About me

"Thanks to the diverse group of passionate methodologists in the department, my work has developed in recent years to consider more centrally the links between the methods I use and the substantive insights they generate. I am particularly proud of the participatory research practices I am now developing."
- Dr Kate Summers reflects on an area of her research that makes her proud as part of our 30th Anniversary celebrations. Read the full close-up with Methodology faculty.

Kate is a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow at the Department of Methodology. Her research centres on developing qualitative methods to study social security policy in a (post) pandemic context.

Kate was an LSE Fellow in the Methodology Department from 2018-2021. She completed her PhD in the Department of Social Policy at the LSE in 2018, holds an MSc in Social Policy (Research) also from the LSE and a BA in Modern History from the University of Oxford.

Kate’s research is concerned with experiences and perceptions of poverty, economic inequality, and related social policies with a particular focus on social security policy, in the UK context. She uses (and is interested in the potential and power of) qualitative methods including in-depth interviews, focus groups and participatory approaches.

Other key research projects include Welfare at a (Social) Distance and The Commission on Social Security: Led by experts by experience.

From September 2024-September 2025 Kate is on academic secondment to the In-House Research Unit at the UK Government's Department for Work and Pensions.

Expertise Details

Qualitative interviews; Focus groups; Participatory approaches; Research with 'vulnerable' groups; Thematic analysis; Poverty; riches and economic inequality in the UK; Working-age social security policy; Welfare reform; Sociology of money

2023, 'Welfare Attitudes in a Crisis: How COVID exceptionalism undermined greater solidarity' (with Robert de Vries, Ben Baumberg Geiger, Lisa Scullion, Daniel Edmiston, Jo Ingold, David Robertshaw and David Young), Journal of Social Policy (link)

2023, 'Building on Broad Support for Better Social Security' (with Daniel Edmiston, Ben Baumberg Geiger, Robert de Vries, Lisa Scullion, David Young and Jo Ingold), IPPR Progressive Review (link)

2022, ‘Why Isn’t There More Support for Progressive Taxation of Wealth? A Sociological Contribution to the Wider Debate’ (with Mike Savage and Katharina Hecht), LSE Public Policy Review (link)

2022, 'Interviews in the social sciences' (with Eleanor Knott, Aliya Hamid Rao and Chana Teeger), Nature Reviews Methods Primers (link)

2022, 'Deliberating Inequality: A Blueprint for Studying the Social Formation of Beliefs about Economic Inequality' (with Fabien Accominotti, Tania Burchardt, Katharina Hecht, Elizabeth Mann and Jonathan Mijs), Social Justice Research (link)

2022, ‘Mediating the claim? How ‘local ecosystems of support’ shape the operation and experience of UK social security’ (with Daniel Edmiston, David Robertshaw, David Young, Jo Ingold ,Andrea Gibbons, Lisa Scullion, Ben Baumberg Geiger and Robert de Vries), Social Policy and Administration (link)

2021, ‘Guiding principles for social security policy: outcomes from a bottom-up approach’ (with Michael Orton and Rosa Morris), Social Policy and Administration (link)

2021, ‘The Long and Short of It: The temporal significance of wealth and income’ (with Katharina Hecht), Social Policy and Administration (link)

2020, ‘For the Greater Good? Ethical reflections on interviewing the ‘rich’ and ‘poor’ in qualitative research’, International Journal of Social Research Methodology (link)

2020, ‘Universal Simplicity? The alleged simplicity of Universal Credit from administrative and claimant perspectives’ (with David Young), The Journal of Poverty and Social Justice (link)

2024, ‘Temporality and the social meaning of social security money: insights from qualitative longitudinal studies’ (with David Young), in Researching Resources within the Household, Edward Elgar – edited by Fran Bennett, Silvia Avram and Siobhan Austen. (link)

2022, 'Welfare at a (Social) Distance: Accessing social security and employment support during the Covid-19 and its aftermath' (with David Robertshaw, Lisa Scullion, Daniel Edmiston, Ben Baumberg Geiger, Andrea Gibbons, Jo Ingold, Robert De Vries, and David Young) in Garthwaite et al. (eds.) Covid-19 Collaborations: Researching Poverty and Low-Income Family Life During the Pandemic Bristol: Policy Press. (link)

2022, 'The Commission on Social Security and participatory research during the pandemic: new context, abiding challenges' (with Michael Orton and Rosa Morris) in Garthwaite et al. (eds.) Covid-19 Collaborations: Researching Poverty and Low-Income Family Life During the Pandemic Bristol: Policy Press. (link)

2019, ‘Poverty development in affluent welfare states’, in, B. Greve (ed.), Routledge International Handbook of Poverty. (link)

The rise and fall of anti-welfare attitudes across four decades: politics, pensioners and poverty, (with Ben Baumberg Geiger, Robert de Vries and Tom O’Grady). (2023). British Social Attitudes 40.

Hunger and the welfare state: Food insecurity among benefit claimants during COVID-19, Geiger, Edmiston, Scullion, Summers, de Vries, Ingold, Robertshaw and Young (2021). Welfare at a (Social) Distance Project Report.

Solidarity in a crisis? Trends in attitudes to benefits during COVID-19, de Vries, Geiger, Scullion, Summers, Edmiston, Ingold, Robertshaw and Young (2021). Welfare at a (Social) Distance Project Report.

Should social security reach further? Ineligibility for benefits at the start of COVID-19, Geiger, Scullion, Summers, Martin, Lawler, Edmiston, Gibbons, Ingold, Robertshaw, and de Vries (2021). Welfare at a (Social) Distance Project Report.

Non-take-up of benefits at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, Geiger, Scullion, Summers, Martin, Lawler, Edmiston, Gibbons, Ingold, Robertshaw, and de Vries (2021). Welfare at a (Social) Distance Project Report.

Navigating Pandemic Social Security: Benefits, Employment and Crisis Support during COVID-19, Edmiston, Robertshaw, Gibbons, Ingold, Geiger, Scullion, Summers, and Young (2021). Welfare at a (Social) Distance Project Report.

Claimants' experiences of the social security system during the first wave of COVID-19, Summers, Scullion, Geiger, Robertshaw, Edmiston, Gibbons, Karagiannaki, De Vries and Ingold (2021). Welfare at a (Social) Distance Project Report. It was covered in the Guardian.

At the edge of the safety net: Unsuccessful benefits claims at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, Geiger, Scullion, Summers, Martin, Lawler, Edmiston, Gibbons, Ingold, Karagiannaki, Robertshaw, and de Vries, R (2020). Welfare at a (Social) Distance Rapid Report #3. It was covered in the Guardian and the Big Issue.

Who are the new COVID-19 cohort of benefit claimants?, Edmiston, Geiger, De Vries, Scullion, Summers, Ingold, Robertshaw, Gibbons, and Karagiannaki (2020). Welfare at a (Social) Distance Rapid Report #2.

Claiming But Connected to Work. Geiger, Karagiannaki, Edmiston, Scullion, Summers, Ingold, Robertshaw, and Gibbons (2020). Welfare at a (Social) Distance Rapid Report #1.

Living on Different Incomes in London: Can public consensus identify a ‘riches line’?, Davis, Hecht, Burchardt, Gough, Hirsch, Rowlingson and Summers (2020). Trust for London.