William B. Lacy, director of Cornell Cooperative Extension, has been elected president of the Rural Sociological Society (RSS) for the 1998-99 academic year, the sixth time a Cornell professor has held the post.

While Lacy holds rank as a Cornell professor of rural sociology, he also serves as an associate dean in the colleges of Agriculture and Life Sciences and of Human Ecology. He follows several Cornell rural sociology colleagues who have served as president of the RSS since 1938: Dwight Sanderson (1938-39), W.A. Anderson (1946-47), Robert Polson (1950-51), Olaf Larson (1956-58) and Harold Capener (1974-75).

Lacy received his bachelor's degree from Cornell in 1964 (industrial and labor relations); a master's degree from Colgate University in 1965 (higher education administration); and a master's degree in 1971 and a doctoral degree in 1975, both in sociology/social psychology, from the University of Michigan.

Lacy's research interest in the sociology of science eventually led to his studies of the relationship between the generation of scientific knowledge and its dissemination and application. His research also has included extensive studies of agricultural research and extension systems in developing countries.

Prior to returning to Cornell in 1994, Lacy focused his attention on the growing importance of biotechnology in agricultural research and the sociological issues surrounding efforts to preserve biodiversity and genetic resources.

He has co-authored or co-edited several books, including: Science, Agriculture and the Politics of Research (1983), Food Security in the United States (1984), The Agricultural Scientific Enterprise: a System in Transition (1986), Biotechnology and Agricultural Cooperatives(1988), Plants, Power and Profit: Social, Economic and Ethical Consequences of the New Biotechnologies (1991), andBiodiversity/Cultural Diversity: the Plant Germplasm Controversy in Cultural Context (1994).

The RSS is the major professional society for rural sociologists in the United States and Canada with over 1,000 members. RSS currently is broadening its membership to include Mexico and considering expanding its role substantially beyond the traditional land-grant academic community to include practitioners of rural development and others. The society currently publishes two journals (Rural Sociology, which is edited by Thomas Lyson, Cornell professor of rural sociology, and The Rural Sociologist), as well as a book series with Penn State University Press.