Roundtable: Arming the Ivory Tower: A Discussion of Campus Carry Legislative Initiatives

Session Submission Type: Roundtable Session

Abstract

Gun regulations are an ongoing, highly contested debate across the United States especially after a mass shooting. Largely overlooked in this debate have been the regulatory landscape governing carrying guns on college and university campuses. This roundtable has three aims. First, members will examine the diffusion of state-level campus carry policy over the past 25 years, including the current state of policy, the pattern of policy diffusion across the states relating to campus carry, and explanations for why states changed their laws to allow/prohibit campus carry. Second, using Georgia as an example of a state that recently passed a compulsory campus carry law, members will discuss the history of the efforts to pass a campus carry bill in Georgia. This discussion will include an examination of faculty, staff, and student support/opposition to campus carry as well as an examination of prior legislative successes and failures that preceded the adoption of the campus carry law in Georgia. Finally, members will discuss future efforts to change state law undertaken by groups opposing and favoring campus carry. Attendees are invited to share their campus carry research, both work in progress and findings.

Sub Unit

• Area XII. Roundtables

Chair

• John Sloan, University of Alabama at Birmingham

Discussants

• Bonnie Fisher, University of Cincinnati

• James McCafferty, Kennesaw State University

• Jennifer McMahon-Howard, Kennesaw State University

• Andy Pelosi, Campaign to Keep Guns off Campus