With a backdrop of growing importance of achieving research “impact”, scholars at the London School of Economics (LSE) have urged social scientists to join forces across disciplines and make far better use of an “impact” agenda for social science research. The aim of their appeal has been to demonstrate the benefits of social science research to the wider economy and society. Their “shorter, better, faster, free” mantra is being echoed this week in a newly released book, The Impact of the Social Sciences: How Academics and Their Research Make a Difference.
The book’s landmark analyses are based on a three year research project studying how UK-based academic research in the social sciences achieves public policy impacts, contributes to economic prosperity, and informs public understanding of policy issues as well as economic and social changes. Matthew Reisz reflects in Times Higher Education that, “With social science now at a crossroads, their book aims to provide detailed evidence of just how important these disciplines are to public policymaking, business and the third sector, and of the influence they have, via the media, on public thinking.”
A launch event for the book will take place next week, on Wednesday, January 29, 2014 between 13:30 and 15:00 (EST). While already sold out, the launch will be streamed live across Google Hangout here. Be sure to tune in as the event will hear from an elite panel of experts from the BBC News, Oxfam GB, National Audit Office, British Telecom, and the LSE who will comment on the impacts that research in the social sciences has on their respective business, government and civil society sectors.
In the meantime, a thought-provoking preview of the data visualizations along with a living bibliography of open access versions of publications that appear in the book are both available online.