German sociologist
Heinz-Herbert Noll (born 1 January 1949) is a German sociologist.
Education.
Noll studied sociology, economics, social policy and statistics at the Goethe University Frankfurt. After the diploma in sociology he wrote a dissertation at the chair of Wolfgang Zapf at the University of Mannheim and received his philosophers degree (Dr. phil.) in 1981 with a thesis on "Occupational Chances and Working Conditions: A Social Report for the Federal Republic of Germany 1950–1980“ („Beschäftigungschancen und Arbeitsbedingungen: Ein Sozialbericht für die Bundesrepublik 1950–1980“) (1982).
Profession.
Research.
From 1981 to 1987 Noll was scientific member of the SPES-project and the Special Research Group 3 „Microanalytic Foundations of Societal Policies“ (Sonderforschungsbereich 3 „Mikroanalytische Grundlagen der Gesellschaftspolitik“) (Sfb3); afterwards he became project director and director of a research area of the Sfb 3. During this time he specialized in the field of labour market sociology and wrote a dissertation within this realm.
In 1987 he became head of the newly created „Department for Social Indicators“ („Abteilung Soziale Indikatoren“) of ZUMA (today GESIS – Leibniz Institute for the Social Sciences). The main task of this research group consists in the permanent institutionalization of welfare research and of social reporting for Germany as a scientific basic service. Over several years, diverse activities developed from this general purpose. These consist in:
Teaching.
Noll taught at the Universities of Mannheim and Heidelberg, the University of Tartu, the Université Fribourg, the Università degli Studi di Firenze and the École Nationale de la Statistique et de l'Administration Économique in Paris. In addition he was offered guest professorships from several foreign research institutes and universities.
Honorary offices.
Noll was called into several scientific and policy advisory bodies, for example as a speaker of the "Section of Social Indicators" ("Sektion Soziale Indikatoren") of the German Sociological Association (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Soziologie, DGS) or president of the ISA-Research Committee 55 "Social Indicators". Finally until 2012 he was president of the International Society for Quality of Life Studies (ISQLS).
Noll furthermore held positions as a councillor in various research projects and was member of the Editorial boards of journals like Social Indicators Research, Current Sociology and Applied Research in Quality of Life
Scientific importance.
Nollʼs sociological significance consists in institutionalizing the earlier work done by his teacher Wolfgang Zapf and his colleagues in SPES and Sfb 3: by doing this, Noll, in international comparison, saved Germany a prominent ranking place in the scale of social reporting intensity. This way, Germany became one of the leading actors in this field of applied sociology. In addition, Noll contributed to disseminate knowledge of social indicators on the European level, by this way encouraging attempts by Eurostat and the European Commission to make social reporeting a permanent task at the level of European Union authorities.
References.
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