Dr Jeremy Kendall, Professor Christopher Rootes, Dr Iain Wilkinson, Dr Beth Breeze, Dr Kate Bradley, Dr Balihar Sanghera

The School has a strong and growing focus on the meanings, behaviours, resources and roles of civil society, including organisations and other institutions between the market and the state. These interests focus on civil society at both international and national levels; we analyse its contributions across a variety of fields, including environmental action, international development and social welfare; engage with both contemporary and historical dimensions of key issues; and deploy a range of disciplinary and methodological tools drawing on researchers' backgrounds in sociology, social policy, and political analysis. Much of this work is inter-disciplinary and conducted in collaboration with partners in other countries.

View Cilvil Society research cluster web-page

Dr Kate Bradley,  Dr Phil Carney, Dr Caroline Chatwin, Professor Chris Hale, Dr Keith Hayward, Phil Hubbard, Dr Derek Kirton, Dr Anne Logan, Roger Matthews, Dr Kate O’Brien, Professor Larry Ray, Professor Jock Young, Dr Jennifer Fleetwood, Dr Johnny Ilan, Dr Simon Shaw, Professor Alex Stevens

Criminology staff at the University of Kent are primarily involved in projects and research centred activities connected with cultural criminology, for example in the areas of: subcultures, drug-use and intoxification, the night time economy, the surveillance society, the photographic representation of crime, young people and crime and the carnival of crime.  In addition, work of a more traditional nature is also being undertaken, for example in the fields of: international drug policy, the history of crime and punishment and violence.  The department also hosts a vibrant and innovative postgraduate programme and has recently taken on an increasing number of students with a criminological dimension to their research. 

Selected Publications:

Stevens, A. (2011) Drugs,  Crime and Public Health: The Political Economy of Drugs Policy. London: Routledge.

Hayward, K. J., and Young, J (2007) 'Cultural criminology' in Maguire, M., Morgan, R., and Reiner (Eds) The Oxford Handbook of Criminology, 4th Edition, Oxford : Oxford University Press

O'Brien, K, Hobbs , D and Westmarland, L (2008) ‘Negotiating Violence and Gender: Security and the Night Time Economy in the UK ', in S. Gendrot and P. Spierenburg (eds.) Collection on Historical and Contemporary Violence in Europe New York : Springer.

Logan, A. (2008) Feminism and Criminal Justice: A Historical Perspective. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan

Presdee, M. (2005) 'Burning Issues: Fire Carnival and Crime' in Soothill, K. and Peelo, M. (2005) Controversies about Crime. London : Willan.

Young, J. (2007)  The Vertigo of late modernity  Sage

View Crime, Control & Culture research cluster web-page

Professor Andy Alaszewski, Dr Ben Baumberg, Mike Calnan, Derek Kirton, Dr Ellie Lee, Alison Milne, Anne Netton, Chris Schilling, Professor Julia Twigg, Dr Jo Warner and Dr Iain Wilkinson.

The interests of academic staff and researchers based in the CHSS cover a range of issues within the fields of health studies and health policy. Particular interests include health care organisation and policy; risk assessment and management; primary care; public and user views of health care; health inequalities; occupational therapy; carework in health and social care; social constructionist approaches to the study of social problems (contraception, abortion, assisted conception, 'designer babies', and early motherhood); the affective dimensions of risk, the sociosomatic experience of pain and suffering; body work; psychoanalysis, mental health; and race, ethnicity and health.

Current or recent thesis topics include: women's health in Uzbekistan; improving men's health: the role of healthy living centres; women, the body and madness.

Recent publications include: Managing Risk in Community Practice: Nursing, Risk and Decision-making (Andy Alaszewski, 2000); Kleinians: Psychoanalysis Inside Out (Janet Sayers, 2000), Abortion, Motherhood and Mental Health: Medicalizing Reproduction in the U.S. and Britain (Ellie Lee, 2003); Anxiety in a Risk Society (Iain Wilkinson 2001); Suffering: A Sociological Introduction (Iain Wilkinson 2004)

http://preview-www.kent.ac.uk/sspssr/research/clusters/hsce.html

View Health & Social Care research cluster web-page

Professor Frank Furedi, David Garbin, Dr Vince Miller, Dr Lavinia Mitton, Professor Larry Ray, Dr Kim Robinson, Dr Miri Song.

