Dr John Meadowcroft is Reader (Associate Professor) in Public Policy in the Department of Political Economy at King’s College London. He is a political scientist whose research and teaching focuses on the impact of institutions and normative ideas on politics and policy.

John joined King’s in 2006, first appointed to what was then the Department of Management, before moving to the King’s Institute for the Study of Public Policy, and then becoming a founding member of the Department of Political Economy in 2010. In DPE he has served as Head of Department, Director of Teaching and Learning, Director of Postgraduate Research, and Chair of the Postgraduate Exam Board.

Before joining King’s, John worked as a researcher in a Westminster think tank, as a Lecturer in Politics in Queen Mary, University of London, and as a caseworker for a Member of Parliament.

John was awarded a BA in Public Policy (with first class honours) in 1996 and a PhD in Political Science in 1999, both from Goldsmiths, University of London. His PhD was an empirical study of the Liberal Democrats in UK local government, combining quantitative and qualitative methods to analyse the distinctiveness and the impact of the party’s strategy of ‘community politics’ in local government in the 1990s.

John is a member of the Executive Committee of the Public Choice Society and of the Editorial Advisory Boards of The Journal of Medicine and Philosophy and the Routledge book series Annals of Bioethics.