Richard Reeves (British author)

Last updated

Richard V. Reeves
Making Education Work (42839111875).jpg
Born (1969-07-04) July 4, 1969 (age 55)
Peterborough, United Kingdom
Occupation
  • writer
  • scholar
NationalityBritish, American
Alma mater Wadham College, Oxford (BA)
University of Warwick (PhD)
SubjectHistory, philosophy, liberal politics
Website
www.richardvreeves.com

Richard V. Reeves (born 4 July 1969) [1] is a Anglo-American writer and social scientist. He is a Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution and President of the American Institute for Boys and Men. [2] [3]

Contents

Early life and education

Reeves was born in Peterborough, United Kingdom. [4] He was educated in geography at Wadham College, Oxford. [2] He later received a Ph.D. from the University of Warwick. [5]

Career

Reeves has held positions including Director of Futures at The Work Foundation, a British non-profit organisation, Society Editor of The Observer , Economics Correspondent and Washington Correspondent of The Guardian , policy adviser to Frank Field when he was Minister for Welfare Reform, and director of the London-based think tank Demos.

In summer 2010 Reeves left Demos, joining the office of Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, a Liberal Democrat, as a Special Advisor. [6] Until 2012 Reeves was Director of Strategy to Nick Clegg. [7]

In 2012 Reeves urged the Liberal Democrats to choose to become a radical centrist political party, "a hard-driving radical liberal party of the political centre", continuing his campaign for centre left Liberal Democrats to leave, "Any attempt to position the Liberal Democrats as a party of the centre left after five years of austerity government in partnership with the Conservatives will be laughed out of court by the voters – and rightly so. Anybody who wants a centre-left party will find a perfectly acceptable one in Labour. The Liberal Democrats need centrist voters, "soft Tories", ex-Blairites, greens". [8]

Reeves was Director of the Future of the Middle Class Initiative at Brookings, working principally on issues related to intergenerational mobility, inequality and social change. In 2014, he published a Brookings Essay, Saving Horatio Alger , along with a video in which he used Lego bricks to illustrate levels of social mobility in the U.S. In May 2014, he appeared in a Daily Show segment satirizing how the complaints about the plight of the poorer members of the top 1% distracts from solutions to social mobility.

Reeves has published four books, including John Stuart Mill: Victorian Firebrand (2007), [9] a biography of the British liberal philosopher and politician, Happy Mondays (2002) about job satisfaction, [10] and Of Boys And Men: Why the Modern Male Is Struggling, Why It Matters, and What to Do about It (2022). [11] He co-authored The 80 Minute MBA (2009) with John Knell, a condensed business management book. [12]

Reeves appears regularly on radio and television as a political commentator and writes for a variety of publications including The New York Times, The Atlantic, The Guardian and The Observer. He is also a regular contributor to the online 'Think Tank' section of The Wall Street Journal. In 2005, he co-presented the four-part BBC2 series, Making Slough Happy. [13] He writes regularly in British newspapers and magazines [14] on politics, well-being, [15] work and character. [16] In 2008 he argued in The Guardian that social-liberals [a majority of Lib Dem members] should not be involved with the Liberal Democrats, but the Labour Party. [17]

In June 2017, Reeves published a widely circulated [18] New York Times op-ed, "Stop Pretending You're Not Rich". [4]

Reeves's 2017 book is Dream Hoarders: How the American Upper Middle Class Is Leaving Everyone Else in the Dust, Why That Is a Problem, and What to Do about It . [19] [20] [21]

In 2022, Reeves published Of Boys and Men [22] , which David Brooks of The New York Times described as a “landmark” work. [23] The book was named as one of the best books of the year by The Economist [24] [25] and the New Yorker [26] . In The New Yorker, Idrees Kahloon wrote, “Reeves offers a wide menu of policies designed to foster a ‘prosocial masculinity for a postfeminist world.’” [27] Former President Barack Obama included Of Boys and Men on his list of recommended “great books” in August 2024 [28] .

Reeves’s work has also drawn criticism. Some argue that the issues he addresses in education, employment, and family life are broad societal problems rather than specifically male ones. Michelle Goldberg of The New York Times wrote, “Dismissive of partisanship, Reeves elides the political and economic decisions that have made American life brutal, in different but overlapping ways, for women and men both.” [29] Matthew Yglesias noted that “Reeves is focused on ‘boy solutions,’ but even here it’s often a little unclear how much sex really matters.” [30] Conservative critics have taken issue with his relatively muted focus on marriage as a solution for men’s challenges, with one commentator arguing that “he implies that what fathers teach can be decoupled from their role as husband.” [31]

In 2023, Reeves delivered a TED talk titled “How to solve the education crisis for boys and men” [32] and produced several videos with Big Think, including “Male Inequality” [33] and “The Friendship Recession,” [34] the latter winning a Webby Award in 2024 [35] . That same year, he established the American Institute for Boys and Men [36] [37] , a think tank dedicated to “shaping policy and public conversation with reliable, non-partisan research.” [38]

Personal life

Reeves is a dual citizen, having been naturalized in October 2017 as an American citizen. As of 2018, he lives in the State of Maryland. [39]

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References

  1. "Reeves, Richard". LC Name Authority File. Library of Congress. 7 February 2000 [revised 27 February 2008]. LCCN   nb99109518 . Retrieved 26 March 2020.
  2. 1 2 "Richard V. Reeves". Brookings Institution. Retrieved 17 January 2024.
  3. "Richard V. Reeves". American Institute for Boys and Men. Archived from the original on 23 September 2024. Retrieved 17 January 2024.
  4. 1 2 Online version: Reeves, Richard V. (10 June 2017). "Stop Pretending You're Not Rich". Opinion. (International?) New York Times. Gale   A495495955. ProQuest   1907856239. / Print version: Reeves, Richard V. (11 June 2017). "Stop Pretending You're Not Rich". Sunday Review. New York Times. p. SR 5(L). Gale   A495169505. ProQuest   1908008743 (text of article), 2463511194 (scanned image of page).
  5. Reeves, Richard Vaughan (October 2013). Thought Imitates Life: The Case of John Stuart Mill (PhD thesis). Coventry, UK: Department of Philosophy, Warwick University. U608179. EThOS 589925. ProQuest   1535030524.
  6. "Demos". Archived from the original on 8 July 2011. Retrieved 6 June 2011.
  7. Spin doctor Andy Coulson earns more than Nick Clegg. The Guardian (10 June 2010). Retrieved on 6 January 2017.
  8. Online version: Reeves, Richard (19 September 2012). "The Case for a Truly Liberal Party". UK politics. New Statesman. Archived from the original on 21 September 2012. Retrieved 29 April 2018. / Print version: Reeves, Richard (21–27 September 2012). "The case for a truly liberal party". Cover Story. New Statesman. Vol. 141, no. 5124. pp. 26–31. ISSN   1364-7431. EBSCOhost   80164597. Gale   A305084136.
  9. Reeves, Richard V. (2008). John Stuart Mill: Victorian Firebrand. Atlantic. ISBN   978-1-84354-644-3.
  10. Reeves, Richard V. (2002). Happy Mondays: Putting the Pleasure Back Into Work. Perseus Pub. ISBN   978-0-7382-0659-2.
  11. Reeves, Richard V. (2022). Of Boys and Men. ISBN   9780815739876.
  12. "The 80 Minute MBA". the-80-minute-mba. Retrieved 20 October 2019.
  13. Health | Path to true happiness 'revealed'. BBC News (15 November 2005). Retrieved on 2017-01-06.
  14. Including the New Statesman , Prospect , The Guardian , The Observer, The Sunday Times and Management Today.
  15. Reeves, Richard V. (17 April 2002). "It's not the economy, stupid". TheGuardian.com .
  16. Reeves, Richard V. (August 2008). "Essays: 'A question of character'". Prospect. No. 149. Archived from the original on 2 January 2009. Retrieved 13 January 2009.
  17. "Richard Reeves: Social liberals should join Labour". Opinion: Liberal Democrat conference 2008. TheGuardian.com . 19 September 2008.
  18. Leonhardt, David (28 December 2017). "Opinion | Columnists' Favorite Columns". The New York Times.
  19. Whaples, Robert M. (Spring 2018). "Dream Hoarders How the American Upper Middle Class is Leaving Everyone Else in the Dust, Why That is a Problem, and What to Do about It By Richard V. Reeves". The Independent Review: A Journal of Political Economy. 22 (4): v, 196. Retrieved 9 July 2023.
  20. Martinez, Magdalena (18 August 2018). "Dream hoarders: How the American upper middle class is leaving everyone else in the dust, why that is problem and what to do about it, by Richard V. Reeves: Washington, DC, Brookings Institution, 2017". Journal of Urban Affairs. 40 (6): 895–896. doi:10.1080/07352166.2017.1416228. ISSN   0735-2166.
  21. Cassella, Nick (15 August 2017). "Unstacking the deck, by Nick Cassella". Seattle Review of Books. Retrieved 9 July 2023.
  22. Reeves, Richard V. (2022). Of boys and men: why the modern male is struggling, why it matters, and what to do about it. Brookings Institution. Washington, D.C: Brookings Institution Press. ISBN   978-0-8157-3987-6. OCLC   1325652337.
  23. "Opinion | The Crisis of Men and Boys (Published 2022)". 29 September 2022. Archived from the original on 7 December 2024. Retrieved 16 December 2024.
  24. "The Economist's best books of 2022 (43 books)". www.goodreads.com. Retrieved 16 December 2024.
  25. "These are The Economist's best books of 2022". The Economist. ISSN   0013-0613 . Retrieved 16 December 2024.
  26. Yorker, The New (26 October 2022). "The Best Books of 2022". The New Yorker. Retrieved 16 December 2024.
  27. Kahloon, Idrees (23 January 2023). "What's the Matter with Men?". The New Yorker. ISSN   0028-792X . Retrieved 16 December 2024.
  28. "x.com". X (formerly Twitter). Archived from the original on 8 December 2024. Retrieved 16 December 2024.
  29. Goldberg, Michelle (3 October 2022). "Boys and Men Are in Crisis Because Society Is". The New York Times. Retrieved 16 December 2024.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  30. Yglesias, Matthew. "Book Review: Richard Reeves' "Of Boys and Men"". www.slowboring.com. Retrieved 16 December 2024.
  31. "American Education Policy Has Turned against Boys and Men". National Review. 18 January 2023. Retrieved 16 December 2024.
  32. Reeves, Richard (20 June 2023). Richard Reeves: How to solve the education crisis for boys and men . Retrieved 16 December 2024 via www.ted.com.
  33. Big Think (4 January 2023). Male inequality, explained by an expert | Richard Reeves . Retrieved 16 December 2024 via YouTube.
  34. Big Think (31 March 2023). The friendship recession | Richard Reeves . Retrieved 16 December 2024 via YouTube.
  35. "NEW Webby Gallery + Index". NEW Webby Gallery + Index. Retrieved 16 December 2024.
  36. Reeves, Richard V. (30 June 2023). "Some news I can't wait to share". Of Boys and Men. Retrieved 16 December 2024.
  37. "Richard V. Reeves". American Institute for Boys and Men. Retrieved 16 December 2024.
  38. "Home". American Institute for Boys and Men. Retrieved 16 December 2024.
  39. "Richard Reeves on opportunity hoarders: It's not just the 1%". University of California, Berkeley - Othering and Belonging Institute. 31 January 2018. I am now as of last October a US citizen. In fact, I became a US citizen the last day in my state. I live in Maryland where you had to become a citizen in order to register to vote in the presidential election, and I was determined to cast my vote.