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  4. Dr Bob Jeffery

Dr Bob Jeffery BA, MA, PhD, FRSA

Course Leader MRes Social Research and Senior Lecturer in Sociology

Summary

I am an active researcher whose work focuses on work and employment and social inequalities. My current research focuses on ‘work-based harms’, unionisation of so-called ‘difficult-to-organise’ groups and industries and policy levers to promote good work. I am also the Course Leader for the MRes Social Research, a programme focused on training students for future careers in social research. 

Bob Jeffery

About

My central interests are in social inequalities, particularly in terms of work and employment, social class, gender, ethnicity and racism, urban studies and quantitative and qualitative methods. My work has been published in Capital & Class, the Industrial Relations Journal, The Sociological Review, Sociology, Sociological Research Online, Political Studies, and Criminal Justice Matters, amongst others. I have taught at Sheffield Hallam University since 2011, having obtained a Bachelor’s degree from Nottingham Trent University, a Masters from Goldsmiths College, University of London, and a PhD from the University of Salford.

My current research centres on labour market polarisation, the crisis in work quality, and a proliferation of ‘work-based harms’ - ranging from illegal non-payment of the minimum wage and denial of statutory entitlements to health and safety issues and discrimination and harassment in the workplace. I endorse calls by the RSA and others for a new social contract for good work, which includes the need to increase unionisation and restore collective bargaining. As part of this I am interested in how unions can overcome the challenges represented by so-called ‘difficult-to-organise’ sectors (such as retail, hospitality, courier services and social care). This research is grounded in empirical studies of low paid and precarious work in Salford, Sheffield and the London Borough of Islington. 

My earlier research explored class inequalities in the City of Salford (Greater Manchester) and I have also undertaken published research into the history of public order policing in Greater Manchester, student social movements and voter behaviour. 

Teaching

Sheffield Institute of Social Sciences

College of Social Sciences and Arts

Sociology

  • BA Sociology
  • MRes Social Research

  • Deviance, Order and Protest - Level 4
  • Sociology of Work - Level 6
  • Survey Method 1 - Level 7
  • Survey Method 2 - Level 7
  • Classical Social Theory – Level 7
  • Contemporary Social Theory – Level 7
  • Dissertation – Level 7

Research

  • Centre for Regional Economic and Social Research
  • Culture and Creativity Research Institute

Low Paid and Insecure Work in the Sheffield City Region

Challenging Sexual Harassment in Low Paid and Precarious Hospitality Work

This research is an exploration of the link between contractual insecurity and workplace sexual harassment in hospitality, in the context of a slew of news coverage in the post #MeToo era. This research sought to explain the survey evidence that has repeatedly identified that hospitality has the highest levels of workplace sexual harassment of any industrial sector and to give voice to workers’ experience of sexual harassment. Our research grounds the explanation of the endemic nature of sexual harassment in hospitality in four mechanisms: 1) the sexualisation of service work, 2) insecure contracts, 3) employer preferences for recruiting vulnerable workers (including young people), and 4) employment deregulation at the national level. Further, our research also explains the challenges for unions in taking on workplace sexual harassment (including their own mixed track records on the issue) while also identifying promising examples of campaigning. 

You can find out more about our research here: https://notesfrombelow.org/article/challenging-sexual-harassment-low-paid-and-precari 

Work-Based Harms and Union Renewal in the London Borough of Islington

Firstly, this research explores the prevalence of seven work-based harms in Islington’s labour market: 1) National minimum wage violations and low pay, 2) Denial of statutory entitlements, 3) Health and safety, 4) employment insecurity and dependent self-employment, 5) discrimination and harassment, 6) absence of worker voice, 7) impacts of welfare conditionality. This research identifies that many thousands of residents and workers are subject to one or more work-based harm. Secondly, the research investigates trade union perspectives on work-based harms, the challenges they face in unionising in so-called ‘difficult-to-organise’ workers, and the ways in which they can work with local authorities like Islington Council to increase the capacity to challenge work-based harms and promote good work. Finally, the research explores local policy levers available to Islington Council to promote good work, ranging from working with unions to strengthening local policies (on progressive procurement and the Night-Time Economy) and from increasing awareness of employment rights and unions (via PSHE, ACL and advice services) to advocating for investment in employment rights provision. 

