Stephen Lawrence

Biography

I have been lecturing in Sociology since 1973, at UNSW till 1988, and following 1990 at the University of Newcastle. My initial research interests were in gender and sexuality. From about 1993, I shifted my research interest to environment and society, working on the political implications of environmental problems such as global warming. I began research in the Hunter in 1995 to consider attitudes of the public to environmental problems and environmental policy, culminating in a survey with the Hunter Valley Research Foundation in 2003. Another area of interest that has developed during this period is project design for food security and sustainable agriculture in developing countries. In relation to this I have researched an EU project for irrigation for poor farmers in Northern Bali with my student Nazrina Zuryani, and projects for rural development and food security in South Africa, Uganda, Zambia and Namibia. Out of my research in South Africa came a monograph "Permaculture Strategy for the South African Villages" which was published in 2009. I am at present working on a documentary on the CELUCT project in Zimbabwe. In the last few years I have revived a long standing interest in social theory and am writing a book about the relevance of humanist realism to the social sciences in terms of epistemology, ethics and social analysis. I have also been publishing more on the topic of the global environmental crisis and the political response to that, working with some of my students and colleagues to consider the responses of business leaders and young people in the Hunter to these issues. I maintain a website that has pdfs and web pages for my writings - www.gifteconomy.org.au.

Research Interest

Environmental Science and Management, Agriculture, Land and Farm Management, Sociology