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Sue Cavill is a specialist in governance and the delivery of water and sanitation services, holding a PhD from Loughborough University awarded for her thesis investigating "Improvements to Urban Services through Accountability".

Building on a strong background in both technical and social sciences -- her first degree in development studies was followed by a masters in infrastructure engineering -- Sue has gained wide international experience in east and south Asia, Africa, Latin America and the Middle East.

Sue was the main consultant in Public World's recent scoping study for the Freshwater Action Network and World Bank into how to develop dialogue between the Bank and civil society organisations to improve urban water and sanitation services. With Public World or Loughborough University's Water, Engineering and Development Centre (WEDC), Sue has also worked on projects with a number of other NGOs and governmental agencies, including the United Nations agencies and Britain's Department for International Development (DfID).

Sue's particular expertise in corruption is internationally recognised, and she is co-author with Muhammad Sohail of a chapter of Transparency International's 2008 Global Corruption Report.

Stephen Commins is a specialist in essential services delivery in fragile states, and local government roles in disaster risk reduction. He is Associate Director of the Center for Civil Society, at the School of Public Affairs in the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), where he also lectures in the Department of Urban Planning.

A former Senior Human Development Specialist at the World Bank, Steve is currently a member of the Steering Committee of the DFID-funded Network on Health in Fragile States, and Advisor on Fragile States at International Medical Corps. He was also the author of the synthesis paper on services in fragile states for the Development Assistance Committee at the OECD.

Other recent projects have included developing a handbook for community and local government interface on disaster risk reduction for the World Bank in Bangladesh, producing a study on fragile states strategies for Save the Children-UK, and advising PLAN-UK on their global report on girls’ well being.

Steve was also a co-author of the World Development Report 2004, Making Services Work for Poor People, and coordinator of the World Bank’s Children and Youth Network. Prior to joining the World Bank, he was Director of Policy and Planning for World Vision International from 1990 to 1997, where he chaired WVI’s Complex Emergencies Working Group and Global Advocacy Network.

Marie Duboc has worked internationally for several years in both public service reform and labour issues, including frontline experience of sustainable development and conflict issues in Africa. She led Public World's study of primary education in Mali as part of our work to assist Oxfam in preparing its essential services campaign. Marie has also been a member of teams responsible for consultation processes used in UN, World Bank and EU international development frameworks.

Recently returned to London following two years in Cairo, where she researched opposition movements, Marie is currently focusing on workers' strikes and labour relations in Egypt as part of her PhD studies. She holds an MA in history from the Sorbonne, an MSc in comparative politics from the London School of Economics, and a Research Masters from the University of Paris, School of Advanced
Social Sciences Studies.

Fluent in English as well as her native French, Marie also has advanced level skills in Arabic and Spanish. Her earlier work with NGOs included two years with Saferworld, as a project officer in the conflict prevention team of the African programme, and a policy co-ordination role with the Stakeholder Forum's Governance and Policy programme. Among her more recent interests has been learning to make digital films.

Brendan Martin is a specialist in the labour and social dimensions of industrial and public sector restructuring. With experience in more than 70 countries, he has focused mainly on the impacts of privatization and outsourcing, and on the development of participatory alternative approaches.

A journalist by training, Brendan is widely published. In addition to many other monographs, his book, In the Public Interest? Privatization and Public Service Reform (Zed, 1994), has appeared in six languages. Brendan has also written chapters in several edited collections, such as Privatization and Labor, Marsha Pripstein Posuney and Linda J. Cook (eds.), Edward Elgar, 2002.

Much of Brendan's work has been with global union federations, such as the International Transport Workers' Federation (ITF), for whom he is currently developing a number of projects. In addition, he has consulted for inter-governmental organisations, including the International Labour Organisation (ILO), the European Commission, the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions and the Commonwealth Secretariat.

Brendan has been a member of the OECD's Advisory Group on Privatisation and the Ad Hoc Working Group on Privatisation of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), and has represented many civil society organisations in dialogue with the World Bank. He was the founder of Public World and the GAPS Project for a General Agreement on Public Services.

Conor Cradden is a specialist in workplace democracy, with 15 years of research and policy development experience in industrial relations, management and employment. A former head of research with the Association of University Teachers (now University and College Union) in Britain, Conor's particular areas of expertise are partnership forms of industrial relations, industrial relations in the public sector, and business ethics.

