Skip to content
Apply
Stories

Messy, resilient, “genius”: why this Northeastern food policy expert is thankful for SNAP

People in this story

Christopher Bosso, professor of public policy’s new book on Nov. 16, 2023.

A pivotal figure in the expansion of government food stamps, which give low-income citizens financial aid for buying food, wasn’t a community organizer, philanthropist or far-left politician. It was Richard Nixon.

In the early 1970s, the Republican president was facing an eventual reelection campaign against George McGovern, a Democrat from South Dakota and a champion of expanding federal aid. But unlike many of today’s post-Reagan conservatives, Nixon made a robust social agenda one of his hallmarks.

“Nixon was not going to be outflanked by anybody on domestic policy,” says Chris Bosso, a professor of public policy and political science at Northeastern University. “He had a remarkably liberal social agenda on the environment by today’s standards, on consumer safety, on food programs.”

Continue reading at NGN Magazine.

More Stories

Denise Garcia’s, book, The AI Military Race, on Nov. 30, 2023.

Military AI: New book anticipates a world of “killer robots”—and the need to regulate them

12.04.2023
Northeastern postdoctoral teaching associate in english Catherine Fairfield poses for a portrait on Wednesday, Nov. 29, 2023.

A Swiftie’s “Wildest Dreams” come true: Northeastern is offering a course on Taylor Swift

11.30.2023
U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor hold up a copy of the U.S. constitution that she carries with her Saturday, Sept. 17, 2005 at an open-air Immigration and Naturalization citizenship hearing in Gilbert, Ariz.

Sandra Day O’Connor, first woman to serve on the Supreme Court, remembered as “independent thinker” who often disappointed conservatives

12.04.23
Northeastern Global News