LEWISTON – Political scientist Thomas E. Mann will be October’s featured speaker at the Great Falls Forum.

Mann, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, a Washington research institution, will give a talk titled “Campaigning And Governing: The 2004 Elections and Their Aftermath.”

His talk be held from 11:45 a.m. to 1 p.m. Monday, Oct. 18 at Bates College’s Muskie Archives, at 70 Campus Ave. The talk was made possible in part by a donation from the college.

Mann’s current projects include studies on campaign finance reform, transitions from campaigning to governing, and election reform. His expertise is on budget politics, campaign finance, Congress, congressional reform, elections, political campaigns and parties, politics, polling, presidency, reapportionment and redistricting.

He lives in Bethesda, Md., with his wife, Sheilah, who is also a political scientist.

Mann has taught at Princeton University, Johns Hopkins University, Georgetown University, the University of Virginia and American University. He has conducted political polls for the Democratic Study Group Campaign Fund, and has served on the Democratic National Committee’s Winograd and Hunt commissions dealing with presidential selection. He has also worked as a consultant to IBM and the Public Broadcasting Service, and has been chairman of the Board of Overseers of the National Election Studies.

He lectures frequently in this country and abroad about American politics and public policy. He’s also a regular contributor to newspaper stories and television and radio programs on politics and governance.

The Great Falls Forum is sponsored by the Sun Journal, St. Mary’s Regional Medical Center, Lewiston Public Library and Bates College. All forums, except for this Oct. 18 talk, take place at the Lepage Conference Center at St. Mary’s Regional Medical Center.

It is a monthly public platform encouraging thought-provoking speakers and discussion. Everyone is welcome. There are no dues and no obligations.

Lunch reservations may be made by calling Mari Maxwell at (207) 689-2857 on or before Thursday, Oct. 14. Lunch is $7 with preregistration or $10 at the door, if space is still available.

Upcoming speakers this season :

• Raphael Di Luzio, an artist and University of Maine professor, Nov. 18.

• Naomi Schalit, executive director of Maine Rivers, Jan. 20.

• Wes McNair, a Maine poet, Feb. 17.

• William Pope.L., performing artist and lecturer at Bates College, March 17.

• Abraham Peck, director of the Academic Council for Post Holocaust Christian, Jewish and Islamic studies, University of Southern Maine, April 21.

• Mark Bessire, director, Bates College Museum of Art, May 19.