 

My research has been funded and supported by the Low Pay Commission, Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), Yorkshire and the Humber Regional TUC, Islington Council, Capabilities in Academic Policy Engagement, the Zero Hours Justice Campaign, Volkswagen Stiftung, Sheffield Hallam University, University of Salford, Middlesex University, Staffordshire University and the Wales Institute of Social and Economic Research and Data (WISERD). 

Publications

Journal articles

Jeffery, R. (2024). Editorial Introduction: Decolonising Statistics. Radical Statistics, 136, 2. https://www.radstats.org.uk/no136/Editorial136.pdf

Jeffery, B., Etherington, D., Ledger-Jessop, B., Thomas, P., & Jones, M. (2024). Exposure to harm as a function of bargaining position: The class composition of hospitality workers in Sheffield. Capital & Class. http://doi.org/10.1177/03098168241268325

Formby, A., Sheikh, M., & Jeffery, R. (2024). The Global Disappearance of Decent Work? Precarity, Exploitation, and Work‐Based Harms in the Neoliberal Era. Social Inclusion, 12. http://doi.org/10.17645/si.8755

Etherington, D., Jeffery, B., Thomas, P., Jones, M., & Ledger‐Jessop, B. (2023). Trade union strategies to tackle labour market insecurity: Geography and the role of Sheffield TUC. Industrial Relations Journal. http://doi.org/10.1111/irj.12400

Abdel-Samad, M., Boyle, M., Flanigan, S., Garland, C., Jefferson, T., Jeffery, R., ... Sotiropoulos, G. (2021). Legacies of Contention: Revisiting the 2011 Protest Wave. Contention, 9 (2), 49-63. http://doi.org/10.3167/cont.2021.090204

Jeffery, B., Thomas, P., & Devine, D. (2019). Classificatory struggles in the midst of austerity: policing or politics? The Sociological Review. http://doi.org/10.1177/0038026119874585

Jeffery, R., Devine, D., & Thomas, P. (2018). "There's nothing”: unemployment, attitudes to work and punitive welfare reform in post-crash Salford. Sociological research online, 23 (4), 795-811. http://doi.org/10.1177/1360780418787521

Jeffery, B. (2018). 'I probably would never move, but ideally like I’d love to move this week': class and residential experience, beyond elective belonging. Sociology, 52 (2), 245-261. http://doi.org/10.1177/0038038516668124

Jeffery, B. (2017). Column: Decent housing for everyone in society should be entitlement of all. Sheffield Telegraph. https://www.sheffieldtelegraph.co.uk/news/opinion/column-decent-housing-for-everyone-in-society-should-be-entitlement-of-all-1-8645981

Rodriguez-Amat, J., & Jeffery, R. (2017). Student protests. Three periods of university governance. tripleC. Communication, Capitalism and Critique, 15 (2), 526-542. http://doi.org/10.31269/triplec.v15i2.771

Jeffery, B. (2016). Poverty-stricken Sheffield pensioners forced into life of crime. The Star. https://www.thestar.co.uk/news/poverty-stricken-sheffield-pensioners-forced-into-life-of-crime-1-8106423

Jeffery, B., Tufail, W., & Jackson, W. (2015). Policing and the Reproduction of Local Social Order : a case study of Greater Manchester. Journal on European History of Law, 6 (1), 118-128. http://www.historyoflaw.eu/english/journal_on_european_history_of_law.html

Jeffery, B., & Tufail, W. (2015). 'The riots were where the police were': Deconstructing the Pendelton Riot. Contention: The Multidisciplinary Journal of Social Protest, 2 (2), 37-56. http://doi.org/10.3167/cont.2014.020204

