Carville, the oldest of eight children, was born Chester James Carville, Jr. at Fort Benning, Georgia, the son of Lucille (née Norman), a former school teacher who sold World Book Encyclopedias door-to-door, and Chester James Carville, a postmaster as well as owner of a general store. He has Irish and Cajun ancestry. James Carville was raised in Carville, Louisiana, and attended Ascension Catholic High School in Donaldsonville, Louisiana.

He received his undergraduate and Juris Doctor degrees from Louisiana State University. He served for two years in the United States Marine Corps.

Before entering politics, Carville worked as a litigator at a Baton Rouge law firm from 1973—1979. Carville spent two years serving in the United States Marines, achieving the rank of corporal, and later worked as a high school teacher.

Prior to the Clinton campaign, Carville and consulting partner Paul Begala gained other well-known political victories, including the gubernatorial victories of Robert Casey of Pennsylvania in 1986, and Zell Miller of Georgia in 1990. But it was in 1991 when Carville and Begala rose to national attention, leading appointed incumbent Senator Harris Wofford of Pennsylvania back from a 40-point poll deficit over White House hand-picked candidate Dick Thornburgh. Also noteworthy is that Wofford's campaign was where the "it's the economy, stupid" strategy used by Bill Clinton in 1992 was first implemented.

In 1992, Carville helped lead Bill Clinton to a win against George H. W. Bush in the Presidential election. In 1993, Carville was honored as Campaign Manager of the Year by the American Association of Political Consultants. His role in the Clinton campaign was documented in the feature-length Academy Award-nominated film, The War Room.One of the formulations he used in that campaign has entered common usage, derived from a list he posted in the war room to help focus himself and his staff, with these three points:

1. Change vs. more of the same.
2. The economy, stupid.
3. Don't forget health care.

After 1992 Carville stopped working on domestic campaigns, stating that he would bring unneeded publicity, but he has worked on a number of foreign campaigns, including those of Prime Minister Tony Blair of the United Kingdom, Ehud Barak of Israel's Labor Party, and the Liberal Party of Canada. In 2002, Carville worked as a Greenberg Carville Shrum (GCS) strategist to help American-educated Bolivian Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada win the presidency in Bolivia which was portrayed in a documentary Our Brand Is Crisis.

In 2004, he was brought in for last-minute consulting on Senator John Kerry's Presidential campaign, but he did not play a major role.

In 2005, Carville taught a semester of the course "Topics in American Politics" at Northern Virginia Community College. Among the guests he had come speak to the class were Al Hunt, Mark Halperin, Senator George Allen, George Stephanopoulos, Karl Strubel, Stan Greenberg, Tony Blankley, representatives from the Motion Picture Association of America, James Fallows.

In 2006, Carville switched gears from politics to sports and became a host on a sports show called 60/20 Sports on XM Satellite Radio with Luke Russert, son of the late NBC journalist Tim Russert. The show is an in-depth look at the culture of sports based on the ages of the two hosts (60 and 20). After the Democrats' victory in the 2006 midterm election, Carville criticized Howard Dean as Democratic National Committee Chair, calling for his ouster, as he believed Dean had not spent enough money. In late November 2006, Carville proposed a truce of sorts.

Carville is the executive producer of the 2006 film All the King's Men, starring Sean Penn and Anthony Hopkins, which is loosely based on the life of Louisiana Governor Huey Long.

Carville had believed that Al Gore, whom he helped put in the White House as vice president in 1992, would run for president in 2008. This prediction did not come true.

On March 4, 2009, Politico reported that Carville, Paul Begala, and Rahm Emanuel were the architects of the Democratic Party's strategy to cast conservative talk radio host Rush Limbaugh as the face of the Republican Party. Carville was particularly critical of Limbaugh for saying he wanted Barack Obama to "fail." It was later reported that Carville had voiced the opinion, during the presidency of George W. Bush, that, "I don’t care if people like him or not, just so they don’t vote for him and his party. That is all I care about. I hope he doesn’t succeed, but I am a partisan Democrat. But the average person wants him to succeed. It is his country, his life or their lives. So he has that going for him." Carville made the remarks on September 11, 2001, shortly before the terrorist attacks on the United States. Upon hearing news of the attacks, Carville asked reporters to "disregard" his prior comments.

