Toby Samuel James (born 1979), is a professor of

political science Political science is the scientific study of politics. It is a social science dealing with systems of governance and power, and the analysis of political activities, political thought, political behavior, and associated constitutions and ...

and

public policy Public policy is an institutionalized proposal or a decided set of elements like laws, regulations, guidelines, and actions to solve or address relevant and real-world problems, guided by a conception and often implemented by programs. Public ...

at the

University of East Anglia The University of East Anglia (UEA) is a public research university in Norwich, England. Established in 1963 on a campus west of the city centre, the university has four faculties and 26 schools of study. The annual income of the institution f ...

in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the European mainland, continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

. James is known for his work on the fairness and integrity of elections, but also on political leadership and the policy process. He is the Editor-in-Chief of the journa
Policy Studies

Early life and education

James was awarded a Ph.D. from the

University of York , mottoeng = On the threshold of wisdom , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £8.0 million , budget = £403.6 million , chancellor = Heather Melville , vice_chancellor = Charlie Jeffery , students ...

, and worked at the

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The librar ...

University of Swansea , former_names=University College of Swansea, University of Wales Swansea , motto= cy, Gweddw crefft heb ei dawn , mottoeng="Technical skill is bereft without culture" , established=1920 – University College of Swansea 1996 – University of Wa ...

, and

University of Sydney The University of Sydney (USYD), also known as Sydney University, or informally Sydney Uni, is a public university, public research university located in Sydney, Australia. Founded in 1850, it is the oldest university in Australia and is one o ...

, before joining the

Career

Published works

James wrote his first book, ''Elite Statecraft and Election Administration'', on the politics of how elections are run. Writing about the history of reform in the UK, Ireland and the US, he argued that politicians often try to reform how elections are run to maximise political interest, but this would depend on whether nature of the political system. James' second main work focused on electoral management - how elections are organised and delivered. In ''Comparative Electoral Management'' electoral management was defined as the study of: 'the organisations, networks, resources, micro anthropological working practices and instruments involved in implementing elections'. The book then provided a method for assessing the delivery of elections, a new method for identifying who was responsible for running elections and the ways in which running elections could be improved.

Research areas

James has commonly drawn from and re-developed statecraft theory. He published books with former Labour minister

Charles Clarke Charles Rodway Clarke (born 21 September 1950) is a British Labour Party politician, who was the Member of Parliament (MP) for Norwich South from 1997 until 2010, and served as Home Secretary from December 2004 until May 2006. Early life ...

about former UK party leaders using the approach. His work involved interviewing leaders such as

Tony Blair Sir Anthony Charles Lynton Blair (born 6 May 1953) is a British former politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1997 to 2007 and Leader of the Labour Party from 1994 to 2007. He previously served as Leader of the ...

, Nick Clegg and William Hague to assess the theory, which were serialised in British newspapers before the analysis was published in an academic journal.

Political adviser

Toby James has been proactive in using research to influence policy to try to improve the integrity of elections. He was the founding adviser to the UK All Party Parliamentary Group on Democratic Participation, which he worked to establish with

Bite the Ballot Bite The Ballot (BTB) is a party-neutral movement and registered youth democracy charity, based in the United Kingdom. Its mission is to empower young people to evolve UK democracy. BTB was formed in April 2010 by business studies teachers David ...

. James was co-author of th
Missing Millions
report in 2016 on voter registration which was influential in shaping government policy and debate about voter registration. The Minister of State at the time, Chris Skidmore, said that the report would 'go down in history as helping to evolve the UK's electoral registration system.'
second edition of the report
was published in 2019 making the case for further voter registration reform. He was a prominent critic of the UK government’s plans to introduce voter identification requirements in Britain. At the international level he was the co-founding co-convenor of th
Electoral Management Network
in 2016 which has brought together practitioners and academics from around the world in several high-profile conferences. He later became co-Director of the Electoral Integrity Project in 2021.

References

External links

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Profile

{{DEFAULTSORT:James, Toby 1979 births Living people Alumni of the University of York Academics of the University of East Anglia British political scientists