Informing Public Policy: New Agendas for Social Research
Thursday 23 and Friday 24 April 2009
London School of Economics
Clement House, Aldwych, London WC2A 2AE
Speakers
Simon Anderson
Rob Bijl
Jonathan Bradshaw
Ian Diamond
Sue Duncan
Patrick Dunleavy
David Faulkner
Janet Finch
George Gaskell
Howard Glennerster
Simon Griffiths
Roger Jowell
Julian Le Grand
Jennifer Mason
David Morgan
Colm O'Muircheartaigh
Eileen Munro
Susan Purdon
Malcolm Rigg
Betsy Stanko
Matthew Taylor
Robert Walker
Paul Wiles
Simon Anderson, Director, Scottish Centre for Social Research
Simon Anderson is Director of the Scottish Centre for Social Research. Based in Edinburgh, ScotCen conducts both specifically Scottish studies and elements of NatCen's UK-wide work.
Among ScotCen's current projects are the Scottish Social Attitudes Survey series, the Scottish Health Survey the Scottish School Leavers Survey and a number of policy evaluations in the areas of health, health promotion and drugs prevention. Prior to joining NatCen in 2003, Simon was responsible for establishing and developing a Social Research team at the research agency, NFO System Three and worked for several years as a research manager within central government.
Rob Bijl, Deputy Director, The Netherlands Institute for Social Research
Dr. Rob Bijl, PhD, sociologist and psychiatric epidemiologist, is deputy director of SCP / The Netherlands Institute for Social Research (www.scp.nl). SCP is an institute for social and cultural policy analysis. For more than 30 years SCP has supplied central government with empirical information on the Dutch welfare state and the living conditions and quality of life of the population. The main fields studied are welfare, social security and income, the labour market, education, and society's social cohesion. Special focus is on elderly, minorities, youth and the disabled. Its reports are widely used by the government, civil servants, local authorities and academics.
Rob Bijl is editor of the bi-annual overview report The Social State of the Netherlands. This influential SCP-report answers the question: How is the Dutch population faring? In order to answer this question, the report describes the position of the Netherlands and the Dutch today in a number of key areas of life, and explores whether any changes have taken place over the last ten years. Have there been improvements in people's income? Are more people in employment? What is their housing situation? Non-material aspects of people's lives are also explored. Can any trends be identified in the education level of the Dutch population? And what of the social cohesion in the Netherlands: are we seeing an increase or a decrease in trust in society in general and in politics in particular? A large body of survey databases and national records were consulted in answering these questions.
From 2001 - 2005 he was head of the research department on Migration and Integration of the Ministry of Justice. He has published - and is still involved in European research projects - on monitoring the processes of migrant integration, and on the issue of ethnicity and crime. In the '90s he has been active in psychiatric epidemiological research, and published internationally on the relationships between mental health and quality of life, labour market, and need for care.
Jonathan Bradshaw, Professor of Social Policy, University of York
Jonathan Bradshaw CBE is Professor of Social Policy at the University of York, where he completed his second stint as Head of the Department of Social Policy and Social Work in 2007. His main research interests are in poverty and living standards and much of his recent work has been comparative studies of child poverty and child well-being in the EU, OECD and CEE/CIS countries (for UNICEF). He has also just completed an index of child well-being at small area level for England (for DCLG) and a Minimum Income Standard for Britain (for JRF).
Ian Diamond, Chief Executive, Economic & Social Research Council
Professor Diamond joined the ESRC in January 2003 on an initial four year appointment. He came from the University of Southampton where he was Deputy Vice-Chancellor. He had been at Southampton since 1980 as lecturer, senior lecturer and Professor. A social statistician, Ian Diamond's work has crossed many disciplinary boundaries, most notably working in the area of population but also in health, both in the developed and less developed world, in environmental noise and with local authorities.
Ian Diamond's research has involved collaboration with many government departments including the Office for National Statistics, the Department for International Development, the Department of Transport and the Department for Work and Pensions.
