James Sterling Young

James Sterling Young (October 14, 1927 – August 8, 2013) was an American political scientist, winner of the Bancroft Prize, Professor of Government and Randolph P. Compton Scholar at the University of Virginia.

Biography A native of Savannah, Georgia, Young attended the Savannah public schools through high school. Following United States Army service in China and Japan he received an A. B. degree from Princeton University. He pursued graduate study at Columbia University in political science, history, and anthropology. In 1964 he received a Ph.D. from Columbia and was appointed assistant professor in the Department of Public Law and Government. Young served on the Columbia faculty as an associate professor in 1968 and as a professor in 1971. He taught courses on American government and politics, established a graduate internship program with the City of New York, and directed a grants program to encourage the study of urban life and problems, concentrating on the Harlem community. Following the disruptions of 1969, he was elected to the first University Senate and chaired its committee on educational policy.

From 1971 to 1977, Young served as Columbia's third ranking academic officer, holding the posts of Deputy Provost and Vice President. He was principally responsible for the coordinated planning of the central university's academic programs, budgets, and physical facilities and for policies governing the use, historic preservation, and new construction of academic buildings on the Morningside campus.

He taught courses on the presidency, established a presidential research and publications program for resident scholars, and organized conferences of academicians, public officials, and journalists on trends affecting the future presidency. Young founded the nation's only oral history program focused on United States presidents at the Miller Center of Public Affairs, directing oral histories of the presidencies of Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton. He also conducted an oral history on former United States Senator Edward M. Kennedy and the Senate of his time.

Awards 1967 Bancroft Prize

Works (reprint 1986 )