Professor Stephen Ball

  • Qualifications and position:
    • PhD, FRSA, AcSS, FBA
    • Karl Mannheim Professor of Sociology of Education
  • Faculty:
    • Faculty of Policy and Society
  • Department:
    • Department of Educational Foundations and Policy Studies
  • Summary:
    • I am currently involved in 3 ESRC-funded projects, they are focused on: the relationships between philanthropy and education policy (with Carolina Junemann); policy enactments in secondary schools (with Meg Maguire KCL and Annette Braun); and the educational strategies of the black middle class (with Carol Vincent, David Gillborn and Nicola Rollock). I am also working on an international study of the Global Middle Class with colleagues in Spain, Argentina, France, Australia and the US.
  • Teaching:
    • I am a course tutor for the module 'Sociology of Education' on the MA in Sociology of Education
  • Research Projects:
    • In 2008, with Deborah Youdell, I completed a consultancy report for Education International on "Hidden Privatisation in Public Education". I continue to research the many forms of current privatisation in education both in the UK and internationally. I am also the convenor of the BERA Education and Social Theory SIG (see BERA website for details).
  • Professional Activities:
    • Chair Committee of Professors (2008-11); Head of Sociology Section (EFPS); Editor of the Journal of Education Policy; Research Officer British Academy Section S4; Fellow of the British Academy; Member of Academy of Social Sciences; FRSA
  • Conferences/presentations:
    • "The Commercial Ethics of Entrepreneurial Higher Education", SEDA annual conference keynote, November 2008.

      "Precarity, Identity and Place: Researching Contexts of Working Class Subjectivity", ESRC Festival of Research Methods Conference, St Catherine's College, Oxford, 2008.

      "Families, Schools and Policies: Political Naivety and the Dynamics of Educational Inequalities", University of Leeds, School of Education Research Day, Keynote address, 2008.
  • Personal Country Knowledge:
    • Argentina; India; Spain
  • Languages Spoken:
    • Spanish (advanced)
  • Languages Written:
    • Spanish (advanced)
  • Research Students:
    • My main areas of research interest are: Policy and Practice of Comprehensive Education.
      Education markets and social exclusion
      Education, the state and privatization
      Politics and Policy-making in education
      Techniques of qualitative research (case study, ethnography and participant observation)

      My current research students include: Carolina Junemann: Non-completion in Argentine public universities
      Magda Kolokitha: Comparative study of the Bologna process in England and Greece
      Angela Oria: Genealogy of public education in Argentina
      Claudine Rausch: Dividing mechanisms in primary classrooms
      Diego Santori: Comparative study of higher education and social mobility in Argentina and Chile
      Eleni Stamou: Theoretical analysis of youth transitions
Professor Stephen Ball

Contact details

Contact details

  • Email:

  • Address:
  • Department of Educational Foundations and Policy Studies
    Institute of Education University of London
    20 Bedford Way
    London
    WC1H 0AL

  • Office Location:
  • Room 701
    20 Bedford Way, WC1H 0AL

Publications

  • Ball, S.J. (2008) The education debate: policy and politics in the 21st Century. Bristol: Policy Press.
  • Ball, S.J. (2007)  . Education plc: private sector participation in public sector education. London: Routledge.
  • Ball, S.J. (2006)  Education Policy and Social Class: Selected Works (World Library of Educationalists). London: Routledge.
  • Ball, S.J. (2004)
    The RoutledgeFalmer Reader in Sociology of Education. London: RoutledgeFalmer.
  • Ball, S.J. (2003) Class Strategies and the Education Market: the middle class and social advantage.. London: RoutledgeFalmer..