Award Recipients
Per Strömblad (Linnaeus University) and Bo Malmberg (Stockholm University)
The Urban Affairs Association (UAA), the international professional association for urban scholars, researchers and public service professionals, convened its 47th Annual Conference in Minneapolis, Minnesota, April 19-22, 2017. More than 750 participants, representing universities, research institutions, non-profit organizations, and public and private organizations/institutions from around the world met to discuss 21st century issues impacting urban populations and places. Conference participants represented institutions from North America, South America, Europe, Asia, and Africa. The University of Minnesota served as the local sponsor for the event.
During the conference, awards were presented in recognition of outstanding scholarship and service. Among those honored were Per Strömblad (Linnaeus University) and Bo Malmberg (Stockholm University). For their article, “Ethnic Segregation and Xenophobic Party preference: Exploring the Influence of the Presence of Visible Minorities on Local Electoral Support for the Sweden Democrats,” Strömblad and Malmberg were awarded the 2017 Best Article in the Journal of Urban Affairs Award, for a 2016 published article.
Award Committee Assessment
We are very happy to choose Per Strömblad and Bo Malmberg’s paper as the best paper in the Journal of Urban Affairs for 2017. Their analysis of the relationship between exposure to immigrants, economic conditions, and xenophobic party voting patterns is timely and makes important links between local and national political outcomes. The authors use a novel and rigorous methodology to clearly demonstrate that neighborhood-scale dynamics matter for xenophobic party preferences. This work will be of interest not only to those whose focus is on local political dynamics and neighborhood-scale outcomes, but also to the broader community of scholars actively engaged in understanding the often puzzling rise of xenophobic parties and candidates in Europe and North America today. The article is well written and very accessible, and makes an excellent contribution to urban scholarship and pressing political questions.
Award Committee
Chair Sara Hughes (University of Toronto); Daniel Bliss (Illinois Institute of Technology); Gordon Daniels (New York University); Clarissa Freitas (Universidade Federal do Ceara); Stacey Sutton (University of Illinois at Chicago)
Award Winners Bios
Per Strömblad earned his Ph.D. in Political Science from Uppsala University in 2003, and now serves as Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science at Linnaeus University. While completing his dissertation at the Institute for Housing and Urban Research, he also served as secretary for a Swedish government commission of inquiry on political integration of immigrants. Before obtaining his position at Linnaeus University in 2010, he conducted research at the Institute for Futures Studies in Stockholm, first as a Swedish Research Council postdoctoral fellow, and later heading a research program on multicultural integration. Dr. Strömblad has published peer-reviewed articles in publications such as Journal of Urban Affairs, Political Research Quarterly, Journal of Civil Society, and Urban Studies. He has edited 4 volumes, published 4 other books/reports and 18 book chapters, on topics ranging from ethnic and socioeconomic segregation, discrimination, neighborhood effects, political participation, social trust, and xenophobia. In years 2012–2013, he served as appointed expert to a Swedish government commission of inquiry on issues concerning citizenship. He has also been a consultant to the Globalisation Council of the Swedish government, the Swedish Agency for Youth and Civil Society, the Migration Studies Delegation of the Swedish government, and local municipalities.
Bo Malmberg earned his Ph.D. in Human Geography from Uppsala University and now serves as Professor of Geography at Stockholm University. Dr. Malmberg has held an Assistant Professorship at the Institute for Housing and Urban Research at Uppsala University and a Senior Lectureship at the Department of Social and Economic Geography at Uppsala University. He has been a visiting researcher at the University of California, Berkeley and at Harvard University, School of Public Health. From 2002-2011, he was an associate researcher at the Stockholm Institute for Futures Studies.
He has published 37 peer-reviewed articles, 10 books/reports and 32 book chapters on topics ranging from location theory, economic development, demographic change, global income growth, school choice, segregation measurement, and neighborhood effects. He has been a consultant to the Swedish Ministry of Finance, the Swedish Foundation for Strategic Environmental Research, Handelsbanken, and Riksbyggen cooperative housing. He has served as chairman of the board of the Aging Research Center at Karolinska Instititutet and as a member of Swedish Research Council review committees. He is a co-founder of Choros Cognition, a company specialized in urban remote sensing.