Sue Duncan, Research Consultant
Sue Duncan is an independent consultant, with over thirty years' experience working in the public sector, at the centre of government in the Cabinet Office and Treasury, and in social policy departments such as the Department for Work and Pensions, and Communities and Local Government.
While at the Cabinet Office, she worked in the Prime Minister's Strategy Unit and was Director of Policy Studies in the Centre for Management and Policy Studies, where she was responsible for good practice in policy making, research and evaluation and for evidence-based policy making.
For much of her civil service career she was in the Government Social Research service (GSR), where she worked closely with senior civil servants and Ministers, providing research based advice and policy analysis to inform government decision making. Her career in government culminated in her appointment as the first ever Chief Government Social Researcher, responsible for the thousand or so social researchers working across government.
She has written and lectured widely on policy, research, research utilisation and evidence-based policy making. She is a Visiting Professor at both The University of Bristol and The University of Lincoln; a Fellow of the Market Research Society; an Academician of the Academy of Social Sciences; a member of the Social Research Association and an Honorary Fellow of Cardiff University.
Patrick Dunleavy, Professor of Political Science, LSE
Patrick Dunleavy studied Philosophy, Politics and Economics at Corpus Christi College, Oxford, graduating in 1973. He moved to Nuffield College, Oxford to work on his D.Phil (published as The Politics of Mass Housing in Britain, 1945-75) until 1978. He became a Junior Research Fellow at Nuffield in 1976.
He moved briefly to the Open University as Lecturer in Urban Studies (1978-9) before joining LSE as a Lecturer. He was promoted successively to Reader in 1986 and Professor in 1989. Subsequently he founded LSE Public Policy Group in 1992. He helped set up the inter-disciplinary MPA Programme at LSE in 2002 and served as its first Director from 2003-09, during which time the number of streams grew from one to four, and student numbers increased from an initial 18 to a planned 135. He became a (founding) member of the Academy of the Social Sciences in 1999.
David Faulkner, Senior Research Associate at the Centre for Criminology (University of Oxford) and former Deputy Secretary in charge of the Criminal, Research and Statistics Departments at the Home Office (1982-1990)
David Faulkner has been a Senior Research Associate at the University of Oxford Centre for Criminology since 1992, and was a Fellow of St John's College Oxford from 1992 until 1999.
His main career was in the Home Office where he served from 1959 until 1992, becoming Director of Operational Policy in the Prison Department in 1980 and Deputy Secretary in charge of the Criminal and Research and Statistics Departments in 1982.
He was involved in most of the reforms of the prison and probation services which took place during that period, and co-ordinated the process of policy development and consultation which led to the Criminal Justice Act 1991.
Since 1992 he has written and lectured on various aspects of criminal justice and public service reform. His book 'Crime, State and Citizen: A Field Full of Folk' was published in 2001 (second edition 2006), and he has written numerous articles in journals and chapters in edited collections.
Janet Finch, Vice Chancellor, Keele University
Professor Janet Finch is Vice-Chancellor of Keele University, a post which she took up in September 1995. Before that she was at Lancaster University, where she was Pro Vice-Chancellor and Professor of Social Relations.
A Sociologist by background, Professor Finch was awarded a CBE in the 1999 New Year's Honours List for services to Social Science. In the same year she was named as one of the Founder Academicians of Learned Societies for the Social Sciences. In recognition of her contributions to Social Science, and more generally to higher education, she has been awarded honorary degrees by seven Universities. She was also awarded a DBE, Dame Commander of the British Empire, in the 2008 Queen's Birthday Honours List, for services to Social Science and to Higher Education.
Her research expertise lies principally in studies of family relationships, especially relationships across generations. She has held a number of research grants and published extensively on this, and related, topics. Her most recent book is the co-authored study Passing On: Kinship and Inheritance in England (2000).
