Professor Ruth Lister
Professor of Social Policy, Loughborough University (S4) Social policy and sociology; poverty; citizenship, in particular from the perspectives of women, children and young people; gender and welfare; social security
I was born in Yorkshire and grew up in Manchester (but educated at a boarding school in Shropshire). I went south to university (Essex and Sussex) and then spent 16 years in London where I worked for the Child Poverty Action Group, the last 8 years as director. I continue an association with CPAG as a member of their policy committee. I moved into higher education in 1987 when I became Professor and Head of Department of Applied Social Sciences at Bradford University. Since 1994 I have been Professor of Social Policy at Loughborough University and have lived in Nottingham. I held the first Donald Dewar Visiting Chair of Social Justice at Glasgow University between 2005 and early 2007. My two main areas of academic work are poverty and citizenship, with considerable overlap between the two and with a strong gender perspective and an interest in children. Key books are: Citizenship: Feminist Perspectives (2nd edition, Palgrave, 2003, with a Chinese edition due this year); Poverty (Polity, 2004, 2nd edition commissioned; translations include a Japanese one due this year); and Gendering Citizenship in Western Europe (with F. Williams et al, Policy Press, 2007). Alongside my academic research and scholarship, I have continued to contribute to social policy and social justice causes through membership of various independent commissions and organisations. I sat on the Opsahl Commission on the Future of Northern Ireland, the Commission on Social Justice, the Commission on Poverty, Participation and Power and the Fabian Commission on Life Chances and Child Poverty. I am currently a member of the National Equality Panel, which reports to the Minister for Women and Equality, and a trustee of the Community Development Foundation. I am actively involved in the pressure group Compass and am also a member of the Women’s Budget Group. My main source of relaxation is walking – preferably in hills and, better still, mountains. I also do Tai Chi and Pilates. I enjoy films and a wide range of music (and have rediscovered the excitement of live music in recent years). I am also finding great pleasure in watching tennis (all year round, not just Wimbledon!). Election as a Fellow of the British Academy is a great honour and one which I believe reflects what I have gained as a member of the intellectually stimulating inter-disciplinary social sciences department at Loughborough. I am also pleased that this means an increase in the representation of social policy Fellows. I look forward to contributing to the Academy’s work in the social sciences. | 