Jeffery, B., Ibrahim, J., & Waddington, D. (2015). Politics, consumption or nihilism: protest and disorder after the global crash. Contention: The Multidisciplinary Journal of Social Protest, 2 (2), 1-4. http://contentionjournal.org/vol-2-iss-2-april-2015/

Jeffery, B., Ibrahim, J., & Waddington, D. (2014). Politics, Consumption, or Nihilism. Contention, 2 (2), 1-4. http://doi.org/10.3167/cont.2014.020201

Jeffery, B., & Tufail, W. (2014). "The Riots Were Where the Police Were. Contention, 2 (2). http://doi.org/10.3167/cont.2014.020204

Tonge, J., Mycock, A., & Jeffery, R. (2012). Does citizenship education make young people better-engaged citizens? Political Studies, 60 (3), 578-602. http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9248.2011.00931.x

Jeffery, B., & Jackson, W. (2012). The Pendleton Riot: a political sociology. Criminal Justice Matters, 87 (1), 18-20. http://doi.org/10.1080/09627251.2012.671000

Tonge, J., Evans, J., Jeffery, R., & McAuley, J.W. (2010). New order: political change and the Protestant Orange tradition in Northern Ireland. The British Journal of Politics & International Relations, 13 (3), 400-419. http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-856X.2010.00421.x

Book chapters

Jeffery, R., Khan, F., Pandey, A., & Whitaker, T. (2022). Why we need more intergenerational dialogue on the future of work. In Good Work Guild Journal. (pp. 15). Royal Society of Arts: https://www.thersa.org/globalassets/_foundation/new-site-blocks-and-images/reports/2022/09/gwg-journal-090622.pdf

Jeffery, R., & Tufail, W. (2014). Police deviance. In Atkinson, R. (Ed.) Shades of deviance : a primer on crime, deviance and social harm. (pp. 147-150). Abingdon: Routledge: http://doi.org/10.4324/9781315848556

Jeffery, R., & Jackson, W. (2011). Crisis, Rupture and Anxiety: Re-appropriating the Concept of Crisis as Tool for Critique. In Crisis, Rupture and Anxiety An Interdisciplinary Examination of Contemporary and Historical Human Challenges. Cambridge Scholars Publishing

Jeffery, R. (2010). Intoxication, Transgression and Regeneration: The case of binge drinking in Britain as seen along a historical continuum. In Taylor, K.J. (Ed.) Regeneration and Reinvention: Practices of the ‘New’. University of Salford: European Studies Research Institute

Jeffery, R. (2008). Mobile forms of communication and the transformation of relations between the public and private spheres. In Ross, K., & Price, S. (Eds.) Popular Media and Communication: Essays on Publics, Practices and Processes. (pp. 5-23). Cambridge Scholars Publishing: https://www.cambridgescholars.com/product/9781847186263

Books

Jackson, W., Jeffery, B., Marino, M., & Sykes, T. (Eds.). (2012). Crisis, Rupture and Anxiety An Interdisciplinary Examination of Contemporary and Historical Human Challenges. Cambridge Scholars Publishing. https://www.cambridgescholars.com/product/978-1-4438-3612-8

Reports

Jeffery, R., Etherington, D., Stevenson, O., Gay, D., Flynn, J., Bishop, S., ... Clark, S. (2024). Improving Employment Conditions in Islington: Tackling Work-Based Harms and Promoting Unionisation. CAPE. http://doi.org/10.14324/000.rp.10200679

Jeffery, R., Beresford, R., Thomas, P., Etherington, D., & Jones, M. (2024). Challenging Sexual Harassment in Low Paid & Precarious Hospitality Work. Sheffield Hallam University.

