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Dr Michelle Norris

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Dr Michelle Norris
BSocSc, MSocSc, PhD

Michelle Norris joined the staff of the School of Applied Social Science in 2005. Prior to that she was Director of the Housing Unit – an agency funded by the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government and the City and County Managers’ Association which works to promote good practice in the management of social housing, enables the continuing professional development of practitioners in this field, conducts research on housing and housing policy analysis. In addition she was a lecturer at the Department of Applied Social Studies, University College Cork and a community development officer in the housing department of Cork City Council.

Her teaching interests include the development and implementation process, particularly in the local government sector. She also teaches social policy research methods and courses on spatial dimensions of poverty and spatially based anti-poverty initiatives in the Republic of Ireland and Irish Travellers.

Her research interests also centre on the board area of housing and urban studies. In relation to the Republic of Ireland she is currently involved in research on the following areas:
  • the spatial distribution of and identifying solutions to poverty and urban decline

  • the extent of and solutions to the problem of lack of affordability in the owner occupied housing sector

  • rent supplement (Ireland’s housing benefit system for the private rented sector)

  • the implementation of Part V of the Planning and Development Act, (2000) and the impact of the spatial planning system on minorities, particularly Travellers


In 2003 she was commissioned by the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government to carry out a study on housing developments in European Union member States, to mark Ireland’s EU presidency. On the basis of this study she is currently working on an analysis of structural drivers of housing inequalities in the EU for the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions.