John Mueller, Ralph D. Mershon Senior Research Scientist at the Mershon Center, has won the Philip E. Converse Book Award for his book War, Presidents and Public Opinion (Wiley, 1973).

Given by the Elections, Public Opinion, and Voting Behavior organized section of the American Political Science Association, the Converse Award recognizes an outstanding book in the field published at least five years previous for lasting influence on public opinion research.

The author of 19 books and monographs, Mueller is currently working on terrorism and the reactions (and costly over-reactions) it often inspires. His books on this topic include Terrorism, Security, and Money: Balancing the Risks, Benefits, and Costs of Homeland Security, with Mark Stewart (Oxford University Press, 2011); Atomic Obsession: Nuclear Alarmism from Hiroshima to Al Qaeda (Oxford University Press, 2010); and Overblown: How Politicians and the Terrorism Industry Inflate National Security Threats, and Why We Believe Them (Free Press, 2006).

War, Presidents, and Public Opinion is also winner of the first Warren J. Mitofsky Award for Excellence in Public Opinion Research, presented by the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research, and was selected in 1995 as one of the "Fifty Books That Significantly Shaped Public Opinion Research, 1946-1995" by the American Association for Public Opinion Research.