Runciman joined the faculty of Trinity College, Cambridge, in the 1950s as a historical sociologist and became a junior research fellow after submitting a thesis entitled Plato's Later Epistemology. In the 1960s he became primarily a sociologist.[1] He became a senior research fellow in 1971, researching in the field of comparative and historical sociology.[1][3] Runciman's principal research interest was the application of neo-Darwinian evolutionary theory to cultural and social selection.[3]
Runciman was invited by the Governor of the Bank of England to serve on the Securities and Investment Board (later to become the Financial Services Authority), from which he retired in 1998.[5]
Runciman chaired the British Government's Royal Commission on Criminal Justice, established in 1991 and which continued Sir John May's inquiry into the convictions of the Maguire Seven and encompassed further miscarriages of justice. It reported to parliament in 1993. As a result, the Criminal Appeal Act 1995 established the Criminal Cases Review Commission as an executive Non-Departmental Public Body.[6][1]
Runciman's first major publication was Relative Deprivation and Social Justice: a Study of Attitudes to Social Inequality in Twentieth-Century Britain.[8] Since then, he has published A Critique of Max Weber's Philosophy of Social Science,[9]A Treatise on Social Theory,[10] and The Social Animal.[11][1] In 2004, he edited and contributed to a British Academy occasional paper Hutton and Butler: Lifting the Lid on the Workings of Power, which deals with the events surrounding Britain's participation in the invasion of Iraq and the way in which it was presented to the British public.[1]
Runciman died on 10 December 2020.[1] His heir, the 4th Viscount, is a political scientist and writer who teaches at Cambridge University as a Professor of Politics.[1][14]
Arms
Coat of arms of Garry Runciman, 3rd Viscount Runciman of Doxford[15]
Crest
A seahorse erect gules, holding in the fore fins a thistle as in the arms.
Escutcheon
Per fess or and azure a lymphad oars in action, the sail charged with a thistle leaved and slipped proper, flags flying to the dexter gules.
Supporters
On either side a seahorse or gorged with a chain pendent therefrom a grappling iron azure.
