Robin Grove-White


Robin Grove-White is an Anglo-Irish Welsh environmentalist, and academic, Emeritus Professor of Environment and Society at Lancaster University. Grove-White Chairs the board of the Institute for Study of Welsh Estates at Bangor University. He is also involved in local organisations such as Menter Mechell, Cymdeithas Hanes Mechell and is vice chair of the Anglesey Antiquarian Society. In 2018 he was awarded an honorary fellowship for Services to the Community at Bangor University

Personal life

Grove-White was born in Dublin and raised on Anglesey, Wales, the son of William Grove-White, descended from the Bulkeley family of landowners and residing at Brynddu near Llanfechell. He attended Worcester College, Oxford.
Robin Grove-White is married to the artist Helen Grove-White and they have three children; Ruth, Simon and Francis. Robin Grove-White has another child, Will Grove-White, a member of George Hinchcliffe's Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain, from his first marriage to the writer Virginia Ironside

Career

From 1963-1968 he became a freelance scriptwriter, for the television series TW3, a satirical programme hosted by David Frost and featuring Ned Sherrin, Willie Rushton and Lance Percival. Other work was in TV, radio, cabaret, film, and advertising in UK, US and Canada, 'The Frost programme', 'Marty', 'This Hour Has Seven Days', 'Second City', and McCann-Erickson.
In his late 20s he returned to complete his degree at the University of Oxford in politics, economics and philosophy. This led him into rural protection and environmental campaigning with the Campaign for the Protection of Rural England. He was Chair of the Board of Greenpeace UK until 2004.
After a short spell at Imperial College he moved to Lancaster University in 1989 as a research fellow, eventually becoming Professor of Environment and Society. He established the Centre for the Study of Environmental Change in 1991, to focus on problems of contemporary environmental knowledge and policy development. The centre now resides in the Sociology Department but it was highly active in environmental research, achieving a 5* research rating in the 1990s, with funding from the Economic and Social Research Council, the Health and Safety Executive, and the European Environment Agency. Other important members and collaborators included Prof. Brian Wynne, Prof. Elizabeth Shove, Simon Shackley, Bron Szerszynski, Prof. Claire Waterton and Prof. Phil Macnaghten. He was a member of the Government's Agriculture and Environment Biotechnology Commission.
Grove-White retired in 2006 and moved back to the family farm in Llanfechell, Anglesey, initiating several environmental improvements. He completed a PhD in History at Bangor University in 2011 and served as High Sheriff of Anglesey and Gwynedd in 2011–12. In Llanfechell he helped initiate the community hub venture, Caffi Siop Mechell.

Contributions

Grove-White's career is dedicated to the challenge of a viable future in the face of environmental and technological change. As an academic he strove to develop social science-based approaches to 'environmental' research, using 'sociology of knowledge' frameworks linking university centres with wider society. His main contributions there were to the public understanding of science, attitudes towards genetic engineering, local economic development, and spirituality and nature. He continues to agitate.

Publications