Robert Dingwall, Author at Social Science Space

Social Science Space

Robert Dingwall is a consulting sociologist, providing research and advisory services particularly in relation to organizational strategy, public engagement and knowledge transfer.

More about Robert Dingwall...

Reimagining the UK Sociology Curriculum: Internationalization, Decolonialization and Employability

By Robert Dingwall | Published: July 13, 2017

How well do sociology departments in the UK teach sociology that originated in the UK? Asking that surprisingly hard question may produce usable insights for academic Britain, argues our Robert Dingwall.

Posted in Brexit, International Debates, News, Public Engagement, Research, Science & Social Science, Teaching | Tagged Economics, Inequality, Social Science, Sociology, Teaching | Leave a comment

Grenfell Tower: The Missing Social Dimension of Fire Regulations

By Robert Dingwall | Published: June 18, 2017

Fire safety is not just an issue for engineers. People build buildings, people live in buildings, and people use (and abuse) buildings. That creates a need for social and behavioral work to accompany every nail...

Posted in News, Public Engagement, Public Policy, Science & Social Science | Tagged Architecture, Engineering, Fire safety, Grenfell Tower, Health and Safety, regulation, User-centred design | Leave a comment

Leadership and the UK General Election 2017

By Robert Dingwall | Published: June 2, 2017

For social scientists, there must be a concern that a generation’s worth of accumulated empirical evidence on effective leadership has made so little impact on the candidates in the upcoming General Election in the United...

Posted in Impact, News, Public Engagement, Public Policy | Tagged British politics, Impact, leadership, political parties, UK General Election | Leave a comment

Negotiating Brexit – A Clash of Legal Cultures?

By Robert Dingwall | Published: May 7, 2017

Membership in the European Union was a contract, and the differing legal approaches between situational British common law and the more codified French approach helps explain some of the rancor as Brexit comes to be...

Posted in Brexit, International Debates, Public Policy | Tagged Brexit, contract, Culture, experts, law and society, Policy, professions, socio-legal | Leave a comment

In Search of Conservative Sociology

By Robert Dingwall | Published: April 4, 2017

As sociology has drifted further and further from any conservative touchstones, argues Robert Dingwall, it has become less and less able to understand the society that provides its subsistence.

Posted in International Debates, News, Public Policy, Teaching | Tagged Academic Freedom, Conservative, social policy, Social Science, Sociology | 1 Comment

Brexit and British Science: The Cliff Edge Starts to Crumble

By Robert Dingwall | Published: February 12, 2017

The UK science policy establishment has been remarkably sanguine in the face of its government’s plans for Brexit, argues Robert Dingwall.

Posted in Brexit, International Debates, News, Public Policy, Research, Science & Social Science | Tagged Brexit, EU, Horizon 2020, phdpostdoc, Policy, science policy | Leave a comment

Common Rule Reform – A Botched Job

By Robert Dingwall | Published: January 25, 2017

The rush to publish a revised Common Rule for federally funded human research in the United States has created a flawed regulatory regime, says Robert Dingwall., Time to tear the whole edifice down and start...

Posted in International Debates, News, Public Policy, Research Ethics | Tagged Academic Freedom, Common Rule, Ethics, Ethics regulation, Institutional Review Boards, Research ethics, Social Media | 2 Comments

Sociology’s (Selective) Diversity

By Robert Dingwall | Published: January 3, 2017

Our Robert Dingwall reflects on Tinder's in-house sociologist and on the just-announced New Year's Honours list to question just how diverse are current understandings of diversity.

Posted in International Debates, News, Public Engagement, Public Policy, Recognition | Tagged Diversity, Inequality, Policy, Public honors, Public honours, Social Recognition, Social Science, Sociology | Leave a comment

Black History and the Myth of Mary Seacole

By Robert Dingwall | Published: October 23, 2016

In what he describes as the obverse of the Rhodes Must Fall campaign, Robert Dingwall argues that the secular sainthood conferred on Mary Seacole steps on historical scholarship and ignores more genuine exemplars.

Posted in International Debates, Recognition | Tagged Black History, Florence Nighingale, history, Mary Seacole, Nursing | Leave a comment

Why Chan and Zuckerberg Cannot Cure All Diseases

By Robert Dingwall | Published: September 26, 2016

We often use the metaphor of a war to describe the human struggle against disease. This is a very unhelpful way of thinking, because it generates the sort of hubris exemplified by the Chan Zuckerberg...

Posted in News, Public Policy, Research, Science & Social Science | Tagged Antibiotic resistance, biomedical science, Chan, evolution, Research Funding, Zuckerberg | Leave a comment

The Stern Review of the REF – An Economist Against Markets!

By Robert Dingwall | Published: August 1, 2016

In an effort to prevent 'gaming' the REF, new recommendation from Lord Stern cuts down on the freedom of academics to move from institution as they see fit. Is the cure worse than the...

Posted in Academic Funding, Impact, News, Public Policy, Research | Tagged Lord Stern, Policy, REF, Research | 1 Comment

Brexit: Well-Behaved Liberals Seldom Change History

By Robert Dingwall | Published: July 22, 2016

As Ian McBride has commented in The Guardian, one of the strange features of Britain’s EU referendum is the resignation with which the losers have accepted the outcome. 16 million voters – 48 per cent...

Posted in International Debates, News | Tagged Brexit, Policy, Politics, Situationists, Social Movements | 2 Comments

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