Joe Mathews

Notable work and positions

Zócalo Public Square - Democracy Editor and Columnist
Arizona State University - Professor of Practice

Note on name

The source list spells this entry 'Joe Matthews'; published bylines and institutional profiles consistently use the spelling 'Joe Mathews' (one 't'). This profile follows the verified spelling used in his published work.

Biography

Joe Mathews is Connecting California columnist and democracy editor at Zócalo Public Square, and professor of practice at Arizona State University's School of Politics and Global Studies, where he also serves as a fellow at the Center for Social Cohesion. A fourth-generation Californian, he obtained a bachelor's degree in social studies from Harvard University in 1995, where he was an editor at The Harvard Crimson. He worked as a reporter for The Baltimore Sun until 2000, then covered the U.S. Department of Justice for The Wall Street Journal, and joined the Washington bureau of the Los Angeles Times later that year. In 2008 he joined the New America Foundation as an Irvine senior fellow. He is founder-publisher of Democracy Local and a fellow in the Renovating Democracy program at the Berggruen Institute. He has served since 2008 as co-president of the Global Forum on Modern Direct Democracy. He is the author of The People's Machine: Arnold Schwarzenegger and the Rise of Blockbuster Democracy (2006) and The California Recall (2023), and co-author, with Mark Paul, of California Crackup: How Reform Broke the Golden State and How We Can Fix It (2010).

Career highlights

• Democracy Editor and Columnist, Zócalo Public Square
• The People's Machine: Arnold Schwarzenegger and the Rise of Blockbuster Democracy PublicAffairs, 2006.
• California Crackup: How Reform Broke the Golden State and How We Can Fix It With Mark Paul, UC Press, 2010.