JOHNSTON, Ron(ald John) 1941-

PERSONAL:

Born March 30, 1941, in Swindon, Wiltshire, England; son of Henry and Phyllis Joyce (Liddiard) Johnston; married Rita Brennan, April 10, 1964; children: Christopher, Lucy. Education: University of Manchester, B.A. (with honors), 1962, M.A., 1964; Monash University, Ph.D., 1967. Hobbies and other interests: Bell ringing.

ADDRESSES:

Home—123 The Close, Salisbury SP1 2EY, England. Office—School of Geographical Sciences, University of Bristol, Bristol BS8 1SS, England; fax: 0117-928-7878. E-mail—r.johnston@bristol.ac.uk.

CAREER:

Monash University, Clayton, Victoria, Australia, lecturer in geography, 1966; University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand, lecturer, 1967-69, senior lecturer, 1969-73, reader in geography, 1973-74; University of Sheffield, Sheffield, England, professor of geography, 1974-92, department head, 1982-85, chair of Academic Development Committee, 1985-92, pro vice chancellor for academic affairs, 1989-92; University of Essex, Colchester, England, vice chancellor, 1992-95, director of Essex Training and Enterprise Council, 1994-95; University of Bristol, Bristol, England, professor of geographical sciences, 1995—. University of Toronto, associate professor, 1972; University of London, London School of Economics and Political Science, academic visitor, 1973; University of the Witwatersrand, professor, 1976; University of Edinburgh, Wreford Watson Memorial Lecturer, 1992; Macquarie University, visiting research fellow in earth sciences, 1998, adjunct professor of human geography, 1999; Royal Holloway-Bedford College, London, Gordon Manley Lecturer, 1999; University of North Carolina—Chapel Hill, Frey Distinguished Visiting Professor, 2001; guest lecturer at University of Amsterdam, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Oxford University, and University of Southampton. Social Science Research Council/Economics and Social Research Council, vice chair of Human Geography Committee, 1980-82, member of Executive Panel on the Inner City in Context, 1980-83, chair of Academic Oversight Committee for Democracy and Participation Research Programme, 2000—; British National Committee for Geography, representative, 1982-85, 1988-90. Christchurch Cathedral, ringing master, 1969-72; Sheffield Cathedral, ringing master, 1979-92; Central Council of Church Bell Ringers, representative, 1985-93, president, 1993-96; Sarum St. Michael, member of council, 1997-2001, council chair, 1998-2001.

MEMBER:

International Geographical Union (founding chair of Study Group on the World Political Map, 1984-87; member of Commission on the World Political Map, 1988-92), British Academy (fellow), Institute of British Geographers (member of council, 1977-80; chair of Urban Geography Study Group, 1978-81; chair of History and Philosophy of Geography Study Group, 1985-88; president, 1990), Geographical Association (president of Lincoln branch, 1978-83), Association of Learned Societies in the Social Sciences (member of executive committee, 1985-88), Academy of Learned Societies in the Social Sciences (chair of College of Academicians, 2000; member of council, 2000-01), New Zealand Geographical Society (member of council, 1969-74), Yorkshire Association of Change Ringers (president, 1990-92), Salisbury Cathedral Close Preservation Society.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Erskine fellow, University of Canterbury, 1969, 1987; travel fellow, British Council, 1973; citation for outstanding academic book, American Association of College and Research Libraries, 1980-81, for Geography and Geographers: Anglo-American Human Geography since 1945; Royal Geographical Society, Murchison Award, 1985, Victoria Medal, 1990; Premio Iglesias, Associazione Culturale Lao Silesu (with P. J. Taylor), 1989, for A World in Crisis?; Honors Award, Association of American Geographers, 1991; D.U., University of Essex, 1996; LL.D., Monash University, 1999; Prix Vautrun Lud, Festival Internationale de Géographie, 1999; named Foundation Academician, Academy of Learned Societies in the Social Sciences, 1999; D.Litt., University of Sheffield, 2002; grants from Nuffield Foundation, Social Science Research Council, Leverhulme Trust, Economic and Social Research Council, and Boundaries Commission for Bermuda.

WRITINGS:

(Editor, with D. T. Herbert) Geography and the Urban Environment: Progress in Research and Applications, six volumes, John Wiley (Chichester, England), 1978-84.

Geography and Geographers: Anglo-American Human Geography since 1945, Edward Arnold (London, England), 1979, 5th edition, 1997.

(Editor, with D. Gregory, G. Pratt, and M. J. Watts) The Dictionary of Human Geography, Basil Blackwell (Oxford, England), 1981, 4th edition, 2000.

