How Strategic Funding of Conservative Ideas Changed the American Landscape—A Conversation with James Piereson

James Piereson is president of the William E. Simon Foundation, a private grantmaking foundation located in New York City.  The foundation has broad charitable interests in education, religion, and problems of youth.  Piereson is also a senior fellow at The Manhattan Institute in New York where he heads up a project on "The American University."

Piereson was executive director and trustee of the John M. Olin Foundation from 1985 until the end of 2005 when, following longstanding plans, the foundation disbursed its remaining assets and closed its doors.  The John M. Olin Foundation maintained program interests in the areas of public affairs and public policy, and awarded grants in these areas to support research, fellowships, books and journals, and television documentaries.  Most of its funds were allocated each year to major universities and private research institutions.  

Piereson joined the John M. Olin Foundation in 1981 as a program officer, and was appointed executive director in 1985.  He was elected to the Board of Trustees in 1987.

Prior to joining the Foundation, he served on the Political Science faculties of several prominent universities, including Iowa State University (1974), Indiana University (1975), and the University of Pennsylvania (1976-82), where he taught courses in  United States government and political theory.

Piereson is the author (with J. Sullivan and G. Marcus) of Political Tolerance and American Democracy (University of Chicago Press, 1982).  He has also published articles and reviews in numerous journals, including Commentary, The American Political Science Review, The Public Interest, The New Criterion, the Journal of Politics, Philanthropy, The American Spectator, The Wall Street Journal, and The Weekly Standard.