My research explores social and cultural aspects of:

• sustainability and sustainability transitions
• social value
• socio-technical aspects of innovation and transformation
• impact management and measurement
• social and environmental accounting
• evidence-based policy making and rigour in research
• impact investing and sustainable finance
• philanthropy
• innovative participatory qualitiative research and mixed methods

I primarily use ethnographic and participatory methods. I often collaborate with behavioural scientists including by co-designing experiments with marginalised communities. Theoretically, my work explores ideas about value and valuation, measurement, action and enterprise, and sustainability.

Current Leverhulme-funded research explores impact investing in sustainability and sustainable transitions. It explores investments in new agricultural technologies and changes in impact management and measurement. I also work with impact investors (and foundations) interested in exploring alternative ways of understanding their relationships with 'beneficiaries.'

Emerging from this research, I am leading a mixed methods British Academy-funded project that explores the production of data for evidence-based policy making through attention to the lived experience of enumerators/field officers who make data. This is a collaboration with the University of Nairobi and the Busara Center for Behavioral Economics.

With colleagues in the Kenya, Uganda, and the UK, I am exploring working through 'citizen ethnography' in which research participants with lived experience of the subject shape research design and analysis of findings. 

Recent research (ERC-funded) explored green finance, biodiversity, and voluntary carbon markets.

Earlier research (ESRC-funded) explored technological innovation through a case study of 'philanthrocapitalist' initiatives to transform cattle-keeping and promote a value chain approach to the dairy industry among Nyakyusa agro-pastoralists in Rungwe District in South-West Tanzania, and before that (ultra-)high-net-worth philanthropy in the City of London. 

sustainability; science and technology studies; social studies of finance; global development; climate change; sustainable business; impact investing; sustainable finance; digital technologies; ag tech; ethnography; ethnography; social anthropology

Before returning to academia I worked for a decade as an advisor to sustainability and impact investors as well as philanthropic foundations. My decision to undertake long-term research stemmed from concerns about the quality of evidence of impact I claimed to have as a routine part of my job, and in particular the absence of 'beneficiary' perspectives or voices in it. Alongside theoretical interests grounded in a belief that more fundamental research is required, I continue to work with a small number of investors and philanthropists on the contribution of critical analysis and ethnographic methods and theory to the equitable and effective allocation of impact capital. For example, new work convenes space for conversation between creative young voices and international actors who aim to improve their lives.

I am Co-Director of the MA in Global Social Development and convene the Masters module on Social and Gender Analysis of Global Development. 

I previously convened the 2nd/3rd year module on Sub-Saharan African Development. I have taught Social Analysis for International Development (Masters), Development Policy Management (Year 2), and Global Challenges: Issues and Concepts in Development Studies (Foundation Year).

Prior to my time at UEA I taught Anthropology of Sustainability (Masters) and Future Earth, Climate Change and Societal Challenges (Multi-disciplinary Graduate Course) at the University of Bologna, and Introduction to Business Anthropology (Year 1) and Materiality and Representation (Year 2) at the University of Manchester. I have also guest lectured at Northwestern University's Global Engagement Studies Institute (GESI) and the Australian National University. 

My interdisciplinary background informs my current research. I have a BA in English Language and Literature from the University of Oxford and an MSc in Social and Cultural Anthropology from University College London. I obtained my PhD in the School of Social Sciences at the University of Manchester. I then worked as a Research Fellow at the University of Bologna, where I remain a research associate of the Social and Cultural Anthropology Lab.