Pullen, C., Jeffery, R., & Griffiths, T.-.L. (2024). Experiences and Perceived Impacts of the Apprenticeship Minimum Wage: A Qualitative Scoping Study. gov.uk. https://minimumwage.blog.gov.uk/wp-content/uploads/sites/157/2024/02/Pullen-et-al-2024_Apprentice-Experiences-2.pdf

Jeffery, R., Khan, F., Pandey, A., & Whitaker, T. (2022). Overcoming intergenerational divides to build better workplaces. Royal Society of Arts. https://www.thersa.org/comment/2022/09/future-of-work-intergenerational-dialogue

Thomas, P., Etherington, D., Jeffery, R., Beresford, R., Beel, D., & Jones, M. (2020). Tackling Labour Market Injustice and Organising Workers: The View from a Northern Heartland. Sheffield TUC. https://lowpaysheffield.com/

Etherington, D., Jeffery, R., Thomas, P., Brooks, J., Beel, D., & Jones, M. (2018). Forging an inclusive labour market - empowering workers and communities : an interim report on low pay and precarious work in Sheffield. Sheffield: Sheffield Trades Union Council.

Internet Publications

Jeffery, R. (2025). Power shifts: From fast-food jobs to academic posts, I've seen why workers need unions. http://doi.org/10.51428/tsr.jilr8690

Beresford, R., & Jeffery, R. (2024). Challenging Sexual Harassment in Low Paid and Precarious Hospitality Work. https://notesfrombelow.org/article/challenging-sexual-harassment-low-paid-and-precari

Pullen, C., Jeffery, R., & Griffiths, T.-.L. (2024). Experiences and Perceived Impacts of the Apprenticeship Minimum Wage - a qualitative scoping study. https://minimumwage.blog.gov.uk/2024/02/07/experiences-and-perceived-impacts-of-the-apprenticeship-minimum-wage-a-qualitative-scoping-study/

Jeffery, R., & Thomas, P. (2019). Class, Collective Bargaining and Labour Rights. https://sheffieldinstituteforpolicystudies.com/2019/05/10/class-collective-bargaining-and-labour-rights/

Jeffery, R., & Jackson, W. (2012). Youth riots: policing disorder in the regenerating city - Understanding the Pendleton Riot (Part 1). https://www.dialoguesociety.org/articles/799-youth-riots-policing-disorder-in-the-regenerating-city-understanding-the-pendleton-riot-part-1.html

Jeffery, R. (2012). Youth riots: policing disorder in the regenerating city - Understanding the Pendleton Riot (Part 2). https://www.dialoguesociety.org/articles/801-youth-riots-policing-disorder-in-the-regenerating-city-understanding-the-pendleton-riot-part-2.html

Presentations

Jeffery, R. (2025). Introduction to the Special Issue. Presented at: In Precarity and Exploitation in the Neoliberal Era: A Social Inclusion, Online

Jeffery, R., & Etherington, D. (2025). Improving Employment Conditions in Islington: Tackling Work-Based Harms and Promoting Unionisation. Presented at: Islington North People's Forum, London

Jeffery, R., & Beresford, R. (2025). Explaining The Ubiquitous Harm of Workplace Sexual Harassment in Hospitality: Power Dynamics, Industry Level Characteristics, Deregulation and Prospects for Collective Organising. Presented at: Work and Equalities Institute 6th Fairness at Work Conference, University of Manchester

Jeffery, R., & Beresford, R. (2025). Ending Workplace Sexual Harassment. Presented at: End Not Defend: Campaign Launch, Palace of Westminster, London

Jeffery, R., Etherington, D., & Stevenson, O. (2024). Improving Employment Conditions in Islington: Tackling Work-Based Harms and Promoting Unionisation: Report Launch. Presented at: Improving Employment Conditions in Islington: Tackling Work-Based Harms and Promoting Unionisation: Report Launch, Friends House, Euston, London

Jeffery, R., & Beresford, R. (2024). The Pandemic of Sexual Harassment in Low Paid and Precarious Hospitality Work. Presented at: British Industrial Relations Association: Annual Conference, Queen Mary, University of London

Jeffery, R., & Beresford, R. (2024). Challenging Sexual Harassment in Hospitality: Report Launch. Presented at: Challenging Sexual Harassment in Hospitality: Public Launch, Sheffield Hallam University