Afghan presidential candidate Ashraf Ghani hired Carville as a campaign advisor in July 2009. Carville said that the 2009 Afghan presidential election is "probably the most important election held in the world in a long time," and he called his new job "probably the most interesting project I have ever worked in my life." Carville, whose work for Ghani is pro bono, when asked about similarities between politics in Afghanistan and politics in Louisiana, responded:

:Yeah, I felt a little bit at home, to be honest with you.

In 2010, Carville worked as senior advisor for the campaign of Colombian presidential candidate Juan Manuel Santos.

As an advisor to Hillary Rodham Clinton's 2008 presidential campaign, Carville told The New York Times on March 22, 2008, that New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson, who had just endorsed Senator Barack Obama for the Democratic nomination, was comparable to Judas Iscariot. It was "an act of betrayal," said Carville. "Mr. Richardson’s endorsement came right around the anniversary of the day when Judas sold out for 30 pieces of silver, so I think the timing is appropriate, if ironic,” Mr. Carville said, referring to Holy Week. Governor Richardson had served in President Bill Clinton's administration as both United States Ambassador to the United Nations and Secretary of Energy, and Carville believed that Richardson owed an endorsement to Senator Clinton in exchange for being offered those posts by her husband. Carville also claimed that Richardson assured many in the Clinton campaign that he would at least remain neutral and abstain from taking sides. Richardson refuted Carville's account, arguing that he had not made any promises to remain neutral. Richardson claims that his decision to endorse Obama was "clinched" by his speech on race relations following the swirl of controversy surrounding Obama's former pastor Jeremiah Wright. Carville went on to note,"I doubt if Governor Richardson and I will be terribly close in the future," Carville said, but "I've had my say...I got one in the wheelhouse and I tagged it."

Even as Clinton's campaign began to lose steam, Carville remained both loyal and positive in his public positions, rarely veering off message and stoutly defending the candidate. But on May 13, 2008, a few hours before the primary in West Virginia, Carville remarked to an audience at Furman University in South Carolina, "I'm for Senator Clinton, but I think the great likelihood is that Obama will be the nominee." The moment marked a shift from his previous and often determinedly optimistic comments about the state of Hillary's campaign.

After Barack Obama's clear lead for victory in the Democratic presidential campaign on June 3, James Carville said he was ready to open up his wallet to help Obama build a political war chest to take on John McCain in November.

Carville is also a best-selling author. With his wife, Mary Matalin - a Republican - and writer Peter Knobler, Carville co-wrote All's Fair: Love, War and Running for President, published in 1995. He later wrote: We're Right, They're Wrong: A Handbook for Spirited Progressives, published in 1996; ...And The Horse He Rode In On: The People vs. Kenneth Starr, published in 1998; With Paul Begala he co-wrote Stickin. Suck Up, Buck Up... and Come Back When You Foul Up, in 2001, which detailed strategies for fighting and winning in business, politics, and life. In 2004, Carville released a political banter book entitled Had Enough?, as well as a children's picture book, Lu and the Swamp Ghost, with co-author Patricia McKissack and illustrator David Catrow. In January 2006, he released another book co-written with Begala, Take It Back: Our Party, Our Country, Our Future.

Carville's most recent book is entitled 40 More Years: How the Democrats Will Rule the Next Generation.

In 1996, Carville was inducted into the Louisiana Political Museum and Hall of Fame in Winnfield, along with former Louisiana State Treasurer Mary Evelyn Parker and the late segregationist leader Leander Perez.

Carville is married to Republican political pundit Mary Matalin, who had worked for President George H. W. Bush on his 1992 reelection campaign. Carville and Matalin were married in New Orleans in October 1993. They have two daughters: Matalin Mary "Matty" Carville and Emerson Normand "Emma" Carville. Carville publicly acknowledged that he has adult attention-deficit disorder.

In 2008, Carville and Matalin relocated their family from Virginia to New Orleans. He is currently on the faculty of the department of political science at Tulane University.