Richard Reeves Joins Brookings Economic Studies as Fellow and Policy Director

Washington, D.C. – Richard Reeves joins Brookings’ Economic Studies program as a fellow and policy director for the Center on Children and Families. Vice President and Economic Studies Co-Director Karen Dynan announced today that Reeves will help develop CCF’s research agenda on intergenerational mobility and opportunity.  His current research in this area includes work on character, downward mobility, and parenting programs.

Prior to joining Brookings, Reeves worked as director of strategy to the UK’s Deputy Prime Minister, Nick Clegg.  Reeves is also a former director of Demos, the London-based political think-tank.  He is the author of John Stuart Mill – Victorian Firebrand, an intellectual biography of the British liberal philosopher and politician, as well as a series of articles, radio programs and publications on politics and policy.

His other principal areas of research are the theory and practice of coalition building; the development of progressive political thought; policies relating to social mobility; the economics and politics of wellbeing; the formation of character; contemporary gender and masculinity; the future of the workplace; and organizational leadership.

Reeves, former European Business Speaker of the Year, co-presented and co-authored The 80 Minute MBA (2009). He also has written and presented a number of programs for the BBC, including: Anti-Social Housing, which addressed the failures of the UK social housing system (2009); Character Factories, on the importance of character formation for public policy (2008); and the series Political Roots, an examination of the historical and intellectual foundations of modern liberalism and social democracy (2009).  In 2005, he presented the four-part BBC2 TV series, Making Slough Happy.

Reeves’ previous roles include director of futures at the Work Foundation; principal policy advisor to the Minister for Welfare Reform, research fellow at the Institute for Public Policy Research, one of the UK’s premier think-tanks, and a researcher at the Institute of Psychiatry at the University of London.  He is also an associate director of CentreForum.

“We look forward to Richard’s work on social mobility and how to help more achieve the American Dream,” said Dynan.

“We welcome Richard into the ES family,” added Ted Gayer, co-director of Economic Studies. “Richard’s work on character formation, family formation and opportunity should help inform the debate as policymakers continue to grapple with these issues.”

“I greatly look forward to collaborating with the scholars at Brookings on the social mobility issues of the day,” said Reeves.  “Even across the Pond, Brookings’ reputation is renowned, and I am pleased to be a part of the team.”