Jeffery, R., Pullen, C., & Griffiths, T.-.L. (2023). Experiences and Perceived Impacts of the Apprenticeship Minimum Wage: A Qualitative Scoping Study. Presented at: The Low Pay Commission, Online

Jeffery, R. (2022). Intergenerational Dialogue on the Future of Work. Presented at: RSA Brighton: intergenerational work, Brighton WERKS Central Café

Jeffery, R. (2022). From Exceptional to Routine Harms and Back Again. Presented at: Historical Materialism, School of Oriental and African Studies, London

Jeffery, R. (2022). You and Your Neighbourhood: Understanding the 2011 Riots. Presented at: ESRC Festival of Social Science, Sheffield Hallam University

Jeffery, R. (2022). Promoting intergenerational dialogue around the future of work. Presented at: Good Work Guild Summit, Online

Jeffery, R. (2022). How can Trade Unions evolve to meet 21st century needs? Presented at: Good Work Guild Case Clinic, Online

Jeffery, R. (2021). Harm and Domination in Low Paid and Precarious Work. Presented at: Class, Power and Philosophy, University of Sheffield

Jeffery, R. (2021). Low Paid and Precarious Work in Sheffield. Presented at: Good Work Round Table, Islington, London

Jeffery, R. (2021). From Steel City to Low Pay Capital: Class Composition and Prospects for Union Renewal in the City of Sheffield during the Covid Pandemic. Presented at: European Sociological Association Annual Conference, Barcelona, 2021

Jeffery, R. (2021). Precarity and Challenging the Employment Impacts of Covid-19. Presented at: Creating Knowledge Conference, Sheffield Hallam University

Jeffery, R. (2021). Precarity is the Pandemic: Sheffield, and the Predictable Consequences of a Lack of Bargaining Power. Presented at: British Sociological Association Annual Conference: Remaking the Future, Online

Jeffery, R. (2021). Punishing the Poor and Classificatory Struggles: Decomposition to Recomposition. Presented at: Crime, Criminalisation and Injustice: An International Conference, University of Leeds

Jeffery, R. (2020). Tackling Labour Market Injustice and Organising Workers: The View from a Northern Heartland (Report Launch). Presented at: Tackling Labour Market Injustice and Organising Workers (Report Launch), Online

Jeffery, R. (2019). From Bourdieu to Rancière: Capitals to Classificatory struggles. Presented at: Building on Bourdieu in National and International Spaces, Sheffield Hallam University

Jeffery, R. (2019). What does 21st Century Workplace Democracy Look Like? Presented at: Festival of Debate, The Circle, Sheffield

Jeffery, R. (2019). Sheffield Needs A Pay Rise. Presented at: Class, Austerity and Precarity: A Sheffield Institute for Policy Studies Symposium, Sheffield Hallam University

Jeffery, R. (2019). Developing a Research Base for Sheffield Needs A Pay Rise. Presented at: Britain is Broken, Rotherham Trades and Labour Club

Jeffery, R. (2018). Sheffield’s Deregulated Labour Market and Prospects for Reform. Presented at: Independent Working-Class Education Network Day School, Zest Centre, Sheffield

Jeffery, R. (2018). “Middle-Class People Who Have a Low Opinion of People Like Us”: Classed Identities and Classificatory Struggles. Presented at: British Sociological Association Annual Conference: Identity, Community and Social Solidarity, Northumbria University

Jeffery, R. (2016). “I’m part of that fighting class really’: From Dis-identification to Classificatory Struggles, the Significance of Class in the New Gilded Age. Presented at: Department of Psychology, Sociology and Politics Research Conference, Novotel, Sheffield

Jeffery, R. (2015). '"The Riots Were Where the Police Were: Deconstructing the Pendleton Riot'. Presented at: British Sociological Association Annual Conference: Societies in Transition, Glasgow Caledonian University, 2015

Jeffery, R. (2014). '[A] red rag to a bull, you know what I mean? ': Popular Resistance in the Splintering Post-Industrial City. Presented at: Competitiveness, crisis and political authority in a changing global Order, Leeds Metropolitan University

