Michael Johnston is the Charles A. Dana Professor of Political Science and division director for social sciences at Colgate University. He served as founding co-editor of the journal Corruption and Reform from 1985 through 1996, and with the late Arnold J. Heidenheimer, co-edited Political Corruption: Concepts and Contexts (2002). His forthcoming books include Syndromes of Corruption: Wealth, Power, and Democracy (2005) and an edited anthology on civil society and reform. Dr. Johnston has served as a consultant to international organizations and development agencies, including the World Bank, the Asia Foundation, the New York State Commission on Governmental Integrity, the U.S. Agency for International Development, and the United Nations. Dr. Johnston is currently working on a corruption assessment project for USAID. He holds a Ph.D. from Yale University.

Kenneth Janda is the Payson S. Wild Professor Emeritus at Northwestern University. He has been co-editor of the international journal Party Politics since 1995, and in 2000 he won a Lifetime Achievement award from the American Political Science Association (APSA) for his research on political parties. In 2005, he was co-winner of the Best Instructional Software Award from the APSA, an award he also received in 1992. Dr. Janda's books include Political Parties: A Cross National Survey (1980) and, with co-author Robert Harmel, Parties and Their Environments: Limits to Reform? (1982). His co-authored American government textbook, The Challenge of Democracy, is used in hundreds of colleges across the nation and has been translated into Czech, Georgian, Hungarian, Korean, and Russian.

Susan Scarrow is an associate professor of political science at the University of Houston. She is the author of Perspectives on Political Parties: Classic Readings (2002) and Parties and their Members: Organizing for Victory in Britain and Germany (1996), and with Bruce Cain and Russell Dalton is co-editor of Democracy Transformed? (2003). Her articles have appeared in such journals as Comparative Political Studies, Legislative Studies Quarterly, Party Politics, and The European Journal of Political Research. Dr. Scarrow serves on the editorial boards of Party Politics. and West European Politics and is a past president of the British Politics Group, an affiliated section of the American Political Science Association. She holds a Ph.D. from Yale University.

Pippa Norris is the McGuire Lecturer in Comparative Politics at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. She has published almost three dozen books, including Radical Right: Parties and Electoral Competition (2005), Sacred and Secular: Religion and Politics Worldwide (2004), and Electoral Engineering: Voting Rules and Political Behavior (2004). Dr. Norris has acted as an expert consultant for many international bodies including the United Nations, the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization, the Council of Europe, the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA), the National Endowment for Democracy, and the United Kingdom Electoral Commission. She has also served on the executive boards of the American Political Science Association and International Political Science Association. Dr. Norris holds a master's degree and Ph.D. in politics from the London School of Economics.

Norm Kelly, PhD, is an associate with the Centre for Democratic Institutions, based at the Australian National University. Dr. Kelly presents political training courses, including political party development and candidate training, and has worked in this field in Afghanistan, the Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea and Indonesia. He lives in Wellington, New Zealand. Previously, Dr. Kelly was a member of the Legislative Council of Western Australia, representing the Australian Democrats from 1997 to 2001. After leaving parliament, he was elected to the National Executive of the Democrats from 2001 to 2003, including one term as national deputy president. Dr. Kelly was also the Democrats’ Western Australian campaign director for the 2001 federal election. He completed his PhD on the topic of Australian electoral system reforms through the political science program at the Australian National University."