His book on business ethics, Repoliticizing Management: A Theory of Corporate Legitimacy, was published by Ashgate in 2005. This followed Conor's PhD, awarded by the European University Institute in Florence, on theoretical approaches to industrial relations and the employment relationship, and an MSc in industrial relations.

After a number of years working in the education and NGO sectors, Conor began working in trade union research in the 1990s. Based in the Geneva area since 2002, Cradden now works full time with Public World on labour-and employment-related projects. In particular, he takes the lead on surveys of the academic literature and on in-depth policy analysis focussing on the logic and structure of arguments made in support of policy positions.

Conor's recent projects have included work for the New Zealand Department of Labour's Partnership Resource Centre on the relationship between productivity and workplace democracy in the public sector, and with Britain's Department for International Development (DfID) on public procurement and labour standards. He has also undertaken a number of projects global union federation Education International on academic staff mobility and university terms and conditions of employment in Europe.

Christof Schiller is a specialist in public sector modernization and governance in both OECD and developing countries, with particular expertise in strategic management, performance measurement and management, human resource management, public participation, and public sector finance.

Currently working at the Hertie School of Governance in the University of Berlin on a research project called on "the political dynamic of labour market reforms in Germany", headed by Professor Anke Hassel, Christof has worked with Public World since 2006.

He made a key contribution to our report for the New Zealand Department of Labour's Partnership Resource Centre on the relationship between productivity and workplace democracy in the public sector. Christof was also part of our team that produced a study for Britain's Department for International Development (DfID) about the extent to which European Union governments include labour standards in public procurement.

Christof has also worked on the international project “Cities of Change”, initiated and run by the Bertelsmann Foundation and the World Bank; on Bürger Europas e.V, an EU-funded education project on EU-enlargement; on Kommunalpolitische Infothek, the internet project of the Heinrich-Böll-Foundation; and with interpublic berlin, a research institution based in Berlin.

A doctoral candidate at the University of Potsdam, where he is supervised by Professor Dr. Werner Jann on a thesis entitled "Policy Making in Germany– the Case of Hartz IV-Reform", Christof holds Masters degree equivalent diplomas in Public Policy and Management for work on "International Organizations and International Administration" and "Strategic Management in Municipalities - Evidence from OECD Countries".

Mike Waghorne is a former global and national trade union leader with widely respected expertise in public services and the role of international institutions in restructuring and "reforming" them.

Until 2007, when he retired from the post, Mike was Assistant General Secretary of Public Services International (PSI), the global union federation linking 20 million members in 650 public sector unions in 154 countries. He represented PSI at the World Bank, the IMF and the WTO, as well as at UN bodies such as UNCTAD and the World Health Organisation, and was for several years the voice of international labour in OECD policy discussions about governance and democratic accountability.

Mike was responsible for much of PSI's policy development work, especially in the matrix of issues surrounding the role of the state, public sector modernisation, structural adjustment, privatisation and contracting out, regulatory reform and public management. He was also the key link person between the international trade union community and the international civil society movement on trade issues.

Prior to working at PSI, Mike was with the New Zealand Public Service Association and worked to develop union education programmes about privatisation, public sector reform and union development in seven South Pacific countries. Before that, he worked as a teacher and health services researcher, and played a leading research and policy role in New Zealand's student movement and as a key ally and spokesperson for the country's early gay rights community in the 1970s and 1980s.

Mike holds a Masters degree in Sociology, and a Diploma of Teaching, and now lives in Bretagne, France. Among other projects, Mike is currently involved with a number of German foundations, the International Labour Organisation and universities in four countries in developing the Global Labour University.

John Uden is a specialist in community participation in urban renewal, with hands-on experience of the roles and relationships involved, as well as of project management at senior levels. His background in national and local government, non-governmental organisations and private sector partnerships prepared him for his recent engagement by the Mayor of London to develop the business plan for Design for London and start up the new organisation.

With a masters degree in regional planning, John was a town planner in Cumbria, England, before moving to central America to assist in Nicaragua's development as project manager in the Ministry of Housing and Planning. Returning to Europe, he had project management roles with Friends of the Earth , the Council for the Protection of Rural England, and English Heritage before being appointed managing director of the public-private partnership North London Leadership.

Since switching to consultancy, John has prepared the economic development programme for the Thames Gateway project, developed the investment programme for the Park Royal Partnership, served as consultants' team leader in the Tottenham Hale partnership, and run the North London Transport Forum. With Public World, he is leading our development of a whole systems approach to sustainable urban development, encompassing economic development, environmental protection and repair, and all areas of public service.