Community re-studies: lessons and prospects

Community re-studies have played an important role in the development of knowledge about social relationships and social change although they have had a chequered history. Assessments of their value vary according to whether they are approached as replications of earlier studies or as a different type of project. Re-studies have the potential to undermine the credibility of earlier studies but they can also fill in gaps and provide the basis for assessment of social change at a local level. They are generally characterized by methodological and theoretical innovation, learning from and building on what has gone before and contributing to an accumulating body of knowledge about community relations and how to study them. </jats:p

Ray Pahl's Sociological Career: Fifty Years of Impact

The history of a discipline records the careers of its practitioners as well as providing an account their ideas. Studying these careers reveals much about the particular people and their work, and also provides insights into general questions such as how disciplines evolve, and how impact can be achieved amongst and beyond academic peers. This article focuses on the career of R. E. (Ray) Pahl. It argues that his position in British sociology over the last half century can be attributed in particular to two things. First, Pahl was committed to asking sociological questions whilst being open to other influences; we call him an interdisciplinary sociologist. Secondly, his approach engaged simultaneously with theoretical, methodological and substantive elements of the discipline rather than treating them as areas of separate expertise. These key facets of his work help in understanding why his work has reached such a wide range of audiences, and in explaining his distinctive record as a sociologist within and beyond the academy, which long pre-dates current concerns with 'impact'.Pahl, Impact, Interdisciplinary, Public Sociology

Friends, Neighbours and Distant Partners: Extending or Decentring Family Relationships?

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Informed Consent and the Research Process: Following Rules or Striking Balances?

Gaining informed consent from people being researched is central to ethical research practice. There are, however, several factors that make the issue of informed consent problematic, especially in research involving members of groups that are commonly characterised as \'vulnerable\' such as children and people with learning disabilities. This paper reports on a project funded by the UK Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) which was concerned to identify and disseminate best practice in relation to informed consent in research with six such groups. The context for the study is the increased attention that is being paid to the issue of informed consent in research, not least because of the broad changes taking place in research governance and regulation in the UK. The project involved the analysis of researchers\' views and experiences of informed consent. The paper focuses on two particular difficulties inherent in the processes of gaining and maintaining informed consent. The first of these is that there is no consensus amongst researchers concerning what comprises \'informed consent\'. The second is that there is no consensus about whether the same sets of principles and procedures are equally applicable to research among different groups and to research conducted within different methodological frameworks. In exploring both these difficulties we draw on our findings to highlight the nature of these issues and some of our participants\' responses to them. These issues have relevance to wider debates about the role of guidelines and regulation for ethical practice. We found that study participants were generally less in favour of guidelines that regulate the way research is conducted and more in favour of guidelines that help researchers to strike balances between the conflicting pressures that inevitably occur in research.Informed Consent; Research Ethics; Regulation of Research; Research Governance; Professional Guidelines

New Divisions of Labour?: Comparative Thoughts on the Current Recession

This article argues that it is useful to compare the current recession with that which occurred three decades ago. Drawing on research undertaken at that time by Ray Pahl, it is suggested that four questions are once again revealing in the study of the current economic downturn: \'How have we come to be where we are currently?\', \'Who gets what?\', \'How do we know what we claim to know?\', and \'What sorts of lessons can be drawn to inform thinking about the future?\' The usefulness of asking these questions is discussed, even though the answers must await further research.Recession, Divisions of Labour, Community