Amber Mackey studies race and ethnic politics, representation and public policy in the United States. Her research examines when legislation about race reaches the political agenda and how these policies eventually impact existing racial inequalities. Through this work, she aims to document how variations in attention, responsiveness, and policy outputs impact the lived realities of racial and ethnic minorities.   

In her book project, Symbols Over Substance: Legislative Attention to Race, Mackey deploys text analysis to track legislative attention to race across state legislatures and Congress. Paying careful attention to the different types of legislation, her work reveals an increasing reliance on resolutions to communicate ideas about race.  

Mackey holds a B.A. in political science and sociology from Barnard College of Columbia University and received her Ph.D. and master’s in political science from the University of Pennsylvania. She also recently completed a predoctoral fellowship at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Her work has earned her recognition as an American Political Science Association Minority Fellow, an Urban Leaders Fellow, a Fontaine Fellow,  and a Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellow.