Jolyon Michael Howorth (born 4 May 1945) is a British scholar of French history, European politics and defense policy. He is currently Jean Monnet Professor of European Politics and Professor Emeritus of European Studies at the University of Bath; and a Fellow at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University. He served as Visiting Professor of Public Policy at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government (2018–2019). He was Visiting Professor of Political Science and International Affairs at Yale University (2002–2018). He served as Professor of French Civilization at the University of Bath from 1985 to 2004.
His previous appointments were at the University of Paris III: Sorbonne Nouvelle, University of Wisconsin–Madison and Aston University. He has held Visiting Professorships at Harvard University, the Institut d’Etudes Politiques (Sciences-Po, Paris), Luiss Guido Carli University (Rome), the Australian Defence Force Academy (Canberra) the University of Washington, Columbia University and New York University.
In addition, Howorth has held a Senior Research Fellowship at the European Union’s Institute for Security Studies. He is a Senior Research Associate at the Institut Français des Relations Internationales (Paris), a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts in (UK), Chevalier dans l’Ordre des Palmes Académiques (France), and has been a Member of the Advisory Boards of the European Institute of Public Administration (Netherlands), the Centre for Defence Studies (UK), the Institut de Recherche Stratégique de l'Ecole Militaire (Paris), the Centre National Jean Jaurès (France), the European Policy Centre (Brussels) and the Centre for the Study of Security and Diplomacy (University of Birmingham, UK). He was a founder member of the Association for the Study of Modern and Contemporary France. In 2019, in recognition of his outstanding contribution to scholarship on France, he was granted French citizenship.
Early life and education
Howorth was born in Blackpool, Lancashire, UK and brought up outside Oxford. His father was a photographer and his mother a head-teacher. He was educated at Rossall School (Fleetwood) and at Henry Box School (Witney). He holds a BA in French Studies (1966) from the University of Manchester and a PhD in French History (1972) from the University of Reading. From 1966 to 1967, he taught at the Collège de Genève in Geneva, Switzerland. From 1968 to 1977, he lived in Paris, where in 1969 he was appointed as a lecturer at the Université de la Sorbonne Nouvelle (Paris III).
Howorth’s scholarly work has encompassed social history, comparative politics, political science and international relations. He has published extensively in the field of French and European politics and history, especially security and defense policy and transatlantic relations – fifteen books and two hundred and fifty journal articles and chapters in books. His publications on transatlantic defence issues include: The European Union and National Defence Policy, London, 1997 (co-edited with Anand Menon); European Integration and Defence: The Ultimate Challenge? Paris, 2000; Defending Europe: the EU, NATO and the Quest for European Autonomy, London, 2003 (co-edited with John Keeler) and Security and Defence Policy in the European Union, London, 2007; 2nd edition 2014). His current research focuses on humanitarian intervention since the end of the Cold War and power transition in the 21st century.
Howorth has also served as an advisor for the transatlantic think-tank European Horizons; and for Fair Observer on foreign and defense policy as well as the changing nature of transatlantic relations. He has served on the editorial boards of Politique Etrangère; European Geostrategy; European Review of International Studies; Les Cahiers de Mars; Studia Diplomatica- the Brussels Journal of International Relations; Yale Journal of International Affairs; L'Evénement européen. From 1986 to 1990, he served (with George Ross) as Managing Editor of Contemporary France: a review of interdisciplinary studies. From 1996 to 2003, he served as General Editor of a series of monographs on Contemporary French Politics and Society, Berghahn Books (Oxford and New York).
Research
Howorth’s work has covered three distinct fields: French social and political history during the Belle Epoque (1870–1914); French politics and particularly security, defence and nuclear policy since the 1960s; European security and defence policy and its relations with NATO (1990–present).