Professor Edward Acton, BA, Phd, FRHS
Edward Acton was appointed Vice-Chancellor of the University of East Anglia with effect from 1 September 2009.
Professor Acton is an historian, the first of Lord Acton’s descendants to follow in his footsteps. He specialises in modern Russian and Soviet history, his best-known books being Alexander Herzen and the role of the Intellectual Revolutionary (1979), Rethinking the Russian Revolution (1990), Russia: The Tsarist and Soviet Legacy (1995), and The Soviet Union: A Documentary History (2 vols, 2005, 2007).
He was born and brought up in Zimbabwe, studied history at the University of York and took his doctorate at Cambridge. He worked at the Bank of England before taking up a lectureship at Liverpool and, later, a Senior Lectureship at Manchester. In 1991 he was appointed to the Chair of Modern European History at UEA. He served as Dean of the School of History and Pro-Vice-Chancellor before his appointment as Vice-Chancellor.
