For he’s a jolly good Fellow

Strategic management expert from the University of St Andrews elected Fellow of the prestigious Academy of Social Sciences.

Brad MacKay, Vice-Principal (International Strategy and External Relations), Senior Vice-Principal and Professor of Strategy at the University of St Andrews is among 37 leading social scientists to be conferred the title of Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences.

The Academy’s Fellowship is made up of distinguished individuals from academic, public and private sectors, across the full breadth of the social sciences. The Award is conferred on leading academics and practitioners who are nominated and recognised by their peers to have made a distinguished contribution to the social sciences. Through leadership, scholarship, applied research, policy making and practice, they have helped to deepen the understanding of, and address, some of the toughest challenges facing our society and the world.

In his current role as St Andrews’ Senior Vice-Principal, Professor MacKay has oversight and development of the University’s international strategy in the post-Brexit era, this includes the development and management of practices and policies related to strategic national and international relationships. Professor MacKay’s research and teaching interests include strategy development, execution and implementation, contingency planning, scenario planning and the political economy of strategy-making. His research is interdisciplinary in nature, importing sensibilities from economics, history, philosophy, psychology and sociology for the purpose of better understanding the mechanisms underpinning the strategic management of organisations.

Professor MacKay was appointed by the ESRC (Economic Social Research Council) as a Senior Fellow for Scotland Analysis, to investigate the impact of the independence debate in Scotland and the United Kingdom on business decision-making. He has published in a range of respected scholarly journals including the Academy of Management Journal, Organization Studies, Human Relations and the European Management Review. He is also co-editor of the Edward Elgar Handbook of Research on Strategy and Foresight (2009) and a co-founder of the Strategic Foresight Special Interest Group (SIG) of the British Academy of Management.

The Academy comprises more than 1400 Fellows, 46 Member Learned Societies and a number of affiliates. Collectively, this extensive community of over 90,000 social scientists has helped establish the UK’s position as a global leader in the social sciences.

Professor Roger Goodman, President of the Academy of Social Sciences, said: “We are delighted to welcome 37 talented Fellows to the Academy this Spring. Our new Fellows have been selected for the excellence of their research, impact and thought leadership, and the practical application of social science to real world problems. I congratulate them all and look forward to collaborating with them in promoting high quality social science in the UK and across the world.”