The 1999 Reith lecturer is Professor Anthony Giddens, director of the London School of Economics.
His writings have been used by world leaders - including Tony Blair and Bill Clinton - to develop ideas on what has become known as The Third Way in politics. He has helped to lead brain-storming seminars on the subject in both Downing Street and the White House.
Anthony Giddens was born in London in 1938 and educated at Minchenden School, Southgate. He studied sociology and psychology at the University of Hull, and gained post-graduate degrees from the LSE and the University of Cambridge.
He was Professor of Sociology at the University of Cambridge from 1986-96 and took up his current post as Director of the London School of Economics in 1997.
He is a passionate supporter of Tottenham Hotspur (his MA thesis at the LSE was on Sport and Society in Contemporary England). He has been described as "Britain's best-known social scientist since Keynes". As Director of the LSE, he still delivers regular lectures for students. One commentator wrote recently: "With his cordless mic and no notes, he is a star turn as he paces up and down explaining complex ideas with fluency and wit".
Among Anthony Giddens's published works are:
- Social Theory and Modern Sociology, Cambridge: Polity Press, 1987; Palo Alto: Stanford University Press.
- The Consequences of Modernity, Cambridge: Polity Press, 1990; Palo Alto: Stanford University Press.
- The Transformation of Intimacy, Cambridge: Polity Press, 1992; Palo Alto: Stanford University Press.
- Beyond Left and Right, Cambridge: Polity Press, 1994; Palo Alto: Stanford University Press.
- Making Sense of Modernity. Conversations with Anthony Giddens, Polity Press, 1988.
- The Third Way: The Renewal of Social Democracy, Polity Press, 1998.