Sidney Ball Memorial Lectures
Sidney Ball Memorial Lectures
The department’s special annual lectures began in 1917, shortly after Barnett House was founded in 1914. The first lecture was published as the Barnett House Papers No.1 by Oxford University Press in the same year.
When Sidney Ball, chairman of the Barnett House Committee, died in March 1918, the annual talks were renamed as the Sidney Ball Memorial lectures.
The first lecture was delivered on 1 December 1920 by the Right Hon. Sir Horace Plunkett. He began this first lecture with these words:
“I have the honour to inaugurate [the memorial lectures] today. Their aim will be the promotion of an intimate and mutually helpful relationship between the thought of the University Sidney Ball adorned and the working life of the community he lived to serve.”
Barnett House retained copyright over the lectures, except for John Maynard Keynes’ lecture in 1924.
Where available, texts or recordings are linked below.
Barnett House Papers: 1917-1920
Sidney Ball Lectures: 1920 - present
1 December 1920, printed as ‘Oxford and the Rural Problem’ Barnett House Papers No.6, OUP 1921.
Barnett House Papers No. 7, OUP 1922.
31 October 1923, Barnett House Papers No. 8, OUP 1923.
November, 1924. The essay with the same title, published in 1926 by the Hogarth Press was stated to be based on the 1924 Sidney Ball lecture. The Hogarth Press version has been reprinted many times, including in J. M. Keynes, Essays in Persuasion, Palgrave-Macmillan, 2010.
25 November 1925, Barnett House Papers No. 9, OUP 1926
5 November 1926, Barnett House Papers No. 10, OUP 1927
21 November 1927, Barnett House Papers No. 11, OUP 1928
27 May 1929, Barnett House Papers No. 12, OUP 1929 (A.C. Pigou was invited to speak in 1928 but was delayed by illness).
7 February 1930, Barnett House Papers No. 13, OUP 1930
October 31 1930, Barnett House Papers No. 14, OUP 1930
13 November 1931, Barnett House Papers No. 15, OUP 1931
16 November 1932, Barnett House Papers No. 16, OUP 1932
2 May 1934, Barnett House Papers No.17, OUP 1934
15 November 1934, Barnett House Papers No. 18, OUP, 1935
26 October 1935, Barnett House Papers No.19, OUP 1936
Barnett House Papers No. 20, OUP 1937
16 November 1937, Barnett House Papers No.21, OUP 1938
3 November 1938, Barnett House Papers No. 22, OUP 1938
29 February 1940, Barnett House Papers No. 23, OUP 1940
28 February 1941, Barnett House Papers No. 24, OUP 1941
4 June 1942, Barnett House Papers No. 25, OUP 1942
26 February 1943. Barnett House Papers No. 26 OUP 1943
3 March 1944, Barnett House Papers No. 27, OUP 1944
8 March 1945, Barnett House Papers No. 28, OUP 1945
29 May 1947, Barnett House Papers No. 29, OUP 1947
Barnett House Paper No. 30 OUP 1949. (It is not clear whether this was a Sidney Ball lecture).
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‘Social Work and Recession’ - Dr. Jane Aldgate
‘The Prospects for Social Reform’ - David Donnison
‘Socialism and Freedom’ - Frank Field MP
‘The Social Services in Adversity – a Review’ - Professor A. H. Halsey
‘In Defence of Comprehensive Schools’ - Dr. A. F. Heath
‘The Changing Political Contours of the Welfare State’ - Neville Johnson
‘Innovation, Experiment and Research in Social Services’ - G. A. N. Smith
‘European Demographic Trends and Their Implications for Social Policy’ - Jonathan Bradshaw
‘Are ‘Rights’ an Essential Component of any Theory of Social Policy?’ - David Donnison
'Does the Welfare State Make People Passive and Dependent? A Test Against the Swedish Experience' - Robert Erikson
'Poverty in the European Community: Trends and Responses' - Graham Room
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30 November 2000. No paper available.
23 April 2007. No paper available.
In 2007 the Sidney Ball Memorial Lecture series was reinstated as an annual event.
1 November 2007; no paper available.
Professor Greg Duncan, 'Early Childhood Poverty and Adult Attainment', 26 February 2009.
Professor Gosta Esping-Andersen, 'Life Chances and Early Childhood Investments', 13 October 2010
Professor Mark Lipsey, 'Evidence-based interventions in juvenile justice: Concept, research, practice, and frontiers', 9 November 2011
Professor John Hills, 'The Reform of the Welfare State and the Dynamics of People's Lives', 31 October 2012
Baroness Ruth Lister, 'Speaking truth to power: social policy in action', 4 December 2013
Professor Tom Cooke, 'The Major Assumptions of Evidence-Based Policy: Bringing Empirical Evidence to Bear', 4 November 2014
Dr Phyllis Solomon, 'Anti-Deinstitutionalization and Anti-Institutionalization for Persons with Severe Mental Illnesses: Finding Common Ground', 18 December 2015
Professor Colin Crouch, 'Britain, Europe and Social Policy', 11 November 2016
Professor David Spiegelhalter, 'Why should we have trust in numbers?', 26 October 2017. Watch online
Thursday 8 November 2018 at Lady Margaret Hall. Watch here.
Professor Dame Margaret Whitehead presented on 15 November 2019. Video unavailable.
Peter Taylor-Gooby gives the centenary Sidney Ball Lecture on 12 November, 2020. Watch it here.
View this lecture on YouTube.
