Professor of Sociology at the Pompeu Fabra University of Barcelona and also ICREA-Academia professor. Before coming to Barcelona he taught in the Universities of Harvard and Trento and at the European University in Italy.

His research work is concerned with social stratification, life-course dynamics, and comparison of different kinds of social policy and models of the welfare state. He has published numerous books, notable amongst which are Los tres mundos del estado del bienestar (Alfons el Magnànim, 1993 – published in English as The Three Worlds of Welfare Capitalism, Princeton University Press, 1990), The Social Foundations of Postindustrial Economies (Oxford University Press, 1999) and, more recently, Trois leçons sur L’État-providence (Le Seuil, 2008), and The Incomplete Revolution. Adapting Welfare States to Women’s New Roles (Polity Press, 2009). He is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, honorary professor at the University of Aarlborg and Doctor Honoris Causa at the Roskild University, Denmark.