Shaun Wilson is a Professor of Sociology at Macquarie where he is also Chair of the Sociology Discipline.

Shaun's primary research investigates the distributional and ideological conflicts that are reshaping the politics of liberal welfare states.

His recent book Living Wages and the Welfare State with Policy/University of Bristol Press was published in 2021 here. The book takes a sociological perspective on minimum wages and living wage campaigns and shows how they challenge the architecture of the low-wage policy consensus in the liberal welfare states.  Reviews of this book are here and here. Shaun is presently researching for a book on the global living wages movement under contract with the Contentious Politics series of Cambridge Univ Press.

Shaun has worked with Prof Alan Morris of UTS, Prof Gaby Ramia of Sydney University, Dr Emma Mitchell of WSU (now Macquarie) and Dr Catherine Hastings (Macquarie) on a ARC Discovery Project on housing and work precarity of international students. Recent studies covers the impact of the COVID-19 recession on students; see, for example, here, here, and here. Shaun has also worked with Luke Ashton on new, more detailed profiles of housing and work precarity among international students.

Shaun is now working on a new ARC Discovery grant with Raj Velayuthum, Amanda Wise, Nick Harrigan, and Norbert Ebert on precarious work in Australia, particularly among delivery drivers on work visas. See here.

Shaun's other active research interests include: Australia's welfare-to-work policies, union voting patterns, and the political sociological foundations of the Australian electorate.

Shaun is the current chair of the Advisory Committee for the Australian Survey of Social Attitudes and edits a series called Australian Social Attitudes with the Sydney University Press and a Chief Investigator of the Australian Co-operative Election Study for the 2025 federal elections led by Dr Shaun Ratcliff (here) and Prof Juliet Pietsch. Data from AECS 2022 led to a comprehensive survey of attitudes towards religion with A/Prof Kate Gleeson, Dr Robert Ross, and Luke Ashton (here).

Finally, he is also collaborating with Dr Nick Turnbull and Prof Steve Jones, both of Manchester University, on topics related to populism and higher education policy.

Shaun is privileged to have supervised or co-supervised talented PhD and Masters students -- Dr Catherine Hastings of Macquarie University, Dr Vikas Arya of Melbourne University, Dr Charlotte Overgaard of Aalborg University, Denmark, Dr Sobhi Albadawi, Aprill Miles, Dr Jodie Skellern, and Madelaine Bergland. Shaun is presently on the PhD supervisory panels for Luke Ashton and Dylan Sullivan.  

Shaun's Google Scholar page is here.

Shaun currently teaches two undergraduate units -- An Introduction to Social Policy and Social Inequality (SOCI 2030 and 3070) -- and co-teaches a graduate unit on public policy, Policy Ideas in Focus (SOCI 8075).