Richardson Dilworth (Ph.D., Johns Hopkins University) is Professor of Politics and Director of the Center for Public Policy at Drexel University. His research focuses on urban political development and urban public policy. He is the author of The Urban Origins of Suburban Autonomy (2005) and the editor of Cities in American Political History (CQ Press, 2011), The City in American Political Development (Routledge, 2009), and Social Capital in the City: Community and Civic Life in Philadelphia (Temple University Press,  2006). In 2008, he was a visiting scholar at the Legislative Office for Research Liaison of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, and in 2009 a visiting scholar at the Center for Environmental Policy at the Academy of Natural Sciences. In 2008, he was appointed by Mayor Michael Nutter to serve on the Philadelphia Historical Commission,  where he is chair of the Historic Designation Committee. He is also the Director of Drexel’s Center for Public Policy (CPP). The CPP supports interdisciplinary policy-oriented scholarship among Drexel faculty and other external affiliates and engages students in this research through its Master of Science in Public Policy degree program.