Ray Forrest is Research Professor in Cities and Social Change and Director of the Centre for Public Policy Research. Before joining Lingnan he was Chair Professor of Housing and Urban Studies and Head of the Department of Public Policy at City University of Hong Kong. Previously, he has worked at the University of Birmingham (UK) and the University of Bristol. At Bristol he was appointed as Chair Professor in Urban Studies in 1994 and was Head of the School for Policy Studies (2001-2004), Associate Director/Director of the Centre for East Asian Studies (2004-2008) and co-director of the ESRC Centre for Neighbourhood Research (2001-2005). He has also held visiting appointments at the Universities of Hong Kong, Glasgow and Amsterdam. Ray is Emeritus Professor of Urban Studies at Bristol and a Fellow of the UK Academy of Social Sciences. His research focuses on the sociology and political economy of the contemporary city with a particular focus on housing markets and housing policy. He has been PI on some 50 externally funded research projects.

Urban political economy, Socio-spatial change in the contemporary city, Housing markets and the macro economy, Housing policy and social inequality, The family and social change