Professor Finch has also been involved at national level in a range of policy-making bodies related to higher education, both before and since moving to Keele. These include: Research Council funding; work with the Health Service; equal opportunities.
George Gaskell, Pro-Director of the London School of Economics and Professor of Social Psychology
Howard Glennerster, Professor Emeritus of Social Administration at the London School of Economics and Co-Director of the Centre for the Analysis of Social Exclusion
Howard Glennerster is Professor Emeritus at the London School of Economics where he began teaching in 1968. He became head of the Social Policy department, Chairman of the Suntory and Toyota Centres for Economics and Related Disciplines and Co-Director of CASE, the Centre for Analysis of Social Exclusion.
He was an advisor to HM Treasury and is currently on the Secretary of State for Health's Advisory Committee on Resource Allocation.
He has written widely on the finance and economics of social policy, quasi market reforms, income distribution and comparative social policy more generally.
His recent books include 'Understanding the Finance of Welfare (second edition just published in February 2009)' and 'British Social Policy: from 1945 to the present'.
Simon Griffiths, Senior Research Fellow, Social Market Foundation
Simon Griffiths is a Lecturer in Politics at Goldsmiths, University of London. He is also Senior Research Fellow at the Social Market Foundation, one of the UK's most important think-tanks, where he heads the organisation's work on public service reform. He is lead author of their recent report, Assertive Citizens, and regularly contributes to the media.
Simon has a PhD from the London School of Economics on the Left's engagement with pro-market arguments after 1989, and previously worked for the sociologist, Anthony Giddens, and as a parliamentary researcher. He publishes academically and is the co-editor, with Kevin Hickson, of British Party Politics after New Labour (Palgrave Macmillan, 2009).
Roger Jowell, Director Centre for Comparative Social Surveys (City University) and Deputy Chair UK Statistics Authority
Roger Jowell is a Research Professor at City University London where he is the founder Director of the Centre for Comparative Social Surveys. He is the Principal Investigator of the European Social Survey (ESS), a rigorous comparative survey of changing social attitudes and values within and between 34 European countries.
The ESS won the Descartes Prize in 2005 for "excellence in collaborative scientific research" and was named in 2007 as one of the new 'ESFRI' European Research Infrastructures. Prior to joining City University, Roger Jowell was the founder Director of the National Centre for Social Research, Britain's largest research institute. He writes widely on changing political and social attitudes and on research methodology, especially comparative research. He was knighted in 2008 for "services to social science".
Julian Le Grand, Richard Titmuss Professor of Social Policy, LSE
Julian Le Grand is the Richard Titmuss Professor of Social Policy at the London School of Economics. He is an Honorary Fellow of the Faculty of Public Health Medicine, a Senior Associate of the Kings Fund, and a Founding Academician of the Academy of Learned Societies for the Social Sciences. He has an honorary doctorate from the University of Sussex.
In 2003-5 he was seconded to No 10 Downing St as a senior policy adviser to the Prime Minister. As well as his position at No 10, he has acted as an adviser to the World Bank, the World Health Organisation, Her Majesty's Treasury and the UK Department of Health. He has been vice-chairman of a major teaching hospital, a commissioner on the Commission for Health Improvement, and a non-executive on several health authorities. He has served on many NHS working parties, on several think-tank commissions and on two grants boards of the Economic and Social Research Council. He is currently a member of the Group of Societal Policy Analysts advising the President of the European Commission.
Julian Le Grand is an economist by training with a Ph.D. in economics from the University of Pennsylvania where he was a Thouron Scholar. He is the author, co-author or editor of seventeen books and over ninety articles on economics, philosophy and public policy. His most recent books are, The Other Invisible Hand: Delivering Public Services through Choice and Competition. Princeton University Press (2007) and Motivation, Agency and Public Policy: Oxford University Press (2006) He was one of Prospect magazine's 100 top British public intellectuals, and one of the Economic and Social Research Council's ten Heroes of Dissemination.
