About

Hello!

I’m interested in democracy, governance, wellbeing and the effects of digital tech on these things. But also other things. This blog includes bits of them all.

I’m currently Programmes Mgr for the Public Interest News Foundation.

Work history

I recently spent five years helping to build Democracy Club, which tries to build digital infrastructure to support participation in democratic life. I then a spent a year looking at the UK democracy space more broadly and, in particular, researching and developing plans for better networking in the space. This work is being taken forward by the Centre for Democracy and by Involve.

Before that, I worked at Purpose, designing digital communication efforts to encourage large online collectives to be – or push for – the change. Other roles with… Giving What We Can, UN social media, a lovingly-remembered agency of the UK Government, Commonwealth Secretariat, Malaria No More, Absolute Return for Kids, Transparency International-Kenya, Global Witness, BBC World Service, an MP in the UK Parliament and Shelterbox.

Education 

My first degree was in Jurisprudence from New College, Oxford and I have a Master of Laws, Governance and Development from the School of Oriental and African Studies, and a MA Global Governance from the University of Waterloo, Ontario.

At the latter I worked on the idea of a more democratic forms of global governance. I wrote about why I think digital technology gives us the tools with which to change governance the global level. Ten years on and you can gradually see bits of it happening…possibly.

Other stuff

I once spent a year of Saturdays mentoring a lively seven-year-old from Brixton. It was scary and fun and you should do it too.