Andrew Nickson is Honorary Reader in Public Management at the University of Birmingham, England. He has worldwide experience of teaching, research and consultancy on public administration reform, decentralization, and the reform of the urban water supply sector. He has been advisor to British Council, UK Aid (ex-DFID), European Union, Inter-American Development Bank, OECD, UNDP, Commonweath Secretariat, and World Bank. His long-term country experiences have been in Nepal, Paraguay, Peru and Sierra Leone. From 1992-98 he directed a European Union regional training program for senior public administrators in Latin America and from 1999-2000 he directed a European Union Project for State Reform in Paraguay. He has carried out short-term assignments in forty other countries in Latin America, Sub-Saharan Africa and Asia. He has published six books and over fifty chapters and articles in academic journals. He is a regular writer for the Economist Intelligence Unit, Oxford Analytica and Jane’s Information Group. His most recent research has focussed on decentralisation and poverty reduction, private sector participation in urban water supply, and the relationship between language, governance and citizen participation. His most recent assignments have been: teaching a course on decentralisation in post-conflict situation at the United Nations System Staff College in Turin, Italy (December 2011); leading a Commonwealth Secretariat workshop on the role of youth in local development for the Ministry of Local Government & Ministry of Youth and Sports, The Gambia (February 2012); and designing a strategy for UNDP Peru to strengthen its work at the regional and local government level (March 2012).

r.a.nickson@bham.ac.uk

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