People

James Brandon

James Brandon is Head of Research and Communications and author of Unlocking Al-Qaeda: Islamist extremism in British prisons (November 2009). He joined the team in November 2008.

Before Quilliam, he was the Deputy Director of the Centre for Social Cohesion where he was the author of several reports on Islamic extremism and honour-based violence. From 2002 - 2007, Brandon worked as a journalist for a wide-range of newspapers and broadcast media, reporting on Islamic issues from more than a dozen countries in Europe, Africa and the Middle East. In 2003 - 2004 he was based in Baghdad where he worked for two local English language newspapers and in 2006 - 2007 he lived in Qatar where he worked for al-Jazeera’s English-language satellite news channel. Brandon regularly appears on British and international broadcast media to debate Islamic extremism and he also contributes articles on the subject to a range of think tanks and academic journals in the US and the UK. He has an MA in Middle Eastern Studies from the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS).