a great study of the politics of criminal justice in the USA. https://t.co/J2VpHodwQv pic.twitter.com/tLZd933GDH
— Will Jennings (@drjennings) June 13, 2020

Can non-probability sampling compete with RDD and other probability polls? In the 2020 election, yes -- in fact, they did better!

New research with @jake_rothschild @3Streamsblog: https://t.co/3rctXwUkVD (a short thread) pic.twitter.com/IVlfeLhMr9
— Peter K. Enns (@pete_enns) March 18, 2021

What is the future of public opinion polling? Register for tomorrow’s live panel of #polling, #media, and #surveyresearch experts as they discuss what we can and should expect from #publicopinionpolls. https://t.co/6YHlSinIez @pete_enns @doug_rivers @jennagiesta @pollcat pic.twitter.com/Ucq9rSsFkX
— Roper Center (@RoperCenter) January 20, 2021

Executive director @pete_enns joins scholars in Uruguay to discuss the release of hundreds of Uruguay datasets through @RoperCenter https://t.co/nQH7hmPBLV
— Roper Center (@RoperCenter) December 2, 2021

I recall seeing authors present it while in progress and it was obvious this would be high impact and important. pic.twitter.com/o6ajxPcPhc
— David Brady (@davebrady72.bsky.social) (@DaveBrady72) February 22, 2022

.@jake_rothschild and I peeked behind the curtains to learn how companies outsource online survey respondents and we were blown away by what we found: https://t.co/4rZZHq0U0d.
— Peter K. Enns (@pete_enns) May 2, 2022

The rise of mass incarceration in the U.S. in 10 seconds (Animated version of Fig.1.1 from Incarceration Nation: https://t.co/KC5J9EeU8l) pic.twitter.com/4qnJoCDZk5
— Peter K. Enns (@pete_enns) October 19, 2017