New RAI Gift Establishes Associate Professorship in US Politics and Enables Launch of Postgraduate Programme

The RAI is delighted to announce the creation of the Churchill Chair, an Associate Professorship in US Politics. This transformative new post has been made possible by an exceptionally generous endowment gift from a donor who wishes to remain anonymous. The chair is named after Sir Winston Churchill, the first recipient of honorary US citizenship, in recognition of his commitment to the Anglo-American relationship and his lifelong fascination with the dynamism and political creativity of America.

The Churchill Chair is a bold statement of our commitment to becoming the global centre for the historically informed study of the politics of the United States and its place in the world. It will allow us to launch a new master's course in contemporary US politics and government, the University's first specialist postgraduate programme in US politics, which we hope will attract and help shape the next generation of leaders in public life, policy, scholarship, and business. It is a major step towards strengthening Oxford’s research and teaching strengths in this field.

In this, the RAI’s 25th anniversary year, our mission to provide rigorous analysis of the United States in a global context, and to share our research and expertise with a wide public, has never felt more important. Adam Smith, RAI Director, said, “I’m immensely grateful to the donor for their extraordinary vote of confidence in the RAI’s work. But also: we wouldn't have reached this point without the vision and support of my brilliant colleagues in the RAI, in the Department for Politics and International Relations, in the Humanities Division — and also former colleagues in the Institute who laid the groundwork over many years. My heartfelt thanks to everyone who has made this happen."