Mr Khyber Alam
PhD Candidate, School of Medicine, Deakin University
Mr Khyber Alam is a qualified optometrist with experience as an educator, researcher, clinician, founder and humanitarian project manager. His research interests include neurodegenerative retinal diseases, public health, vision impairment and the evaluation of eye care services. He holds a Bachelor of Vision Science and Master of Optometry and is in the final stages of his PhD. Mr Alam is extremely passionate about serving the global community through economic development, education, sustainable healthcare, social justice international relations and effective and sustainable governance systems.
Mr Alam has volunteered for numerous eye clinics both in Australia and overseas, and also runs an orphanage in Khost, Afghanistan, that provides access to quality education and healthcare, and teaches life and leadership skills.
Available for: consultancies and industry partnerships
Alfred Deakin Professor Matthew Clarke
Pro-Vice Chancellor Researcher Development, Deakin University
Prof Matthew Clarke has previously held formal roles with the Centre for Humanitarian Leadership, including as Chair and Deputy Chair, and separately as Head of Centre and Interim Centre Director. In 2010, he co-edited a volume on the Reconstruction of Aceh following the Indian Ocean Tsunami and a review of humanitarian workers’ experience during this response (published in 2008). Since the Centre’s establishment, he has continued undertaking research in this field as well as supervising a number of the Centre’s PhD students.
Prof Clarke has attended the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative and Save the Children US office as part of a Fulbright Fellowship in Non-Profit Leadership which was awarded due to his leadership of the Centre. His current research considers the nexus between religion and development/humanitarian work, and he maintains an interest in humanitarian education.
Available for: consultancies, industry partnerships and HDR supervisions
Dr Zouhir Gabsi
Senior Lecturer, Arabic and Islamic Studies
Dr Zouhir Gabsi is passionate about making a positive change to society. His current research focuses on Tunisian youth’s marginalisation and minority communities in the Arab world. He is also engaged in research on xenophobia and Islamophobia, which is the subject of his forthcoming book. Dr Gabsi is multilingual with an intimate understanding of global societies. His interest in youth studies emanates from marginalisation – in North Africa, particularly, there is an unfolding humanitarian crisis due to clandestine migration and suicide. Dr Gabsi’s research attempts to understand the psychology of these youth, their concerns, and culture.
Available for: consultancies, industry partnerships and HDR supervisions
A/Prof Max Kelly
Associate Professor, International and Community Development, School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Deakin University
A/Prof Max Kelly is strongly committed to critical reflection on the theory and practice of development and humanitarian field of research. She has a strong background in analysing the political and economic structures that contribute to ongoing marginalisation and the many diverse voices that make up the development and humanitarian sector. Her focus has been primarily international and community development, mostly in Africa with some focus on post-conflict contexts (Timor Leste and Northern Uganda).
A/Prof Kelly’s recent research focuses on the localisation debate, as a way of trying to centre critical theorising of humanitarian discourse. This nascent research, in partnership with A/Prof Mary Ana McGlasson and Dr Maree Pardy, is designed to focus discourse towards the complex engagement (or lack thereof) between international and local stakeholders, with a focus on power, and the amplification of diverse voices.
Available for: consultancies, industry partnerships and HDR supervisions
Prof Mark McGillivray
Professor of International Development, School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Deakin University
Prof Mark McGillivray is a Research Professor of International Development. For more than 30 years, he has conducted research focused on aid effectiveness and allocation, and the conceptualisation and measurement of poverty, inequality and disparity. His work seeks to evaluate the impact of official aid on poverty reduction and related indicators, and whether the allocation of this aid is consistent with recipient country need for aid. He has collaborated with Prof Matthew Clarke to build a ‘fair share’ index to measure deviations across donor countries.
Prof McGillivray’s previous positions include Chief Economist of the Australian Agency for International Development and Deputy Director of the United Nations World Institute for Development Economics Research. He has authored or co-authored 90 journal articles and 62 book chapters, co-authored 12 books and edited or co-edited 14 books. He is co-author of International Development: Issues and Challenges (Palgrave Macmillan, 2016).
Available for: consultancies, industry partnerships and HDR supervisions
Dr Tebeje Molla
DECRA Fellow, School of Education, Deakin University
Dr Tebeje Molla’s research focuses on educational inequality and policy responses. Theoretically, his work is informed by critical sociology and the capability approach to social justice and human development. Currently, Dr Molla is leading an Australian Research Council project that explores higher education participation among African refugee youth. The study also analyses the relationship between educational attainment and refugee integration. Preliminary findings of the project have been published in academic journals and on The Conversation.
Available for: consultancies, industry partnerships and HDR supervisions
Dr Alfred Presbitero
Senior Lecturer, Management, Deakin Business School
Dr Alfred Presbitero works in the field of cross-cultural management and leadership focusing mainly on cultural intelligence (CQ). He believes in the critical role of CQ as an enabler for managers and leaders, particularly those engaging and leading international humanitarian work. He brings to the CHL his knowledge and skills of CQ – mainly assisting the centre on how to achieve greater humanitarian leadership effectiveness through CQ.
Dr Presbitero has been recognised by the European Journal of International Management as an influential academic in the field of cultural intelligence and cultural competence. He is also serving in the Academy of Management International Management Division Committee. He is originally from the Philippines where he has witnessed many humanitarian crises that require strong leadership, and believes that humanitarian leadership can be made more effective by leveraging CQ.
Available for: consultancies, industry partnerships and HDR supervisions
A/Prof Anthony Ware
Associate Professor of International and Community Development, School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Deakin University
A/Prof Anthony Ware’s research focusses on humanitarian-development approaches in conflict-affected situations. He is particularly interested in conflict-sensitivity/do no harm, everyday peace, the incorporation of peacebuilding into bottom-up community-led approaches, and countering violent/hateful extremism via programme design and implementation, especially by NGOs. His fieldwork is in Myanmar, Bangladesh, Indonesia and Philippines.
A/Prof Ware is Convenor of Deakin’s Development-Humanitarian Research Group, Secretary of the Development Studies Association of Australia, and a former director of the Australia Myanmar Institute. A/Prof Ware has published four books including Myanmar’s ‘Rohingya’ Conflict (Oxford Uni Press, 2018, with Dr Costas Laoutides), and more than 40 peer reviewed academic papers/chapters.
Available for: consultancies, industry partnerships and HDR supervisions
Dr Vicki-Ann Ware
Senior Lecturer, International and Community Development, Deakin University
Dr Vicki-Ann Ware’s work is strongly influenced by Sen’s notion of development as removing unfreedoms that prevent people’s ability to live the valued lives. She teaches students about respectful, collaborative work with local communities, which enables their empowerment and, where possible, designs programmes around their expressed needs and desires. Her practice-focussed research seeks to build capacity among local people, ultimately working herself out of a role.
Dr Ware’s current research is focussed on arts-based approaches to conflict transformation – an area that bridges the ‘nexus’ between humanitarian and development practice. Over the past five years, she has worked collaboratively with local colleagues in Myanmar to design and implement a programme of arts-based workshops, aimed at shifting conflict narratives, attitudes and behaviours, and has conducted training for a consortium of organisations focused on building social cohesion via the arts.
Available for: consultancies, industry partnerships and HDR supervisions
