Leighton Andrews is Professor of Practice in Public Service Leadership and Innovation at Cardiff Business School. He teaches, researches and writes in the fields of government, public leadership and innovation, education policy, regulation and governance of media, social media and digital. His most recent book is Facebook, the Media and Democracy (Routledge, 2019)
Formerly Minister for Education and Skills and Minister for Public Services in Carwyn Jones's Welsh Labour Governments from 2009-16, a Deputy Minister in Rhodri Morgan's One Wales Government from 2007-9 and Assembly Member for the Rhondda from 2003-16.
Prior to his election to the National Assembly in 2003, Leighton had had a successful career in the private, public and voluntary sectors. He was the BBC's Head of Public Affairs in London from 1993-1996 during its Charter Renewal campaign He ran a number of businesses in the public relations field and set up his own business after leaving the BBC.
He chaired the Digital News Taskforce for the Presiding Officer of the National Assembly which reported in June 2017. He is a member of the Editorial Board of the Journal of Public Affairs.
Research interests:
Public Service Leadership and Innovation, including Ministerial Leadership
Governance of Devolution
Public policy-making
Education Policy
Media and Social Media Regulation
Governance in the digital age
Recent peer-reviewed journal publications include Public administration, public leadership and the construction of public value in the age of the algorithm and 'big data' in Public Administration; Telling Governance Stories in PS: Political Science; How can we demonstrate the public value of evidence-based policy making when government ministers declare that the people ‘have had enough of experts’? in Palgrave Communications.