Professor Jørgen Elklit (b. 1942) is a trained historian, who changed to political science and had his academic career primarily at Aarhus University in Denmark. His key professional interests are Danish politics, policy studies, qualitative methodology, ethnic studies, and elections (national and local, Danish and foreign, contemporary and historical).
His doctorate (1988) was on the introduction of secret voting in Denmark (1901), and he became full professor of political science at Aarhus University in 2000. He retired in 2020. He has been a visiting scholar at Berlin, Notre Dame (USA), and Sidney, and has held the van Zyl Slabbert Visiting Professorship at University of Cape Town (2014). Professor Elklit has published extensively within his fields of interest.
Professor Elklit has also since 1990 had a separate carreer as an international advisor on elections and democracy in emerging democracies, including e.g. Kenya, South Africa, Nepal, Lesotho, Bosnia-Hercegovina, Tanzania, China (village elections), and Kosovo. He was Secretary to the Independent Review Commission in Kenya (2008) and an International Member of the Independent Electoral Commission in South Africa 1994, as well a member of the van Zyl Slabbert Electoral Task Team 2002-03.