Biography

Martin Bulmer joined the department in February 1995. He was previously professor of sociology at the University of Southampton, 1993-1995, and before that taught at LSE for seventeen years in the Department of Social Science and Administration. He has also been a member of the Government Statistical Service and a visiting professor of sociology at the University of Chicago. He is Director of the Question Bank (a WWW resource) based at the University of Surrey. He also directs the ESRC Survey Link Scheme. He is also a Director of the department's Institute of Social Research, and an Academician of the Academy of Learned Societies for the Social Sciences.

Research Interests

His research interests cover the methodology of social research, the history of the social sciences, the study of ethnicity and race, the application of sociology to public policy, and the sociology of social care. He undertook an ESRC-funded project on the problems of making electronic questionnaires in CAPI (computer assisted personal interviewing), which are administered from a lap-top computer, intelligible when translated into a paper equivalent, for display in a setting such as the Question Bank. The second edition of the DIRECTORY OF SOCIAL RESEARCH ORGANISATIONS IN THE UK, which he directed, was published in 1998. He is the editor (with John Solomos) of RACISM (Oxford Readers, OUP, 1999) and RESEARCHING RACE AND RACISM (Routledge, 2004) and of QUESTIONNAIRES (Sage, 2004).

Publications

Books
M. Bulmer, (2004)(editor) 'Questionnaires' [Sage Benchmarks in Social Research Methods series] [4 volumes, 1550 pages]. London: Sage Publications.

M. Bulmer and J. Solomos (2004) 'Researching Race and Racism' [London: Routledge] 240 pp.

Other Selected Publications
M. Bulmer, E. Coates, L. Dominian and S. Duncan (editors) (2007) 'Evidence based policy making' Making Policy in Theory and Practice . Bristol: Policy Press, pp 87-103.

M. Bulmer (2007) “The place of values in the study of ethnicity and ‘race': reflections on the contribution of John Rex”, in T Abbas and F Reeves (eds) Immigration and Race Relations: sociological theory and John Rex, London: I B Tauris, pp. 47-60.

M. Bulmer (2007) 'T H Marshall' in John Scott (ed) Fifty Key Sociologists: the formative theorists. London: Routledge, pp. 91-94.

M. Bulmer (2005) 'Sociology in Britain in the twentieth century: differentiation and establishment', in A H Halsey and W G Runciman (eds) British Sociology seen from within and without. Oxford: Oxford University Press for the British Academy, pp 36-53.

M. Bulmer (2001) "Problematical parents and critical children: what is the significance of Gunnar and Alva Myrdal's chequered family history ?", Politics, Culture and Society Vol. 14, no 3, pp. 563-570 (part of symposium of five articles on Alva and Gunnar Myrdal: a symposium on their lives and works).

M. Bulmer (2001) 'Social Measurement: what stands in its way ?' Social Research: an international quarterly of the social sciences , Vol 68, no 2, pp.455-480.

M. Bulmer and J. Solomos (2001) 'Conceptualizing multi-ethnic societies', Ethnic and Racial Studies,Vol 24, no 6, pp. 889-891.

M. Bulmer (2001) "Knowledge for the public good: the emergence of social sciences and social reform in late-nineteenth and early twentieth-century America, 1880-1940" in David L Featherman and Maris A Vinovskis (eds), Social Sciences and Policy-Making: a search for relevance in the twentieth century (Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press), pp. 16-39.

M. Bulmer (2001) 'Research Ethics' in Nigel Gilbert (ed) Researching Social Life (London: Sage) , pp. 45-57 .

M. Bulmer (2001) Entry on “Ethnicity” in A S Leoussi (ed) Encylopaedia of Nationalism (New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction).

Professional Activities

Editor of the international academic journal ETHNIC AND RACIAL STUDIES, based in the department, published eight times per year.

Member, editorial board, American Behavioral Scientist, the Sociological Quarterly, and Minerva.

Vice Chair, Executive Board of the Research Committee (08) on the History of Sociology, International Sociological Association, 1998-2006.

Related Links

Institute of Social Research
The Question Bank
Ethnic and Racial Studies