Ruth Fincher is Distinguished Professor Emeritus at the University of Melbourne, Australia, and a Professorial Fellow in the School of Geography there.
An urban geographer and a social scientist, she has had a long academic career at universities in Australia and North America, and has received major awards nationally and internationally for her scholarship and her academic and institutional leadership. Her particular research interests are in inequality and social difference within cities, especially where associated with immigration, and in urban planning as a form of public policy that can reduce inequality. She has also collaborated in research on adaptation to climate change. A past member of the Executive Committees of the International Geographical Union and the International Social Science Council, Fincher has considerable experience of cross-disciplinary, and cross-regional, decision-making in the international committees of science.