Jennifer Mason, Professor of Sociology, University of Manchester, Director of Realities, part of the ESRC National Centre for Research Methods
Jennifer Mason is Professor of Sociology at the University of Manchester. She is Director of 'Realities', and before that she directed 'Real Life Methods' - both of these are programmes or 'Nodes' within the ESRC National Centre for Research Methods. She is also co-Director of the Morgan Centre for the Study of Relationships and Personal Life.
Jennifer's long-term research interests are in family, kinship, personal life, relationships and research methodology - especially qualitative and mixed methods approaches. She is particularly interested in research approaches that can capture and represent the complexity, multi-dimensionality and vitality of real life.
David Morgan, University Professor, College of Liberal Arts & Sciences, Portland State University
David L. Morgan is a Professor in the Institute on Aging at Portland State University, where he also holds appointments in the School of Community Health and in the Sociology Department. He received his Ph.D. in sociology from the University of Michigan in 1977. He specializes in focus groups and in research designs that combine qualitative and quantitative methods.
Colm O'Muircheartaigh, Professor in the Harris School (University of Chicago) and Vice President for statistics and methodology in the National Opinion Research Center (NORC)
Colm A. O'Muircheartaigh is a professor in the Harris School and senior fellow in the National Opinion Research Center (NORC). O'Muircheartaigh's research encompasses survey sample design, measurement errors in surveys, cognitive aspects of question wording, and latent variable models for nonresponse. He is principal investigator on the National Science Foundation's (NSF) Internet Panel Recruitment Survey, and co-principal investigator on NSF's Data Research and Development Center and the National Institute on Aging's National Social Life Health and Aging Project (NSHAP). He is also responsible for the development of methodological innovations in sample design for NORC's face-to-face surveys in the U.S.
He joined the Harris School from the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), where he was the first director of the Methodology Institute, the center for research and training in social science methodology, and a faculty member of the Department of Statistics since 1971. He has also taught at a number of other institutions, having served as a visiting professor at the Universities of Padova, Perugia, Firenze, and Bologna, and, since 1975, has taught at the Summer Institute of the University of Michigan's Institute for Social Research.
Eileen Munro, Reader in Social Policy, LSE
Eileen Munro. PhD, is Reader in Social Policy at the LSE. After taking her first degree in philosophy, Dr Munro qualified and then practised as a social worker for several years before returning to philosophy to study the problems of developing knowledge and skills in social work. She undertook a study of child abuse inquiries, drawing on social psychology to make sense of the recurrent errors in human reasoning that were reported. This work was taken up by many child protection services in several countries but, in working with management and practitioners to improve risk assessment and decision making, she realised that the individual decision maker is strongly influenced by organizational and social factors that also need to be understood in order to reduce error. A powerful framework for doing this is provided by the systems approach to investigating error that was developed in aviation and has been adapted to medicine in the US and UK. She has worked with the Social Care Institute for Excellence in the UK to adapt this approach to use in child protection services.
Susan Purdon, Quantitative Methods Advisor, NatCen
Susan Purdon is a Quantitative Methods Advisor at the National Centre for Social Research. Her research interests are in the design, implementation and analysis of sample surveys, social experiments, and quasi-experiments. Studies include: DWP's Job Retention and Rehabilitation RCT: the evaluation of the New Deal for Lone Parents; the HO's "Withdrawal of benefits from those in breach of community sentences" evaluation; the evaluation of DCSF's Neighbourhood Nurseries Initiative; the evaluation of the National Healthy Schools Programme; the evaluation of DCSF's Activity and Learning Agreements Pilots; and the evaluation of a pilot DSCF scheme offering free early years education to disadvantaged families.
Malcolm Rigg, Director, Policy Studies Institute
Malcolm Rigg became Director of the Policy Studies Institute in 2004. In his career, he has covered a wide spectrum of the social and market research world as practitioner, commissioner and manager of research. He was Head of Social Research then Managing Director of BMRB International; Director of Research at the government's communications agency, COI Communications; Head of Public Interest Research at Consumers' Association (Which?) and a Senior Fellow at the Policy Studies Institute.
