Mr Aled Williams
Key information
- Qualifications
- BA English Literature and the History of Ideas (Wales) MA International Relations (Cantuar)
- Email address
- 602820@soas.ac.uk
- Thesis title
- Shaping Room for Manoeuvre: Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation as a Forest Policy Choice in Indonesia (working title)
- Internal Supervisors
- Professor Peter P Mollinga
Biography
Political scientist focusing on aid, corruption, governance, and natural resources, particularly political economy and political ecology approaches to the forestry sector and extractive industries.
My work focuses on the uneven politics of natural resource-driven development, with a particular interest in issues of corruption, access, legitimation and control in the forest and extractive sectors. I have a country focus on Indonesia and experience from assignments in Albania, Cambodia, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Macedonia, Mozambique, Nepal, Pakistan, the Philippines, South Africa, Vietnam, and Zambia.
I am co-editor of the books "Corruption, Grabbing and Development: Real World Challenges" (with Prof. Tina Søreide, Edward Elgar Publishing, 2014) and "Corruption, Natural Resources and Development: From Resource Curse to Political Ecology" (with Prof. Philippe Le Billon, Edward Elgar Publishing, 2017).
I was previously Senior Research Coordinator at the global anti-graft NGO Transparency International based in Berlin.
I hold a BA in the History of Ideas and English Literature from the University of Wales, Cardiff, and an MA in International Relations from the University of Kent. My SOAS PhD thesis provides a political ecology perspective on REDD+ as it is evolving in Indonesia, with fieldwork in Jakarta and Central Sulawesi.
I am a member of the SOAS Political Ecology of Environment and Development (SEED) network and the POLLEN Political Ecology Network.