Professor Rodney Barker is a British academic and political commentator. He is currently the Professor of Government at the London School of Economics and Political Science

London School of Economics

The London School of Economics and Political Science is a public research university specialised in the social sciences located in London, United Kingdom, and a constituent college of the federal University of London...

 and he was the Professor of Rhetoric

Gresham Professor of Rhetoric

The Professor of Rhetoric at Gresham College, London, gives free educational lectures to the general public. The college was founded for this purpose in 1596 / 7, when it appointed seven professors; this has since increased to eight and in addition the college now has visiting professors.The...

 at Gresham College

Gresham College

Gresham College is an institution of higher learning located at Barnard's Inn Hall off Holborn in central London, England. It was founded in 1597 under the will of Sir Thomas Gresham and today it hosts over 140 free public lectures every year within the City of London.-History:Sir Thomas Gresham,...

 in London from September 2006 to September 2009.

After gaining his BA in History from Downing College, Cambridge

Downing College, Cambridge

Downing College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. The college was founded in 1800 and currently has around 650 students.- History :...

, he undertook a PhD at the London School of Economics and Political Science, jointly supervised by Richard Titmuss

Richard Titmuss

Richard Morris Titmuss was a pioneering British social researcher and teacher. He founded the academic discipline of Social Administration and held the founding chair in the subject at the London School of Economics.His books and articles of the 1950s helped to define the characteristics of...

 in the Department of Social Administration, and Robert McKenzie in the Department of Sociology. His first full academic position was as a lecturer in Politics in the Department of Political Theory and Government of University College Swansea

Swansea University

Swansea University is a university located in Swansea, Wales, United Kingdom. Swansea University was chartered as University College of Swansea in 1920, as the fourth college of the University of Wales. In 1996, it changed its name to the University of Wales Swansea following structural changes...

, a position he held between 1967 and 1971. After that, he returned to the London School of Economics and Political Science in 1971 and has held the positions of Lecturer, Senior Lecturer, Reader and Professor of Government. He was an Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Glasgow

University of Glasgow

The University of Glasgow is the fourth-oldest university in the English-speaking world and one of Scotland's four ancient universities. Located in Glasgow, the university was founded in 1451 and is presently one of seventeen British higher education institutions ranked amongst the top 100 of the...

 between 1990 and 1991.

As well as numerous scholarly articles, he is widely published in the British broadsheet

Broadsheet

Broadsheet is the largest of the various newspaper formats and is characterized by long vertical pages . The term derives from types of popular prints usually just of a single sheet, sold on the streets and containing various types of material, from ballads to political satire. The first broadsheet...

 newspapers and has been an opera critic for the Tribune

Tribune (magazine)

Tribune is a democratic socialist weekly, founded in 1937 published in London. It is independent but supports the Labour Party from the left...

.

Books

• Making Enemies, Palgrave Macmillan, 2007, ISBN 9780230516816
• Legitimating Identities, Cambridge University Press, 2001, ISBN 9780521004251
• Political Ideas and Political Action, Blackwell, 2000, ISBN 0631221425
• Political Ideas in Modern Britain, Routledge, 1997, ISBN 0415071216