James Alan Robinson (born 1960) is a British economist and political scientist who serves as University Professor at the Harris School of Public Policy, University of Chicago since 2015 and prior to that taught at Harvard University between 2004 and 2015. Robinson has also taught at the University of California, Berkeley, University of Southern California and the University of Melbourne and is the co-author of Why Nations Fail along with Daron Acemoglu. His accomplished works include: Why National Fail (2012), Economic Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy (2006) and The Role of Elites in Economic Development (2012).