Philip E. Tetlock, a professor of business administration and political science at the University of California at Berkeley, has won the 2008 Grawemeyer Award for “ideas improving world order,” the University of Louisville has announced. Mr. Tetlock will receive the $200,000 prize for his research on the accuracy of high-profile advisers on issues of public policy.

Predictions on political issues are frequently wrong, says Mr. Tetlock, which is unfortunate because lawmakers frequently rely on such analyses to shape policy. In a 20-year study of 27,000 predictions made by 284 “experts” cited in the news media, he found that, very often, the professionals were no more accurate in their crystal-ball gazing than ordinary people.

“In this age of academic hyperspecialization, there is no reason for supposing that contributors to top journals—distinguished political scientists, area-study specialists, economists, and so on—are any better than journalists or attentive readers of The New York Times in ‘reading’ emerging situations,” writes Mr. Tetlock in his 2005 book about the study, Expert Political Judgment: How Good Is It? How Can We Know? (Princeton).

Experts need to receive more training and be held publicly accountable for their advice, he argues in the book.

The award for ideas improving world order is one of five Grawemeyer prizes that are presented each year in recognition of achievements in the arts, humanities, and social sciences. It is the second Grawemeyer prize to be announced this week. The prize for music composition was awarded on Monday to the composer Peter Lieberson for the song cycle “Neruda Songs.” Winners in the categories of psychology, education, and religion are scheduled to be announced later this week.

The awards were created in 1984 by H. Charles Grawemeyer, an industrialist and a University of Louisville alumnus. More information about the Grawemeyer Awards and the Grawemeyer Foundation at the University of Louisville is available on the organization’s Web site. —Jason Breslow