The Contributions and Impact of Professor William H. Riker

This paper demonstrates the significant and extensive impactof W.H. Riker's works on the study of political science andpublic choice. We provide a citation analysis, peer reviews,and commentaries from former colleagues and students. Thecitation analysis shows that Riker's work has been cited morethan 3700 times by over 2000 different scholars in more than500 different journals. Peers, former colleagues and studentshighly respected him as a scholar and a person. Riker's mostsignificant intellectual contributions include using gametheory to analyze political behavior and incorporatingrational interest theory as a basis for the scientific studyof politics.