Co-Director Senior Research Fellow and Director of MAP Centre M.A. (Oxon), M.Sc. (Oxon), PhD (Copenhagen), Fellow of the Galton Institute Tel:  +44 (0) 1865 612808 E-mail: george.leeson@ageing.ox.ac.uk

Research

Dr. George W. Leeson is Co-Director of the Oxford Institute of Population Ageing and a Senior Research Fellow in the Department of Sociology at the University of Oxford. He is External Lecturer in Demography at the University of Copenhagen. Dr. Leeson trained as a mathematician and statistician at Oxford and as a demographer at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and at the University of Copenhagen.

Dr. Leeson’s main research interests are in the socio-demographic aspects of ageing populations, covering both demographic modelling of population development and the analysis of national and international data sets.

Dr. Leeson has directed the Danish Longitudinal Future Study, which elucidates the attitudes and aspirations of future generations of older people in Denmark, and he is Principal Investigator with Professor Sarah Harper on the Global Ageing Study, a survey of 44,000 men and women aged 40 to 80 in 24 countries.

Dr. Leeson’s current research includes the demographic inequalities of global ageing, the changing populations of Europe, migration and migrants in Europe, health and social eldercare migrant workers, migration and fertility in Central and Eastern Europe, and the demographics of increasing longevity.

Dr. Leeson is a leading member of The Complex Environmental Population Interactions Project which unites key demographers, economists, anthropologists, philosophers and environmentalists to address through research, modeling and scenarios, the range of complex interactions between environmental and demographic change over the first half of the 21st century.

Recent professional commitments

Dr. Leeson is co-editor of the Journal of Population Ageing and chair of the editorial board of Ageing Horizons.

Dr. Leeson has been the demographic change expert working on the European Commission's independent evaluation of innovative measures under Article 6 of the ESF Regulation: innovative approaches to the management of change.

Dr. Leeson has worked extensively with user groups, academics and providers across Europe in these areas of research, beginning in 1979-1981 as Specialist Advisor to the Danish Government Commission on Ageing; 1998 - 1999  Advisor to the Danish Government Programme on Older People and Technology; 1998 - 2000  International advisor to British Government initiative Better Government for Older People; 2002-2010 Member of Help the Aged's Social Policy Committee; and 2003 -2008 Member of EU-Network PEFETE on late life learning and full citizenship (including the role of ICT).

Recent publications

• Leeson, G.W. The Importance of Demography, Journal of Population Ageing, Vol. 4, Nos. 1-2. pp. 1-4, 2011.
• Prepared or Not, Latin America faces the Challenge of Aging, Current History, Journal of Contemporary World Affairs, Vol. 110, No. 733, pp. 75-80, 2011.
• Migrant carers – saving or sinking the sustainability of eldercare? Journal of Population Ageing, Vol. 3. Nos. 1-2, pp. 1-6, 2010.
• Income inequality and health: Importance of a cross-country prespective (with Karlsson, M. et al). Social Science & Medicine, Vol. 70 (6), pp. 875-885, 2010.
• Grandfathers in Contemporary Families in Britain: Evidence from Qualitative Research (with Mann,R.), Journal of Intergenerational Relationships, Vol. 8 (3), pp. 234-248, 2010.
• The Myth of Welfarism Crowding Out Family in Old Age: the Danish experience, Hallym International Journal of Aging, Vol. 11 (1), pp. 33-47, 2009.
• Future Ageing in Southeast Asia: demographic trends, human capital and health status (with Lutz W et al), in Older Persons in Southeast Asia (eds. Evi Nurvidya & Aris Ananta), pp. 47-67, Institute of Southeast Asian Studies (ISEAS), Singapore, 2009.
• Demography, politics and policy in Europe, in Setting EU Priorities 2009 (ed. Ludlow, P), pp.102-124, The European Strategy Forum, Ponte de Lima, Portugal, 2009.
• Some descriptive findings from the Global Ageing Survey (GLAS) – Investing in later life, (with Harper S), Research report 108, Oxford Institute of Ageing, University of Oxford, 2008.
• The Demography of Aging in Bangladesh: A Scenario Analysis of the Consequences, Hallym International Journal of Aging, Vol. 8 (1), pp. 1-21, 2008 (with Khan, H.).
• The alcohol behaviour of independent older people in Denmark, International Journal of Health Promotion and Education, Vol. 45 (2), pp. 49-52, 2007.
• The Global Ageing Survey (GLAS) - Ageing and later life, Hong Kong and Asia (with Harper S), Research report 307, Oxford Institute of Ageing, University of Oxford, 2007.
• The Global Ageing Survey (GLAS) - Ageing and later life, the Americas (with Harper S), Research report 207, Oxford Institute of Ageing, University of Oxford, 2007.
• The Global Ageing Survey (GLAS) - Ageing and later life, United Kingdom and Europe (with Harper S), Research report 107, Oxford Institute of Ageing, University of Oxford, 2007.
• Financial Security in Old Age – the Myth of Welfarism? Results from the Danish Longitudinal Future Study, Hallym International Journal of Aging, Vol. 7 (2), pp. 165-176, 2007.
• Attitudes and practices of employers towards ageing workers (with Harper S et al), Ageing Horizons, no. 5, pp. 31-41, 2006.
• The Global Ageing Survey (GLAS) – Attitudes to ageing and later life, (with Harper S), Research report 106, Oxford Institute of Ageing, University of Oxford, 2006.

Current PhD students

• Norainie Ahmad: Investigating the proximate determinants of fertility decline in the context of rentier economies
• Brian Beach: Ageing, Employment and the Welfare State
• Taichang Chen: Intergenerational Transfers and Well-Being in Old Age in Contemporary Urban and Rural China
• Louise Hateley: Barriers to, and triggers of nurses’ retirement savings: A decision-making approach
• Pam Irwin: A conceptual analysis of social resilience
• Jiweon Jun: Modern Retirement Expectations and the Retirement Decision
• Seung-Min Park: Intergenerational Solidarity and Quality of Life of Older People in South Korea
• Atulya Saxena: Globalization, Health and Ageing
• Yiu-Tung Suen: Singlehood: A Life Course Perspective
• Keke Zhao: East or West. Nest is Best. Sense of Belonging and Social Identity of Older Chinese Men in Britain.

Recently Graduated PhD Students

• Jeaah Jung (2011): Balancing the five Pillars of Old Age Material Security: A Case Study of Korea