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Research Fellow New South Institute, Emeritus Professor at The Nelson Mandela School of Public Governance, University of Cape Town

I founded and was director of The Nelson Mandela School of Public Governance at University of Cape Town (UCT) until 2020. I am a research fellow at the New South Institute, managing a research program on migration governance reform in Africa. I am a member of President Ramaphosa’s Economic Advisory Council. and Professorial Research Associate at SOAS. I was born in Cape Town and educated in Economics, Economic History and History at UCT, Wits and Columbia. After economic research and teaching at the University of Cape Town, I joined the South African Department of Trade and Industry in 1995, managing industry and technology policy. I moved to the Presidency in 2002. I managed economic policy in the South African Presidency, represented the Presidency at the G20, and was co-chair of the G20 Development Working Group. I have served or serve on several boards, and am associated with a range of policy research initiatives including the TIPS, the International Growth Centre for which I was the Zambia Country Director, and the European Centre for Development Policy Management where I was a board member. I was a visiting scholar at the Harvard Business School, a regular visiting professor at the Graduate School of Governance at Maastricht University and a member of the OECD Secretary-General’s Inclusive Growth Advisory Group. I write about economic development issues, including Season of Hope - Economic Reform under Mandela and Mbeki and recently co-edited The Oxford Companion to South African Economics.

Experience

  • –present
    Director of the Graduate School of Development Policy, University of Cape Town