Gideon Doron, born in Tel Aviv, earned both his BA and MA in political science from Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel. In 1978 he earned his doctorate from Rochester University, New York, USA. His dissertation was supervised by Professor William Riker, renowned for publishing The Theory of Political Coalitions.
During the mid-1980s, Doron was among the founders of the Department of Public Policy at Tel Aviv University, and the first to direct it. Doron taught in Tel Aviv University’s Department of Political Science for many years, and in the early 1990s filled a two year position as department head. In this same period he was also one of the founders of the Political Communications track in the political science department.
Between 1997 and 2000, Doron headed the Public Policy Department in Ben Gurion University’s Faculty of Business Management.
For many years he served as a lecturer in New York State’s Binghamton University, and as guest lecturer at New York University, Queens University in New York State, and Yeshiva University in New York.
Doron has authored 17 books in Hebrew and English, and dozens of professional articles in diverse fields, such as political strategy and economics, public policy and administration, methods of choice making, political communication and manipulation, and game theory. Doron served as academic consultant for the Yezreel Valley College Faculty of Political Science.
Doron edited the “Contemporary Political Science” book series for Ramot Publishing Company, and in recent years edited the “State of the Nation” book series for Carmel Publishing.
Doron served as chair for the Israel Political Science Association and the Political Research Association which includes researchers and teachers in fields of political science in diverse Israeli universities and colleges. From 1993 to 1999 he was also a board member of the International Political Science Association.
Between 1995 and 1999 he was chair of Israel’s Channel Two Television and Radio Authority.
Doron headed various public commissions over the years, and served as a member of diverse public committees, among them the National Security team, the Commission for Examining Public Appointments (colloquially known as the “jobs commission”), various committees for setting municipal limitations, and the Israel Film Council.
In 2003, Doron was in the founding group of the “Citizen’s Empowerment Center in Israel” in Tel Aviv University, a non-partisan not for profit organization which seeks to research worldwide methods of governance and elections, examine their suitability to Israeli needs, and share the knowledge with the general public. Doron served both as the center’s Vice President and its academic consultant.
He was a 2005 member of the public commission established by then President of Israel, Moshe Katzav, and which sought to study the political structure and election methods in Israel. Among the commission’s recommendations was a move to a regional election system, and several additional changes that would enable stabilizing the political system and improving the quality of its actions.
Most recently, Doron headed “Yitzug Shalem” which aims to spread information about the single representative regional election method that integrates the principle of compensation for contesters who do not win their electoral region but gain sufficient votes across Israel to enter parliament through the relative vote totals method. In the past, Doron headed the “Israelis for Change” movement which sought to implement committee recommendations and apprise the public of the regional election method’s advantages.
Doron was the academic head and one of the developers of the Social Resilience Index which incorporated the Corruption Index, publicized annually in the framework of the city of Sderot’s Social Conference. Doron serves as a member of the Quality Government Movement’s leadership, and developed its National Ethics Index. He additionally served as a permanent local and regional evaluator for the Transparency International Organization, which ranks the world’s countries based on their level of public corruption.
In 1992, prior to the elections for the 13th Knesset (Israel’s Parliament), Doron served as Yitzhak Rabin’s political strategist.
Before elections for the 17th Knesset in 2006, Doron joined the Kadimah Party and was slotted into the unrealistic 52nd place.
In 2009 he was among the founders of “The Israelis Party” and headed it. The party sought to encourage a public agenda around the urgent need for reform in Israel’s election and government structure. Many of the party’s candidates were his former students. The party ran in elections for the 18th Knesset, but only earned 865 votes, an insufficient number for Knesset entry.
In 2009, Professor Doron joined the Israel Hi-tech Industry Association, a not for profit group representing hi-tech employees, as its President.
Gideon is forever in the hearts of his family: Becky, Shira, Aeran, Batia, Talia, Hillel