(Editor) The Changing Geography of the United Kingdom, Methuen (London, England), 1982, 2nd edition, 1991.

City and Society: An Outline for Urban Geography, Hutchinson (London, England), 1984, 2nd edition, Unwin Hyman (London, England), 1989.

Residential Segregation, the State, and Constitutional Conflict in American Urban Areas, Academic Press (London, England), 1984.

The Geography of English Politics: The 1983 General Election, Croom Helm (London, England), 1985.

(Editor, with P. J. Taylor) A World in Crisis?, Basil Blackwell (Oxford, England), 1985, 2nd edition, 1989.

On Human Geography, Basil Blackwell (Oxford, England), 1986.

Bell-Ringing: The English Art of Change-Ringing, Viking (London, England), 1986.

Money and Votes, Croom Helm (London, England), 1987.

(With C. J. Pattie and J. G. Allsopp) A Nation Dividing? The Electoral Map of Great Britain, 1979-1987, Longman (London, England), 1988.

Environmental Problems: Nature, Economy, and State, Belhaven Pres (London, England), 1989, revised edition published as Nature, State, and Economy: The Political Economy of Environmental Problems, John Wiley (Chichester, England), 1996.

(With others) An Atlas of Bells, Blackwell Reference (Oxford, England), 1990.

A Question of Place, Basil Blackwell (Oxford, England), 1991.

(Editor) The Challenge for Geography, Blackwell Publishers (Oxford, England), 1992.

(Editor, with P. J. Taylor and M. J. Watts) Geographies of Global Change, Blackwell Publishers (Oxford, England), 1995.

(With D. J. Rossiter and C. J. Pattie) The Boundary Commissions: Redrawing the UK's Map of Parliamentary Constituencies, Manchester University Press (Manchester, England), 1999.

(With C. J. Pattie, D. F. L. Dorling, and D. J. Rossiter) From Votes to Seats: The UK Electoral System in Operation, 1950-1997, Manchester University Press (Manchester, England), 2001.

Contributor to more than 100 books. Coeditor of the series "World Cities," Belhaven Press (London, England), 1990-95, then John Wiley (Chichester, England), 1995—. Contributor of about 500 articles to professional journals. Editor, New Zealand Geographer, 1969-74; coeditor, Environment and Planning, 1979—; coeditor and review editor, Progress in Human Geography, 1980—; member of editorial board, Progress in Physical Geography, Urban Geography, Political Geography Quarterly, Electoral Studies, Journal of Geography in Higher Education, Geography Review, Geographical, Geographical and Environmental Modelling, and Australian Geographer.

SIDELIGHTS:

Ron Johnston told CA: "My first research focused on urban social areas, looking at patterns of residential differentiation in Australian and New Zealand cities. This involved exploring new techniques for portraying those patterns, their changes over time, and movements between social areas, with later work examining how people perceive the characteristics of different social areas. My other project in the area of urban social geography looked at the use of the planning system within the fragmented local government structures of U.S. metropolitan areas to promote social (especially ethnic) segregation. It concentrated on legal challenges to segregation and the determinations of courts in key cases regarding exclusionary zoning, school catchment areas, and the distribution of public goods.

"In the early 1970s I initiated a continuing interest in the history of the academic discipline of geography since 1945. The work has two main strands. The first strand involves charting the major changes in approach and methodology that occurred during the period and evaluating the relevance of various models of disciplinary progress to their understanding. The major output of this has been Geography and Geographers: Anglo-American Human Geography since 1945. The second strand has involved promoting the importance of place as a key geographical concept within the social sciences and illustrating this from a range of contexts. Recognition of the importance of place as a context for social learning and behavior derived from my original work on urban social areas and formed the basis for much of my later work in electoral studies. It was also advanced in two major books: On Human Geography, which was a personal evaluation of the trends in the discipline, and A Question of Place, which advanced the argument regarding the centrality of place in geographical thinking.

"Since 1980 my research has focused on the value of a geographical perspective in the study of electoral systems. Most of the studies have concentrated on three main themes in the British situation: spatial variations in voting, the impact of local campaigns, and the process of constituency definition.

"These strands of my work have provided substantial new insights to the operation of the British electoral system. They have recently been brought together in original work on the biases inherent in the system and how they have operated (and been manipulated) during the last fifty years. Alongside that work, I have explored two other themes: studies of the measurement of power in electoral systems and studies of the political pork barrel in the United States."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

BOOKS

Brams, S. J., Negotiation Games, Routledge (London, England), 1991.