The Academy of Social Sciences is a representative body for social sciences in the United Kingdom. The academy promotes social science through its sponsorship of the Campaign for Social Science, its links with Government on a variety of matters, and its own policy work in issuing public comment, responding to official consultations, and organising meetings and events about social science. It confers the title of Fellow upon nominated social scientists following a process of peer review. The academy comprises over 1000 fellows and 41 learned societies based in the UK and Europe.
Dame Janet Valerie Finch DBE, DL, FAcSS is a British sociologist and academic administrator. She was Vice-Chancellor and Professor of Social Relations at Keele University, and has held a number of other public appointments in the UK. She currently holds an honorary position at the Morgan Centre for the Study of Relationships and Personal Life, based in the School of Social Sciences, University of Manchester. She is also part of Flooved advisory board.
Michèle Lamont is a Canadian sociologist who is the Robert I. Goldman Professor of European Studies and a professor of Sociology and African American Studies at Harvard University. She is a contributor to the study of culture, inequality, racism and anti-racism, the sociology of morality, evaluation and higher education, and the study of cultural and social change. She is the recipient of the Gutenberg Award and the Erasmus award, for her "devoted contribution to social science research into the relationship between knowledge, power, and diversity." She has received honorary degrees from five countries. and been elected to the British Academy, Royal Society of Canada, Chevalier de l’Ordre des Palmes Academiques, and the Sociological Research Association. She served as president of the American Sociological Association from 2016 to 2017.
Susan Jane Smith is a British geographer and academic. She was mistress of Girton College, Cambridge from 2009 to 2022. Smith previously held the Ogilvie Chair of Geography at the University of Edinburgh from 1990 to 2004 and until 2009 was a professor of geography at Durham University, where she played a key role in establishing the Institute of Advanced Study. On 1 October 2011, she was conferred the title of Honorary Professor of Social and Economic Geography in the Department of Geography at the University of Cambridge for five years, which was renewed until 2021.
Geoffrey Nigel Gilbert is a British sociologist and a pioneer in the use of agent-based models in the social sciences. He is the founder and director of the Centre for Research in Social Simulation, author of several books on computational social science, social simulation and social research and past editor of the Journal of Artificial Societies and Social Simulation (JASSS), the leading journal in the field.
Sara Lynne Arber is a British sociologist and Professor at University of Surrey. Arber has previously held the position of President of the British Sociological Association (1999–2001) and Vice-President of the European Sociological Association (2005–07). She is well known for her work on gender and ageing, inequalities in health and has pioneered research in the new field of sociology of sleep.
Barbara Risman is Professor and Head of Sociology at the University of Illinois at Chicago.
Ann Phoenix, is a British psychologist and academic, whose research focuses on psychosocial issues related to identity. She is Professor of Psychosocial Studies at the Institute of Education, University College London. She was previously ESRC Professorial Fellow for the Transforming Experiences research programme. She was previously Co-Director of the Thomas Coram Research Unit, and Reader in Psychology at the Open University.
Heather Evelyn Joshi, is a British academic, economist, and demographer. She is Emeritus Professor of Economic and Developmental Demography at the University of London. She was Director of the Centre for Longitudinal Studies from 2003 to 2010.
Dame Madeleine Julia Atkins, is a British academic administrator, scholar of education, and former teacher. Since 2018, she has served as the 9th President of Lucy Cavendish College, Cambridge. She was formerly vice-chancellor of Coventry University, and the Chief Executive of the Higher Education Funding Council for England (2014–2018).
Melinda Mills, is a Canadian and Dutch demographer and sociologist. She is currently the Nuffield Professor of Sociology at Nuffield College, University of Oxford. Mills’ research spans a range of interdisciplinary topics at the intersection of demography, sociology, molecular genetics and statistics. Her substantive research specializes in fertility and human reproductive behaviour, assortative mating, labour market, life course and inequality.
Hilary Mavis Graham, is a British sociologist and social policy academic, who specialises in public health. Since 2005, she has been Professor of Health Sciences at the University of York. She previously lectured at the University of Bradford, the Open University, Coventry Polytechnic, the University of Warwick, and Lancaster University.
Barbara E. Adam,, FLSW is a retired British sociologist and academic. She specialises in social theory particularity in reference to time. From 1988 to her retirement in 2011, she lectured at Cardiff University; she was appointed Professor of Sociology in 1999. She was the founding editor of the academic journal Time & Society.
Jonquil Fiona Williams, is a British retired academic of social policy whose research covers gender, race, ethnicity, and the welfare state. From 1996 to 2012, she was Professor of Social Policy at the University of Leeds. She was previously a lecturer at the Polytechnic of North London, Plymouth Polytechnic, and the Open University, before becoming Professor of Applied Social Studies at the University of Bradford.
Sara Delamont DSc Econ, AcSS FLSW is a reader in the School of Social Sciences at Cardiff University. She was the first woman to be the president of the British Educational Research Association and the first woman Dean of Social Sciences at Cardiff University. Dr Delamont's research covers many different areas and disciplines including anthropology, feminist and gender studies, the sociology of education, food, professions and qualitative research methods.
Fiona Alison Steele, is a British statistician. Since 2013, she has been Professor of Statistics at the London School of Economics (LSE).
Alan Christopher Walker, CBE, FBA, FRSA, FAcSS is a British academic, social scientist and public health administrator. Since 1985, he has been Professor of Social Policy and Social Gerontology at the University of Sheffield.
Jane Cecelia Falkingham is a Professor of Demography and International Social Policy at the University of Southampton. She is also Vice-President at the University of Southampton, and Director of the ESRC Centre for Population Change and Principal Investigator of ESRC Connecting Generations. She is Chair of Population Europe. She was President of the European Association of Population Studies (EAPS) between 2018 and 2020, and was President of the British Society for Population Studies between 2015 and 2017.
Deborah Oxley, is a Professor of Social Science History at the University of Oxford. Oxley's research focuses on the study of Australian convicts.
Alison Macdonald Park is a British social scientist and professor who served as executive chair of the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) from 2021 to 2023. Her research has focused on longitudinal data collection and social attitudes. She was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2019 New Year Honours for services to the Social Sciences.