Race and ethnicity is a well-established research area in the School. Current research includes 'race', ethnic and cultural identities, racisms, immigrant adaptation, 'mixed race'. Larry Ray's research includes work on racist violence, violence against refugees and ethnic conflict in the Balkans. He has extensive publications on racial and ethnic violence. Frank Furedi is researching rumours and racialization and has previously worked on 'race' and imperialism. Charles Watters's work is concerned with the mental health of migrants and the provision of care.

Recent publications include Choosing Ethnic Identity (Miri Song, 2003), which concerns the ethnic options of minority ethnic people in Britain and the USA.

View Migration and Ethnicity research cluster web-page

Professor Andy Alaszewski, Dr Adam Burgess, Professor Frank Furedi, Dr Keith Hayward, Dr Maria Kalli, Dr Ellie Lee, Professor Alex Stevens, Professor Peter Taylor-Gooby, Professor Sarah Vickerstaff, Dr Jo Warner, Dr Iain Wilkinson

The critical analysis of risk and perceptions of risk have become central issues in the sociology of the 'risk society'. This is a central area of research activity in the School and the work of this group ranges from theoretical issues related to the concept of risk, to risk management in specific fields.The group has been greatly strengthened by recent appointments and a major national ESRC research programme, 'Social Contexts and Responses to Risk', based in the School. Staff research includes work on the development of a culture of risk and anxiety, moral panics, risk and crime, risk and the life-course, the affective dimensions of risk, risk as a public discourse, suffering, perceptions of new communications technology, health risk assessment and management, the risk assessment and management of offenders and the implications of attitudes and behaviour concerning risk for the welfare state.

Current or recent thesis topics include: postmodernism and labour market values; the impact of values on labour-market decision-making.

Recent publications include: Risk, Health and Welfare: Policies, Strategies and Practice (Andy Alaszewski, 1998); Risk, Trust and Welfare (Peter Taylor-Gooby, 1998); The End of the Welfare State: Responses to Retrenchment (Peter Taylor-Gooby, 1999). New Risks, New Welfare: The Transformation of the European Welfare State (edited) (Peter Taylor-Gooby, 2004), Therapy Culture: Cultivating Vulnerability in an Anxious Age (Frank Furedi, 2003); Crime, Consumerism and the Urban Experience (Keith Hayward, 2004); Happy Retirement? (Sarah Vickerstaff, 2004); Anxiety in a Risk Society (Iain Wilkinson, 2001); Suffering: A Sociological Introduction (Iain Wilkinson 2004), Cellular Phones, Public Fears and a Culture of Precaution (Adam Burgess, 2003), Risk in Social Science (edited) (Peter Taylor-Gooby, Jens Zinn, 2006) .

View Risk and Uncertainty research cluster web-page

Dr Ben Baumberg, Dr. Heejung Chung, Steve Roberts, Dr Dawn Lyon, Professor Tim Strangleman, Professor Sarah Vickerstaff

The study of work, once the mainstay of sociology, is witnessing a revival. There is keen interest in the material and institutional conditions of everyday working lives in the context of the global economic crisis, and a renewed focus on the inequalities that underlie who gets what kinds of work and employment opportunities. The University of Kent has a long tradition of scholarship in the sociology of work and economic sociology more generally, including in all its social policy dimensions. Within the School of Sociology, Social Policy and Social Research, the Work, Employment and Economic Life cluster brings together work scholars who have built upon Kent's legacy in new and exciting ways, both in the sorts of topics we research and in the ways that we study them. There are opportunities for postgraduate projects in relation to labour market policy, precarity in work, work/life balance and wider aspects of the importance of work in the constitution of social identities.

View Work, Employment and Economic Life research cluster web-page

In addition to these groupings, there are also certain individual staff research interests in other areas where postgraduate applications would be welcome.

These include the social politics of food (Professor Julia Twigg), social security (Dr Lavinia Mitton), and popular knowledges, secrecy and transparency (Dr Clare Birchall).