Foundation College

Dr Mark McQuinn

Key information

Roles
Department of Development Studies Senior Teaching Fellow Foundation College EAP Teacher
Department
Foundation College
Qualifications
BA (Anglia Ruskin); MSC Applied Linguistics (Edinburgh), MA Development Studies (Hull), PhD Development (London).
Email address
mm22@soas.ac.uk
Thesis title
Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers and national ownership of policy in developing countries: new opportunities for Civil Society Organisations? NGOs and trade unions in Tanzania
Support hours
Mondays 14.00-16.00 or by appointment

Biography

Dr McQuinn has worked on a number of masters and undergraduate programmes including the Aid and Development unit on the MSc in Development Studies and Development in Practice. He worked in the NGO sector for a number of years and has extensive experience of aid issues, as a practitioner, consultant and academic researcher. Dr McQuinn is currently undertaking research for a book: African Labour Organisations in the Neoliberal Era, which focuses on issues including the environment, youth, gender, foreign direct investment (FDI) and civil society-state relations. Dr McQuinn is the Convenor of a Special Edition of the Global Labour Journal on issues facing African trade unions, which will be published in January 2022. He is also working on a project aiming to build capacity for African trade unions through the development of shared database on labour issues. A further area of research is Official Development Assistance (ODA) provided by Southern donors. As part of a collaboration with the Institute of Public Policy (IPP) at South China University, Zhejiang Normal University and the National University of Singapore (NUS), Dr McQuinn has researched and published work comparing and contrasting Chinese aid policies and practices with those of Western agencies. Other areas of research interest include the role of NGOs, poverty reduction policies, education debates and issues affecting informal sector workers. His doctoral research on trade unions and NGOs in Tanzania was published as a book - Civil Society as a Conflictual Sphere in Post-liberalization Tanzania. Dr McQuinn’s regional focus includes East and West Africa, Southeast Asia and Eastern Europe, with research experience in Tanzania, China, Ghana, Sierra Leone, Sudan, Thailand and Bulgaria.

Research interests

Aid policies and practices, labour issues, governance processes, workers in the informal sector in Africa, role of foreign and indigenous civil society organisations and methods used to monitor and evaluate development programmes. Research on trade unions and NGOs in Tanzania, published as Civil Society as a Conflictual Sphere in Post-liberalization Tanzania. 

Currently researching financial investments by trade unions in Sierra Leone and ways of organizing workers in the informal sector in Ghana and Benin. Worked in the NGO sector and in the Sudan and Bulgaria.

Publications

Contact Mark