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University of Warwick researcher honoured for 40 years of work at prestigious award ceremony

The University of Warwick’s Professor Wyn Grant was awarded the Political Studies Association (PSA) Diamond Jubilee Lifetime Achievement Award on Tuesday night.

The award is the most prestigious honour that the PSA can confer and is just reward for Professor Grant’s 40 years of outstanding scholarship and professional service.

He said:  “I am delighted to receive this award from my fellow academics and policy practitioners.”

Professor Grant joined the University of Warwick’s Political and International Studies  (PAIS) department in 1971 as a lecturer and was later promoted to senior lecturer seven years later.

Between 1990 and 1997, he chaired the University’s PAIS department and is a past chair and president of the PSA.

He is a researcher in numerous fields, with particular emphasis on interest groups, relations between governments and business, economic policy and globalisation. He is an acknowledged expert on the European Union’s Common Agricultural Policy, and in recent years has collaborated extensively with researchers in the field of biological science.

On top of his distinguished political career, which has seen him publish numerous academic books, Professor Grant also holds a huge passion for sport - maintaining the Political Economy of Football website, http://www.footballeconomy.com, and he is a regular contributor on both national and regional radio stations

Professor Grant is a huge Charlton Athletic fan, and as well as being a season ticket holder at the Valley, he is also a shareholder and kit sponsor at the League One club.

His love of sport is not restricted to football as Professor is Grant is also a season ticket holder of English ice hockey outfit Coventry Blaze – in fact on Tuesday night he also received a personalised Canadian ice hockey shirt from the International Political Science Association for his work as vice-president of the Montreal based organisation.

It could have turned out rather differently for a young Wyn Grant if political studies had not seduced him from his first love – journalism.

At the age of 11 Wyn was proprietor, editor, chief reporter, typesetter, advertising manager, distributor and street seller of his own local newspaper, the Billericay Observer.

A Pathé newsreel from 1961 followed the 14-year-old schoolboy as he interviewed local officials, including the clerk of Basildon Council, before racing home to type up the stories from his notebook.

He laboriously printed as many as 1,000 copies of the 12-page newspaper every fortnight using a hand-cranked duplicator. The newsreel, which can still be seen on the British Pathé website, is a fascinating insight into the past life of one of the country’s most distinguished political scientists.


Wyn Grant gained first class honours in Politics from the University of Leicester, before going on to postgraduate studies at Strathclyde, where he was awarded his MSc, and Exeter, where he completed a PhD thesis on independent local political parties.

Notes to Editors

Professor Wyn Grant is available for interview on 07973 680599.

A picture of Wyn is available at http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/services/communications/medialibrary/images/sep05/mms_554ebb2589cdc05800e134e0704fd9d0.jpg

 
The Political Studies Association exists to develop and promote the study of politics. Founded in 1950, it is the leading Association in its field in the UK, with an international membership including academics in political science and current affairs, theorists and practitioners, policy makers, researchers and students in higher education

For more information on the PSA log on to www.psa.ac.uk

For more information contact Luke Hamer, Assistant Press Officer, University of Warwick, on 02476 575601, or on 07824 541142. Alternatively email l.hamer@warwick.ac.uk

Professor Wyn Grant