Craig Calhoun

Craig Calhoun is University Professor of Social Sciences. He holds joint appointments in the School of Politics and Global Studies, the School of Public Affairs, the School for the Future of Innovation in Society, the School of Sustainability, and the School of Arts, Media and Engineering.

Prior to coming to ASU, Calhoun served as Director and President of the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE). He was previously President of the Social Science Research Council (SSRC), Dean of the Graduate School and Director of the University Center for International Studies at UNC Chapel Hill, and founder and Director of the Institute for Public Knowledge at NYU. In addition to UNC and NYU, he has been a professor at Columbia and the University of Oslo and a visiting professor at several international universities.

Calhoun’s work at ASU focuses on strengthening the ability of the social sciences, working together with the natural sciences, engineering and humanities, to address the most complex challenges facing society today —from crises in democracy to the shifting nature of globalization and the future of place-based communities, the complicated social and ethical issues raised by new technologies, and the need for creativity, solidarity, and determination in order to achieve just and sustainable futures.

He is the author or co-author of 9 books, editor of another 22, and has published more than 70 journal articles and a hundred book chapters that address culture, social movements, education, communication, religion, nationalism, the impact of technology, capitalism and globalization, critical theory and philosophy, and contemporary and historical empirical research. His work has been widely reprinted in anthologies and translated into 21 languages.

Calhoun serves on the board of the Mastercard Foundation and co-chairs the board of the American Assembly. He has been elected a Fellow of the British Academy, the American Association for Advancement of Science, and the American Philosophical Society, a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, an Einstein Fellow by the City of Berlin, and President of the International Institute of Sociology. He has also served as President of the Berggruen Institute and holds honorary appointments as Centennial Professor at LSE and Professor at the College d’Etudes Mondiales of the Maison des Sciences de l’Homme in Paris.

Calhoun received his D.Phil. from Oxford University, combining politics, sociology, and history. He has previous degrees in anthropology from Manchester, Columbia, and USC.