James Ron, PhD, is an author and social scientist.

 

A former academic, consultant, and journalist, James has broad expertise in the fields of political violence, human rights, war crimes, program evaluation, and cross-national public opinion.

 

James conducted qualitative and statistical academic research in Africa, Asia, Latin America, North America, and the Middle East. As a human rights researcher, he worked for Human Rights Watch, and as a journalist, for the Associated Press. James has done program evaluation work for the Swiss government, the International Committee of the Red Cross, CARE, Life for a Child, and others. 

 

As a social scientist, James is recognized for his research on political violence, human rights policies, global governance, and international aid. He led complex, multi-country studies involving representative public opinion surveys, large-scale data analysis, and qualitative research with affected communities, NGO staff, government officials, and political elites.

 

Having retired from academia and consulting, James now focuses on personal writing. 

 

This website, www.jamesron.org, presents James’s research blog, featuring data-driven commentary, survey results, and evidence-based analysis on domestic and international issues. Posts often draw from his own projects in political science, sociology, and international affairs, as well as critical engagement with other scholars’ work.

 

Academic Work

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Trained as a political scientist, sociologist, journalist, and war crimes investigator, James has explored how states, NGOs, and international organizations interact during armed conflict and political instability. His most recent academic projects examined public opinion in Colombia, India, Mexico, Morocco, Nigeria, and the United States on civil rights, human rights, and trust in advocacy organizations.

 

A graduate of Stanford University and the University of California, Berkeley, James taught at Johns Hopkins University, McGill University (Canada Research Chair), Carleton University, and the University of Minnesota (endowed chair). As a graduate student and professor, his research was funded by the Social Science Research Council, MacArthur Foundation, National Science Foundation, Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the Canada Research Chairs program, the Canada Fund for Innovation, the Ford Foundation, Open Society Foundations, and others.

 

James has also held fellowships and visiting research appointments at the Brookings Institution, Brown University’s Watson Institute, and Mexico City’s Centro de Investigación y Docencia Económicas (CIDE).

 

His scholarly publications have appeared in leading journals, including International Organization, International Security, Comparative Politics, Human Rights Quarterly, Journal of Peace Research, and World Development. He published Frontiers and Ghettos: State Violence in Serbia and Israel (University of California Press) and co-authored Taking Root: Human Rights and Public Opinion in the Global South (Oxford University Press), along with major reports for Human Rights Watch.​

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For commentary linking current events in Gaza to Frontiers and Ghettos, see "A Sad Prediction Born out By Events" on the University of California Press author blog.

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International Research Consulting

 

As a consultant, James evaluated humanitarian, human rights, and development programs for organizations including the International Committee of the Red Cross, the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, CARE, and various government and non-profit clients. His evaluations have covered topics ranging from forensic investigation support in Mexico and Central America to women’s economic empowerment in the Middle East.

 

In earlier years, James documented abuses and war crimes in Chechnya, Israel/Palestine, Kosovo, Kyrgyzstan, Nigeria, and Turkey for Human Rights Watch and assessed ICRC civilian protection efforts during the Balkan wars.

 

James was a long-time volunteer for Life for a Child, an Australian medical charity providing insulin and life-saving supplies to children with Type 1 diabetes in low-income countries—a commitment inspired by his son’s diagnosis at age two.​

 

Publishing for Non-Academic Audiences

 

James published guest editorials in The New York Times, Washington Post, Foreign Policy, Le Monde, and many other international outlets, offering analysis grounded in personal research and field experiences. Those opinion pieces focused on his areas of expertise: foreign aid, political violence, Israeli-Arab politics, the politics of NGOs, and human rights. 

 

James is now working on a memoir focused on his transition from soldiering to human rights work, and on themes of personal and collective accountability, identity, and belonging. 

 

Learn More​​

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For more on James Ron's scholarly work, please visit his Google Scholar, ResearchGate, Academia.edu, Web of Science, Semantic Scholar, ORCID, Social Science Research Network, and PhilPeople. 

 

His contribution pages are available at Medium, OpenDemocracy, OpenGlobal Rights, Foreign Policy, and Amazon.com 

 

See here for mentions of James Ron on the Cal Alumni Network and the Berkeley Sociology Department's Alumni page. 

To learn more about James Ron's consulting work, please check out his profile on LinkedIn.