Jeffery, R. (2014). On the Consequences of Neoliberal Urbanisation: Gentrification, Securitisation and Resistance. Presented at: Critical Perspectives on Youth, Community and Urban Regeneration Seminars, University of Limerick

Jeffery, R., & Clarkson, H. (2014). '"For the People that Have Nothing"': Geographies of Resistance in the 2011 English Riots'. Presented at: Geographies of Neoliberalism and Resistance: The State, Violence and Labour', Jesus College, Oxford

Jeffery, R., & Tufail, W. (2013). "They've made the area look a bit prettier, but that's all": gentrification, social tectonics, securitisation and the right to the city. Presented at: Les classes moyennes dans la ville contemporaine (Middle Classes in the City), Hôtel de Ville de Paris (Paris City Hall)

Jeffery, R. (2013). The Absent Community: Conservative Interventionism and Simulated Engagement in a Splintering City. Presented at: Language, Ideology and Power Research Group, University of Lancaster

Jeffery, R. (2013). Researching the 2011 English Riots: What do we think we know?

Jeffery, R. (2013). "They don’t mix or anything": Gentrification and hysteresis in a Splintering City. Presented at: Media and Cultural Studies @ NTU: 21 years - the past, the present, the future, Nottingham Trent University

Jeffery, R. (2012). A history of oppositional Salford: from dirty old town to splintering post-industrial city. Presented at: Oppositions Conference, University of Salford, 2012

Jeffery, R. (2012). "They're all f***ing top houses, but try and get me one": Gentrification, hysteresis, urban inequality and belonging. Presented at: Symbolic Power and Urban Inequality: Taking Bourdieu to Town, University of York

Jeffery, R. (2012). Riots, Pure and Simple: Invited Keynote. Presented at: Riots: Pure and Simple?, Centre for Crime and Justice Studies, London

Jeffery, R., & Jackson, W. (2012). Policing the return of capital to the post-industrial city: regeneration and the politics of security. Presented at: Security, Policing and Social Control: The Post-Crash City, University of York

Jeffery, R., & Jackson, W. (2011). The Pendleton Riot: A Political Sociology. Presented at: Urban Unrest, Social Resentment and Justice, University of York

Jeffery, R. (2010). Transport and Social Exclusion: From a UK Inner-city Neighbourhood to Europe and Beyond. Presented at: Our Common Future, Hannover

Jeffery, R. (2009). Free Public Transport: An idea whose time has come? Presented at: Manchester Transport Economics Lecture Series, University of Manchester

Jeffery, R. (2008). Intoxication, Transgression and Regeneration: The case of binge drinking in Britain as seen along a historical continuum. Presented at: Regeneration and Reinvention: Practices of ‘the New’, University of Salford

Other publications

Jeffery, B. (2018). Gentrification and the Return of Class. Sheffield Institute for Policy Studies: https://sheffieldinstituteforpolicystudies.com/2018/09/05/gentrification-and-the-return-of-class/

Other activities

Member of the Good Work Guild - Royal Society of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce

Associate Editor of Contention: the Multidisciplinary Journal of Social Protest

Reviewer for Parliamentary Affairs, The International Journal of Social Research Methodology, Sociology, Sociological Research Online and The Sociological Review.

External Examiner for the MSc Social Research at Keele University.

Editor - Radical Statistics.

Postgraduate supervision

Ongoing:

• Freya-Collier Sewell - “We’re all equal here”: Racism and mental health nurse education in Scotland
• Ben Ledger Jessop - Workers in the Contemporary Warehouse: Experiencing and Navigating Harms
• Lillian Maguire - White (British) or Mixed?: The dichotomy within British identity.

Completed:

• Joe McMullan -  Understanding the Class Politics of Brexit in the Context of Urban Deindustrialisation

Media

My key interests encompass a wide range of issues related to Social Inequalities. I have contributed to the local, regional and national media on issues such as the Changing Nature of Social Class, Housing, Impacts of Poverty, the 2011 English Riots, Policing Reform and Transport Inequalities.

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