Niall Ferguson
Niall Campbell Ferguson FRSE (/ˈniːl/; born 18 April 1964)[1] is a Scottish–American historian who is the Milbank Family Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution and a senior fellow at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University.[2][3] Previously, he was a professor at Harvard University, the London School of Economics, New York University, a visiting professor at the New College of the Humanities, and a senior research fellow at Jesus College, Oxford.
For other people with similar names, see Neil Ferguson (disambiguation).
Niall Ferguson
- United Kingdom
- United States
5
Empire: How Britain Made the Modern World (2003)
Civilisation: the West and the Rest (2011)
Ferguson writes and lectures on international history, economic history, financial history and the history of the British Empire and American imperialism.[4] He holds positive views concerning the British Empire.[5] In 2004, he was one of Time magazine's 100 most influential people in the world.[6] Ferguson has written and presented numerous television documentary series, including The Ascent of Money, which won an International Emmy Award for Best Documentary in 2009.[7]
Ferguson has been a contributing editor for Bloomberg Television[8] and a columnist for Newsweek. He began writing a semi-monthly column for Bloomberg Opinion in June 2020.[9]
Career[edit]
Academic career[edit]
In 1989, Ferguson worked as a research fellow at Christ's College, Cambridge. From 1990 to 1992 he was an official fellow and lecturer at Peterhouse, Cambridge. He then became a fellow and tutor in modern history at Jesus College, Oxford, where in 2000 he was named a professor of political and financial history. In 2002 Ferguson became the John Herzog Professor in Financial History at New York University Stern School of Business, and in 2004 he became the Laurence A. Tisch Professor of History at Harvard University and William Ziegler Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School. From 2010 to 2011, Ferguson held the Philippe Roman Chair in history and international affairs at the London School of Economics.[21] In 2016 Ferguson left Harvard[22] to become a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, where he had been an adjunct fellow since 2005.
Ferguson has received honorary degrees from the University of Buckingham, Macquarie University (Australia) and Universidad Adolfo Ibáñez (Chile). In May 2010, Michael Gove, education secretary, asked Ferguson to advise on the development of a new history syllabus, to be entitled "history as a connected narrative", for schools in England and Wales.[23][24] In June 2011, he joined other academics to set up the New College of the Humanities, a private college in London.[25]
In the same year emails were released to the public and university administrators which documented Ferguson's attempts to discredit a progressive activist student at Stanford University who had been critical of Ferguson's choices of speakers invited to the Cardinal Conversations free speech initiative.[26] He teamed with a Republican student group to find information that might discredit the student. Ferguson resigned from leadership of the program once university administrators became aware of his actions.[26][27]
Ferguson responded in his column[28] saying, "Re-reading my emails now, I am struck by their juvenile, jocular tone. "A famous victory," I wrote the morning after the Murray event. 'Now we turn to the more subtle game of grinding them down on the committee. The price of liberty is eternal vigilance.' Then I added: 'Some opposition research on Mr O might also be worthwhile'—a reference to the leader of the protests. None of this happened. The meetings of the student committee were repeatedly postponed. No one ever did any digging on "Mr O". The spring vacation arrived. The only thing that came of the emails was that their circulation led to my stepping down."
Business career[edit]
In 2000 Ferguson was a founding director of Boxmind,[29] an Oxford-based educational technology company.
In 2006 he set up Chimerica Media Ltd.,[30] a London-based television production company.
In 2007 Ferguson was appointed as an investment management consultant by GLG Partners, to advise on geopolitical risk as well as current structural issues in economic behaviour relating to investment decisions.[31] GLG is a UK-based hedge fund management firm headed by Noam Gottesman.[32] Ferguson was also an adviser to Morgan Stanley, the investment bank.
In 2011 he set up Greenmantle LLC, an advisory business specializing in macroeconomics and geopolitics. He also serves as a non-executive director on the board of Affiliated Managers Group.
Political involvement[edit]
Ferguson was an advisor to John McCain's U.S. presidential campaign in 2008, supported Mitt Romney in his 2012 campaign, and was a vocal critic of Barack Obama.[33][34]
Non-profit organisation[edit]
Ferguson is a trustee of the New-York Historical Society and the London-based Centre for Policy Studies.
