Scholars@Duke
Mallory Elizabeth SoRelle

Mallory Elizabeth SoRelle

Assistant Professor in the Sanford School of Public Policy
Sanford School of Public Policy
mallory.sorelle@duke.edu
Box 90245, Durham, NC 27708
210 Sanford Building, Box 90245, Durham, NC 27708

Selected Publications

Deservingness and the Politics of Student Debt Relief

Journal Article Perspectives on Politics · June 25, 2024 As the pandemic accelerated calls to provide relief to millions of student borrowers, President Biden announced executive action to cancel $10,000 of student debt for most federal student loan holders. Both prior to and following his announcement, policyma ... Full text Cite

The policy feedback effects of preemption

Journal Article Policy Studies Journal · May 1, 2024 Scholars have charted a dramatic rise in the use of preemption both at the federal and state levels since the 1970s, with courts and politicians from both parties enacting preemptions across a range of contentious issues. Thus, preemption is a critical fea ... Full text Cite

Blame, Policy Feedback, and the Politics of Student Debt Relief Policy

Journal Article Forum (Germany) · April 1, 2024 Less than 1 year after President Biden announced a sweeping plan to reduce – and in many cases eliminate – the student loan burden for the 46 million Americans who hold educational debt, the Supreme Court ruled the proposal unconstitutional in Biden v. Neb ... Full text Cite

The policy acknowledgement gap: Explaining (mis)perceptions of government social program use

Journal Article Policy Studies Journal · February 1, 2024 Nearly, all Americans have received social policy benefits, yet many do not acknowledge “using government social programs.” Why? Work on the submerged state proposes that people who receive social assistance through market mechanisms do not realize that th ... Full text Cite

Privatizing Financial Protection: Regulatory Feedback and the Politics of Financial Reform

Journal Article American Political Science Review · August 28, 2023 Consumer credit is a crucial source of financial support for most Americans - part of what scholars dub the credit-welfare state. Yet, borrowers have been reluctant to take political action to demand better consumer financial protection, even as subprime l ... Full text Cite

The political benefits of student loan debt relief

Journal Article Research and Politics · April 1, 2023 Are people likely to reward politicians who support canceling student loan debt? This paper draws on original conjoint and survey experimental data to assess the effects of student debt relief proposals on voter behavior. Using data collected 3 months prio ... Full text Cite

Policy Feedback Theory

Chapter · January 1, 2023 How do policies, once created, reshape politics, and how might such transformations in turn affect subsequent policymaking? This chapter explores policy feedback theory: the ability of policies through their design, resources, and implementation to shape t ... Full text Cite

Politics, power, and precarity: how tenant organizations transform local political life

Journal Article Interest Groups and Advocacy · June 1, 2022 As the coronavirus pandemic exacerbated housing precarity, tenant organizations grew in numbers and salience. But membership-based tenant organizations predated the pandemic and will persist beyond it. There are (at least) hundreds of them in localities ac ... Full text Cite

From Personal Responsibility to Political Mobilization: Using Attribution Frames to Overcome Policy Feedback Effects

Journal Article American Politics Research · March 1, 2022 Public policies that promote personal responsibility while minimizing government responsibility are a key feature of modern American political economy. They can decrease Americans’ political participation on a given issue, with detrimental consequences for ... Full text Cite

Methods for Applying Policy Feedback Theory

Chapter · January 1, 2022 The goal of policy feedback research is to ask how policies can influence subsequent politics, and how that process ultimately affects future efforts at policy reform. This chapter considers how to conceptualize and design feedback studies, discusses the m ... Full text Cite

The paradox of policy advocacy: philanthropic foundations, public interest groups, and second-order policy feedback effects

Journal Article Interest Groups and Advocacy · June 1, 2021 The Tax Reform Act of 1969 introduced formal legal barriers designed to limit the political activities of foundations. How do these constraints affect foundations’ funding decisions and the capacity of public interest organizations that rely on philanthrop ... Full text Cite

What Inclusive Instructors Do Principles and Practices for Excellence in College Teaching

Book · April 2021 "This book uniquely offers the distilled wisdom of scores of instructors across ranks, disciplines and institution types, whose contributions are organized into a thematic framework that progressively introduces the reader to the key ... ... Cite

More then Meets the Eye: Government Social Provision and the Politics of “Public Options”

Chapter · 2021 Uniting scholars from across disciplines, this volume delves into the theory of the public option, explores several important case studies, and shows how public options could be a corrective to the trend toward privatization and subsidies. ... Full text Link to item Cite

Democracy Declined The Failed Politics of Consumer Financial Protection

Book · December 7, 2020 In Democracy Declined, Mallory E. SoRelle argues that the failure of federal policy makers to curb risky practices can be explained by the evolution of consumer finance policies aimed at encouraging easy credit in part by foregoing more ... ... Cite

Policy Feedback Theory

Chapter · 2017 "A comprehensive primer to the major contemporary theoretical frameworks used in policy process research written by leading public policy scholars"-- ... Link to item Cite

Partisan Preemption: The Strategic use of Federal Preemption Legislation

Journal Article Publius · September 1, 2016 Federal preemption by both parties has risen dramatically since the 1960s. Scholars note that Democrats and Republicans routinely employ preemption to advance partisan political goals, but we know very little about how each party uses this tool of federal ... Full text Open Access Cite