Laura Roselle, professor of political science, and Michelle Pautz '03, assistant professor of political science at the University of Dayton, have published an article detailing their research on the depiction of civil servants in popular American films.
“Are They Ready for Their Close-Up? Civil Servants and Their Portrayal in Contemporary American Cinema” was published in Public Voices, vol. XI, no. 1.
Pautz and Roselle studied how governmental bureaucrats are depicted in the top 150 films from 1996-2006 and determined that while the U.S. government is often portrayed in a negative light, civil servants are, “more often than not, presented as intelligent, well-trained, and efficient.”