Sara Miller McCune is a visionary publisher, philanthropist, and entrepreneur. She oversaw the growth of Sage from a start-up to one of the largest independent publishing companies in the world. For over 50 years, she has led the publishing industry in business, through her tireless support for social science research and through her passion for philanthropy.

McCune founded Sage in 1965, aged 24, and oversaw its phenomenal growth, founding major publishing offices in UK (1971), India (1981) and Singapore (2006). Guided by an entrepreneurial spirit and an unwavering dedication to academia, McCune has made it her life’s work to challenge and break down borders within publishing and society. She has been at the forefront of numerous publishing innovations from championing of urban studies, media studies, black studies, and family violence (to name only a few examples). She also supported new research methods such as evaluation research and new statistical techniques. Today, McCune remains actively involved in the company’s expansion and development, and still serves as the executive chairman.

The LBF Lifetime Achievement Award in International Publishing will be presented at the International Excellence Awards, an invitation-only event on 10 April 2018 in London. McCune will also speak at The London Book Fair’s Research and Scholarly Publishing Forum on 11 April.

McCune said, “I am honoured to be receiving this award and grateful to The London Book Fair for recognising the critical work that an independent academic publisher can achieve when its commitment to a noble mission is unwavering. I am a passionate supporter of what I call the four justices – economic, educational, environmental, and social – on an international scale, and I view the work of Sage Publishing as pivotal to their advancement as we build bridges from ideas to usable knowledge.”

Jacks Thomas, director, The London Book Fair, said, “Sara Miller McCune is a pioneer and an inspiration to those of us – perhaps especially women – in publishing. Her leadership and vision has helped Sage grow, evolve and prosper over five decades, which is a monumental achievement. She has been at the forefront of so many changes in the sector; she is surely one of the greatest and most enduring publishing visionaries and we are delighted to recognise her at The London Book Fair.”

The London Book Fair’s Advisory Board voted for Sara Miller McCune from a shortlist of international publishing figures.

McCune is a dedicated philanthropist and co-founder and president of the McCune Foundation. The foundation supports productive change through building social capital in two counties on California’s Central Coast. In 2007, Ms. McCune founded the Miller-McCune Center for Research, Media and Public Policy, which launched the award-winning magazine Pacific Standard. In 2017, the magazine and the centre’s mission were transferred to the newly launched Social Justice Foundation, a non-profit organisation with a mission of informing and educating the public with content based on scientific research and supported by Sage Publishing.

The Lifetime Achievement Award recognises an individual who has made a truly significant mark in the sphere of global publishing. It is open to publishers, agents, editors, scouts and anyone else involved in international publishing from any country in the world. Last year, the award was presented to Luiz Schwartz, Companhia das Letras.

Previous recipients include Deborah Rogers of Rogers, Coleridge & White; Sonny Mehta of Alfred A Knopf; Lord Weidenfeld, Weidenfeld and Nicolson; Christopher MacLehose, now of MacLehose Press; John Lyon of Little, Brown (posthumously); Lynette Owen of Pearson Education; Peter Mayer of The Overlook Press/ Duckworth Publishers; Drenka Willen, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt; Antoine Gallimard, Éditions Gallimard; Jorge Herralde of Editorial Anagrama and Michael Krüger of Hanser Verlag and Baroness Gail Rebuck, Penguin Random House. (Courtesy The London Book Fair)