He has published and spoken on a diverse range of subjects including training and development, the graduate labour market, unemployment, education, sustainable development, the provision of government services and evidence-informed policy and practice. He is an Academician of the Social Sciences, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, an Honorary Life Member of the Association of Survey Computing, a member of the Social Research Association and a Fellow of the Market Research Society. He is a former chair of the MRS Professional Standards Committee and also of its Professional Development Advisory Board.
Betsy Stanko, Head of the Strategic Research and Analysis Unit, London Metropolitan Police Service
Professor Betsy Stanko is Head of the Strategic Research and Analysis Unit, London Metropolitan Police Service, and Honorary Professor at Royal Holloway, University of London. As Senior Advisor for Strategic Analysis with the Metropolitan Police, her current role is to analyse crime and public attitude information, suggest ways of aligning strategic planning to take into account this information to improve the delivery of policing in London. Previously, she worked at the Prime Minister's Office of Public Services Reform (Cabinet Office) as the principal advisor for criminal justice. During this time she led the Office of Public Services Reform end of the Home Office joint project on Citizen Focus Policing, and completed a scoping project on behalf of the Police Standards Unit (Home Office) with the Big 6 banks on suspicious financial activity.
Matthew Taylor, Chief Executive, RSA
Matthew Taylor became Chief executive of the RSA in November 2006. Prior to this appointment, he was Chief Adviser on Political Strategy to the Prime Minister. Matthew was appointed to the Labour Party in 1994 to establish Labour's rebuttal operation. His activities before the Labour Party included being a county councillor, a parliamentary candidate, a university research fellow and the director of a unit monitoring policy in the health service.
Until December 1998, Matthew was Assistant General Secretary for the Labour Party. During the 1997 General Election he was Labour's Director of Policy and a member of the Party's central election strategy team. He was the Director of the Institute for Public Policy Research between 1999 and 2003, Britain's leading centre left think tank. Matthew is a frequent media commentator on policy and political issues, and has written for publications including The Guardian, The Observer, New Statesman and Prospect.
Robert Walker, Professor of Social Policy and Deputy Head of Department of Social Policy and Social Work (University of Oxford)
Robert Walker joined the University of Oxford, Department of Social Policy and Social Work as Professor of Social Policy in April 2006 when he also became a Fellow of what is now Green Templeton College. He was formerly Professor of Social Policy at the University of Nottingham and before that Professor of Social Policy Research, Loughborough University where he was Director of the Centre for Research in Social Policy. He is a Research Affiliate of the National Poverty Center, University of Michigan and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. He is a Member of the statutory UK Social Security Advisory Committee and Chair of the Academic Advisory Committee and Member of the Governing Board of the ESRC UK Household Longitudinal Study.
He is keen that high quality research should be used to inform the political process and to improve policy with the goal of enhancing all our lives. To this end, he undertakes research relevant to the development of welfare policies in Britain and other societies, and engages in dialogue with policy makers and anyone else wanting to use or support research to bring about positive change.
Particular research interests include poverty, social exclusion, family dynamics and budgeting strategies, children's aspirations and employment instability and progression. Policy concerns embrace social security and social assistance, welfare to work and labour market policies, policy evaluation and policy transfer - that is the process of learning from experiences in other jurisdictions. He has published 19 books.
Paul Wiles, Chief Scientific Advisor to the Home Office and Director of Research, Development and Statistics
Paul Wiles is responsible for all science and technology development, social research, economic analysis and modelling, horizon scanning and statistics across the Home Office group. Prior to joining the Home Office he was Professor of Criminology at the University of Sheffield, and formerly Dean of the Faculty of law, and Director of the Centre for Criminology and socio-Legal Studies. He previously worked at the University of Cambridge, and the London School of Economics and Political Science. He has also worked as a consultant with major consultancy companies.