Prof. Christoph Maeder, Ph.D. is a sociologist at the Thurgau University of Teacher Education (TG UTE, Switzerland) and teaches also regularly at the Universities of Basel and St Gallen. He was President of the Swiss Sociological Association (SSS) from 2006 to 2009. He was also Vice President of the Research Network 20 on “Qualitative Methods” of the European Sociological Associations (ESA) and remains a member of that board. Born in 1956, he studied at the University of St Gallen where he received his doctorate in Sociology. He was Chief Researcher and Head of the Research Department at the University of Applied Sciences in St Gallen (1996-2004) before he was appointed to a Professorship at the TG UTE where he became research director in 2007. Prof. Maeder is also the author of the most widely used nursing workload measurement system in Switzerland and did extensive fieldwork in prisons, welfare agencies, unemployment programs and schools. Currently he is doing ethnographic research in schools on integration / exclusion and on the impact of educational reforms on the professional role of the teachers. His fields of interests are: Sociology of knowledge & qualitative methods, educational sociology, applied research on organizations, and social problems.