A short route into the produce: a selection of my most substantive, and hopefully fruitful, pieces, grouped by theme, newest first. Everything else can be found on the phases page.
Power, corruption and political economy
- Regulatory landscaping: Better late than never! (Aug 2026). How the notion of regulatory landscaping emerged from my work, with distant echoes from my earlier research.
- Understanding the landscape and sensing how it moves (Jun 2026). How regulatory landscaping and collaborative political intelligence complement each other, with Zahed Yousuf.
- Corruption in health systems: How regulatory landscaping can help (Apr 2026). An LSE blog drawing on the SOAS-ACE synthesis of health systems research.
- Complexity, corruption and change: the SOAS-ACE approach (Mar 2026). A lecture I presented as part of a Basel Institute on Governance course on anti-corruption, including examples from Nigeria and Bangladesh.
- Building bridges for more effective policies (Dec 2025). How the SOAS-ACE approach to political economy analysis could add value to market systems development work, with Luis Osorio-Cortes.
- Complexity, corruption and change: learning from positive deviance (Jul 2025). How bright spots in broken systems can be useful entry points for engagement in those systems; the first of a six-part series.
- Systems of corruption: Patterns, actors and (inter)actions (Dec 2023). Why dynamic maps of corruption systems need to include actors, behaviours, incentives and power, co-written with Kathy Bain.
- Doing anti-corruption differently (May 2016). An early exploration of what politically informed, locally led and adaptive anti-corruption work could look like.
Learning systems and adaptive practice
- Tailoring and localizing systems MEL for impact across contexts (Oct 2025). Reflections on UNDP’s MEL 360 guidance, and why monitoring, evaluation and learning should support local learning systems and pay attention to power.
- Local, learning, systems: Simple solutions and complex realities (May 2025). Why donors should support local learning systems, in all their complexity, rather than search for simple and illusory fixes.
- Embracing systems practice (Dec 2024). Reflections on USAID’s wonderful Local Systems Position Paper and the tensions it leaves open.
- Mobilizing cycles of systems change (Oct 2024). Making the case, through the example of World Bicycle Relief, that “systems change” offers a useful way of understanding how change happens.
Nurturing relationships and building community
- Cross-pollination: Complexity, corruption and community gardening (Apr 2026). How stories and community can carry systems ideas more effectively than analytical reports.
- Reflective relational practice: a video (May 2025). A presentation on reflective relational practice, prepared for the USAID Local Systems Community.
- Weaving on the fly (Apr 2025). A short video weaving power and incentives together with relationships and learning.
- Reflecting on the dynamics of complex social systems (Apr 2025). How relational practice, corruption and Dan Honig’s work on relational state capacity connect.
- Reflective relational practice: Assessing and enhancing the quality of our relationships (Mar 2025). My primary piece on reflective relational practice, with four dimensions of relationships and a participatory way of assessing them.
Ecosystem funding and systemic investing
- Rio reflections: Systemic investing in context (May 2026). What systemic investing misses about government, power and policy, and how to fill the gap.
- Full-stack systemic: Measuring, learning, investing (Part 3 of a series on measurement for systemic investing) (Nov 2025). A learning-centred vision for systemic investing, with returns on investment seen as ripples of change.
- Ecosystems, emergence and social change (Aug 2024). What it might mean for a funder to act as an ecosystem funder.
Love, compassion and social change
- Relationships, co-learning and social change (Nov 2024). Reflections from a month of conversations, including on the compassionate, co-reflective approach to social change of the Tamkeen Community Foundation in Morocco.
- Loving systems (Jul 2023). Why love and relationships became central to my work.
- Awareness, resonance, engagement, reflection (Mar 2023). My early thinking about working in ways that reflect the living, learning and loving systems I hope to help nurture: the introduction to a six-part series.
Also:
Knowledge gardening
- A human and some loops (May 2026). How I crafted an AI-assisted research synthesis on corruption in health systems.
- Landscapes of learning (Oct 2025). Field notes from my knowledge garden, organised by different thematic areas, or landscapes.
- Knowledge gardening in complexity, in action (Aug 2025). An example of how I use my knowledge garden to harvest useful resources to share with others.
Along the way: Updates and reflections
- Connection, cultivation, calibration and care (Aug 2026). What I’ve been working on and learning in 2026.
- Nurturing living, loving and learning systems (Jun 2025). An update on six months of reading, writing and participating in events.
- Ecologies, words and engagement (Jun 2024). Nora Bateson’s words to handle with care – what they are and why they need to be used carefully.
- Systemic meandering (Jun 2023). An update on my work, with a focus on paradoxes, polarities and balancing exploration with direction.
- Living, learning and loving systems (Feb 2023). What I wanted to explore after leaving Global Integrity, and why.
- Diving deeper into complexity, kindness and collaborative learning (Dec 2022). My farewell after eight years leading Global Integrity.
Using any of these ingredients in your own work? I’d love to hear what you’re cooking up. Let’s connect.