As of March 2026, this website is no longer being updated. I now work mainly on climate issues, especially in Brighton and Hove, and new work can be found on the website of Climate:Change, our independent think-tank on socially inclusive action in the City: www.climatechangebh.org.uk.
Meanwhile, however, this website has over 850 entries, mostly representing my work on international development from 2010-2025. Among much else, there are over 50 book reviews, more than 20 papers and training cases on bridging research and policy and on managing think-tanks, nearly 100 articles on climate change, and many papers on other topics, including aid, food security and nutrition, and the future of international development. See ‘Topics and Themes’ for more details. I can be reached at sm@simonmaxwell.net.
Blunt and brutal. But UN reform is possible. Blair, Brown and Benn can make it happen, ODIOverseas Development Institute (London) Blog, November 2006
I welcome the release of ‘Delivering as One’, the Report of the High Level Panel on UN Reform. The Report is blunt and brutal. That’s what happens when you commission a report from three serving Prime Ministers and have Gordon Brown on the team.
The Report criticises the incoherence, fragmentation and unpredictability of UN work on international development. Quite right too, we can’t have 20 UN agencies in every country, all fighting for the Minister’s ear. Nor can we expect the UN to do its job, when donors withhold funding and cherry-pick their favourite projects.....................
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