John Pitcairn Mackintosh

(1921-1978)
Professor of Politics in the University of Edinburgh
and Member of Parliament for Berwick & East Lothian

John Mackintosh was educated at Melville College, Edinburgh and at the Universities of Edinburgh and Oxford and at Princeton. He was twice a graduate of Edinburgh, once with a first-class MA in modern history, and again with a DLitt for his published work, of which "The British Cabinet" (1962) and "British government and politics" (1970) were the seminal works of their day. He held academic posts in the Universities of Glasgow, Ibadan, Strathclyde and (Visiting) Birkbeck College, London as well as at Edinburgh, where he was Lecturer in Politics from 1954 to 1961, and was appointed to the Chair in 1977. Mackintosh was Labour MP for Berwick & East Lothian from 1966 until his death, except for a few months in in 1974. A popular lecturer who always drew large and enthusiastic audiences, John Mackintosh was known also as a writer and television commentator on current political affairs.