James Walsh was a member of the research team for the World Development Report 2015: Mind, Society, and Behavior. Before coming to the World Bank, he served as a Teaching Fellow at Harvard College and as a member of the Saguaro Seminar Research Team led by the political scientist Robert D. Putnam. He has worked at the Gross National Happiness Commission of the Royal Government of Bhutan, where he focused on developing behavioral tools for development interventions and with Michael D. Higgins, President of Ireland, examining how multidisciplinary approaches to policymaking can improve the effectiveness of government interventions. He holds a BA in Economics and Political Science from Trinity College Dublin and a Master in Public Policy from the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard.