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social theory, producing, with Peter Carrington, The Sage Handbook of Social Network Analysis and,
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as sole author, Conceptualising the Social World. He retired from Plymouth University in 2013.
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Scott was elected as President of the British Sociological Association in 2001, succeeding Sara
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Arber, having previously held the posts of Newsletter Editor, Secretary (1990–1992), Assistant
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Treasurer (1996–1998), and Chairperson (1992–93). He is currently an Honorary Vice-President. He is
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a member of the Research and Higher Education Policy Committee of the British Academy. Scott has
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served on the Sociology Panel for the 2001 Research Assessment Exercise (RAE), was Panel Chair in
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the 2008 RAE, and was appointed as Panel Chair for the 2014 Research Excellence Framework. He has
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also been an Assessor for the Teaching Quality Assessment, the A-Level Core Curriculum Working
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Party of the School Curriculum and Assessment Authority, the Subject Benchmarking Group of the
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Quality Assurance Agency, and numerous other committees. He was an Adjunct Professor at Bergen
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University, Norway, from 1997 to 2005 and has held short visiting positions at Hirosaki University,
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Ritsumeikan University, Hitotsubashi University, and Saitama University in Japan, and at the
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University of Hong Kong. He currently holds a Visiting Professorship at the University of Essex,
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UK, an Honorary Professorship at the University of Copenhagen, Denmark, and an Honorary Visiting
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Professorship at the University of Exeter, UK.
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Scott was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2013 Birthday Honours
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for services to social science.
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Class, power, and elites
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Scott has been one of the few British sociologists to investigate the capitalist class and its
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power. His research in stratification and political economy has explored the changing patterns of
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ownership in contemporary capitalist economies and the ways in which these changes are reflected in
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elite recruitment. Critical of the prevailing managerialist interpretation of business enterprise,
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he developed the influential concept of 'control through a constellation of interests' to describe
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the dispersed forms of ownership and control that allow representatives of dominant shareholding
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interests in Britain and the United States to exercise a constraining power over internal business
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decision-making.
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His research on networks of shareholding and interlocking directorships has documented the
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structures and mechanisms through which this constraining power operates. The research has depicted
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the varying, path-dependent patterns of control found in major capitalist economies. Scott has
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contrasted the 'Anglo-American' pattern of controlling constellations with the 'German' pattern of
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aligned corporate filiations, the 'Latin' pattern of 'corporate webs', and the 'Japanese' pattern
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of corporate sets.
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Scott explored, in the British case, the historical development of a capitalist class through a
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close association of landholding and financial interests and showed the mechanisms through which
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this class could be described as a ruling class.
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Theory and methodology
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Social network analysis has been at the heart of Scott's methodological work. He has helped to
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popularise this method of structural analysis through synthesising texts and his own applications
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of the method. He has, in addition, undertaken work on the use of documents in social research,
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producing, in 1990, A Matter of Record as one of the first texts on this topic. Like his work on
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social network analysis, this work developed from a practical research involvement in the use of
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the method. Scott's reflections on documentary research derived initially from his use of company
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records, civil registration records, and newspapers as source materials in his studies of business
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organisation.
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Scott's commitment to social theory as the core sociological activity dates from his early
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engagement with the work of Talcott Parsons and has been inspired by that writer's commitment to
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theoretical synthesis. Scott's view is that behind the contending theoretical explanations proposed
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by different theorists there is a set of concepts that constitutes a shared foundation for
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sociological analysis. Thus, concepts of 'structure' and 'action', for example, may inform a
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variety of competing accounts of particular social phenomena, but there is no necessary opposition
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between structural and agential accounts. Conceptualisations of the social world can be seen as
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complementary to each other, and sociologist should eschew the overemphasis of difference if
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comprehensive, cooperative endeavours are to be produced. Scott's latest work highlights the
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achievement of sociology as a discipline in establishing a set of fundamental principles of
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sociological analysis that can be used cooperatively. These are culture, nature, structure, action,
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system, space-time, mind, and development.
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The view that these basic principles of sociological analysis were established early in the history
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of the discipline and have subsequently been developed and elaborated underpins Scott's interest in
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the history of sociology. His books on theory have concentrated on the earliest statements of the
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various arguments considered and have led him to investigate the ideas of many now-forgotten
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figures. He has, in particular, explored early British sociology and has begun to establish the
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reputation of Victor Branford, the founder of the Sociological Society and the Sociological Review
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and the only British sociologist to have been made an Honorary Life member of the American
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Sociological Society.
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Publications
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Scott's book publications on stratification and on economic and political sociology include:
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Corporations, Classes and Capitalism, London, Hutchinson, 1979. American edition, St Martins Press.
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Reprinted 1981. (Japanese translation: Tokyo, Bunshindo, 1983). Completely revised Second Edition
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1985
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The Anatomy of Scottish Capital, with M. Hughes, London, Croom Helm, 1980. Canadian edition, McGill
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Queens.
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The Upper Classes: Property and Privilege in Britain, London, Macmillan, 1982.
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Directors of Industry, with C. Griff, Cambridge, Polity Press, 1984. (Japanese translation: Tokyo,
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Horitsu Bunka Sha, 1987).
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Networks of Corporate Power, editor with F. Stokman and R. Zeigler, Cambridge, Polity Press, 1985.
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(Japanese translation: Tokyo, Bunshindo, 1993).
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Capitalist Property and Financial Power, Brighton, Wheatsheaf, 1986. American edition, New York
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University Press. (Japanese translation: Kyoto, Zeimukeiri Kyokai, 1989).
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Who Rules Britain? Cambridge, Polity Press, 1991, reprinted 1992.
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Poverty and Wealth: Citizenship, Deprivation and Privilege, Harlow, Longman, 1994.
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Stratification and Power: Structures of Class, Status and Domination, Cambridge, Polity Press,
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1996.
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Corporate Business and Capitalist Classes, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1997.
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Power, Cambridge, Polity Press, 2001. (Polish translation: Warszawa, Wydawnictwo SIC, 2006)
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His edited collections and compilations in this area include:
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The Sociology of Elites, Three Volumes, editor, Cheltenham, Edward Elgar Publishing, 1990.
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Power. Critical Concepts, Three Volumes, editor, London, Routledge, 1994.
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Class. Critical Concepts, Four Volumes, editor, London, Routledge, 1996.
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Renewing Class Analysis, Sociological Review Monograph, editor with R. Crompton, F. Devine, and M.
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Savage, Oxford, Blackwell Publishers, 2000.
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Rethinking Class: Culture, Identities, and Lifestyle, editor with R. Crompton, F. Devine, M.
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Savage, London, Macmillan, 2004.
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Financial Elites and Transnational Business. Who Rules the World? (with Georgina Murray),
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Cheltenham, Edward Elgar, 2012.
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C. Wright Mills and the Sociological Imagination (with Ann Nilsen), Cheltenham, Edward Elgar, 2013.
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His monographs, edited collections and compilations on theories and methods include:
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A Matter of Record: Documentary Sources in Social Research, Cambridge, Polity Press, 1990.
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Sociological Theory: Contemporary Debates, Cheltenham, Edward Elgar, 1995. Second Edition 2012.
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Social Network Analysis, London and Beverley Hills, Sage Publications, 1992. Second Edition, 2000,