Paul Castellani

Specialization: Public Policy

Professor Castellani’s research interests are in health and disability policy, public-nonprofit sector relations, and intergovernmental finance. His first book, The Political Economy of Developmental Disabilities (Brookes, 1985) examines the political and economic forces shaping disability policy in the United States. His second book, From Snake Pits to Cash Cows: Politics and Public Institutions in New York (SUNY, 2005) examines how the political, economic, fiscal, and operational foundations of public institutions for people with mental disabilities evolved in the last half of the twentieth century. In addition to these books, Professor Castellani has published numerous articles and chapters on the financing, organization, and administration of disability services. He has been a consultant to several states, national organizations, and the federal government on organizational change and policy and program development. He has also been a consultant on these issues in the United Kingdom, Sweden and Hungary.

Professor Castellani was Director of Upstate Operations and Program Research for New York’s Office of Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities where he was responsible for oversight of, and liaison among, state regional offices and hundreds of private agencies and local governments delivering services to people with disabilities. He also directed research teams that developed rate-setting formulas, analyzed the effectiveness of services, studied the implementation of programs, and examined the financing, organization and administration of services.

Professor Castellani has taught graduate courses in public administration, political science, and health policy at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Union College, and the SUNY School of Public Health as well as at Rockefeller College. He serves on the editorial boards of the Journal of Disability Policy Studies and the Tizard Learning Disability Review (UK). As part of the Fulbright Specialist Program, he has taught at the Central European University in Budapest in 2008 and Leiden University in the Netherlands in 2010. He received his PhD in Political Science from the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University.