Published: 12 January 2012
by DAN CARRIER

SIR Roger Jowell, who has died aged 69, was known professionally for his research into voting behaviour and his ability to number crunch statistics.

But his interest in the mechanisms of democracy went further than his academic research – it was fuelled by his South African background and his burning belief in the ideals of true democracy.

Sir Roger moved from his native Cape Town to Camden in 1964.

He had been president of Cape Town University’s student union, putting him at the forefront of the student battle against the racist apartheid regime.

He had planned to visit London for a brief working holiday but after meeting other South African ex-pats who had settled in Camden, he decided to stay.

He told the New Journal in 2008, on the occasion of his knighthood, that his decision was also prompted by hearing of fellow students in South Africa being arrested, harassed and beaten up by the government’s security forces for their anti-apartheid campaigning.

He settled first in Kentish Town and became an alderman on Camden Council in 1970.

He married his first wife Camden councillor Tessa Jowell – who was later to become the Labour minister overseeing the Olympics bid – and also became the chairman of Hampstead Labour Party.

Sir Roger worked to highlight the plight of black South Africans.

He sat on a race relations committee at the Town hall and organised a borough-wide boycott of South African goods and services, long before economic sanctions were the norm.

Tessa Jowell, recalls how when he first moved to Britain it was just before the 1964 election and he asked a friend what they thought the likely outcome would be.

“He was so surprised when they replied that the turnout and the result would depend on the weather,” she said yesterday (Wednesday).

“He had come from a  country where elections were a matter of life and death.

He noticed the change in the political temperature immediately and he was fascinated by it.”

Sir Roger was a massive cricket fan and played for the amateur team The Pretenders: many Sundays were spent at the wicket.

He was also a very keen cook – loving traditional South African food – and he enjoyed entertaining, hosting barbecues and showing off his culinary skills.

A professor of social science, Sir Roger founded City University’s Centre for Comparative Social Surveys and was  director of the National Centre for Social Research, which he started in 1969.

He won the Descartes Prize in 2005 and was the first social scientist to scoop the European Union-sponsored prize for excellence in scientific research.

One of his specialisms was the analysis of voting behaviour. He later moved to Belsize Park, and was awarded a CBE in 2001 for his work in the social sciences.