BETH L. LEECH, Associate Professor, received her B.S.J. from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University and her Ph.D. in political science from Texas A&M University. Her primary research interests involve the roles of interest groups, social movements, and the mass media in the public policy process. She currently is involved in a project funded by the National Science Foundation that examines policy argumentation and issue definition by interest groups in Washington (http://lobby.la.psu.edu) and is writing a book on interest group lobbying strategies. In 2005 she received the Emerging Scholar Award presented by the Political Organizations and Parties section of the American Political Science Association.

Her publications include the book Basic Interests: The Importance of Groups in Politics and Political Science, (Princeton University Press, 1998), written with Frank R. Baumgartner, as well as articles in the American Journal of Political Science, Journal of Politics, Political Research Quarterly, Policy Studies Journal, and numerous book chapters.