James Wilson

James Q. Wilson is the Ronald Reagan professor of public policy at the Pepperdine School of Public Policy in California, and a professor emeritus at USCLA. From 1961-1987 he was a professor of government at Harvard University. He has a Ph.D. and Master’s degree from the University of Chicago and an undergraduate degree from the University of Redlands. He is a former Chairman of the White House Task Force on Crime (1966), the National Advisory Commission on Drug Abuse Prevention (1972-1973) as well as a member of the Attorney General’s Task Force on Violent Crime (1981). He served on the President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board (1985-1990) and the President’s Council on Bioethics. He is a former president of the American Political Science Association. Wilson has also served on the board of directors for the New England Electric System, Protection One, RAND, and State Farm Mutual Insurance. He is the Chairman of the Council of Academic Advisors of the American Enterprise Institute, as well as a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Philosophical Society, and a member of the International Council of the New York based Human Rights Foundation. He was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President George W. Bush in 2003.