Richard Mark Bateman (born 27 May 1958) is a British botanist and paleobotanist.
He was awarded a DSc from University of London in 2001 for his work on plant phylogenetics and evolution, palaeobotany and palaeoenvironments.
From 1991-1994 he was a Senior Postdoctoral Research Fellow at University of Oxford.
He is currently an Honorary Research Fellow at Royal Botanic Gardens Kew.
He has over 300 publications which extend from evolutionary-developmental genetics and evolutionary theory through speciation and phylogenetics of orchids to anatomical palaeobotany.