Rate My Professor Russell Deacon

Professor Russell Deacon serves as Visiting Professor in Governance and Political History at the University of South Wales. He earned his PhD in 1999 from the University of Glamorgan with a thesis on ‘The Welsh Office and the Policy Process’, a Postgraduate Certificate in Education from Cardiff University, and a degree in Public Administration from the University of Glamorgan. Prior to academia, he worked in corporate head offices in retail, insurance, and television, and in the civil service at the Welsh Office’s European Affairs Division. From 1992 to 2011, he held positions from lecturer to Head of Department at the University of Wales Institute Cardiff (UWIC), receiving a teaching fellowship in 2009 and a personal chair in Welsh Political History and Governance in 2010. He is a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy and a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. Deacon has lectured at the University of Wales Trinity St David, Swansea University’s Department of History and Classics, and holds a fractional post at Coleg Gwent lecturing on Government and Politics and History while running the Foundation Degree in English and History. From 1999 to 2000, he was on secondment to the National Assembly for Wales, organizing the research department for the Welsh Liberal Democrats.

Deacon’s research specializations include devolved government across the United Kingdom, Welsh political history with a focus on the Liberal party in Wales and the UK, and the ERASMUS study abroad programme. Key publications comprise The Government and Politics of Wales (Edinburgh University Press, 2018), The Welsh Liberal Tradition: A History of the Welsh Liberal Party 1867–2008 (Welsh Academic Press, 2014), Devolved Great Britain: The New Governance of England, Scotland and Wales, 2nd edition (Edinburgh University Press, 2012), Devolution in Britain Today (Manchester University Press, 2006), and The Welsh Office and the Policy Process (1964-1999) (Welsh Academic Press, 2002). He has contributed chapters to Politics UK (9th edition, Routledge, 2018) and articles to the Journal of Liberal History and Parliamentary Affairs. Deacon chairs the European Movement in Wales, Lloyd George Society, and Welsh Political Studies Lecturers and Teachers Society; he co-founded the Gorwel think tank in 2012 as administrative director and serves on boards of These Islands, the Welsh Political Archives of the National Library of Wales, and the Liberal History Group. He advises the John Smith Institute on devolved government and has consulted for BBC Radio productions including Lloyd George’s War (2015).