Nicholas specialises in advice on rapidly changing social, political, and economic factors.

As a researcher, Nicholas has focussed on Asia’s political, social, and economic development for the past 20 years. He is currently Professor and Head of Social Sciences at the University of Tasmania.

Until 2019, he was Associate Dean in the College of Asia and the Pacific at the Australian National University, where he was responsible for international partnerships, government affairs, and corporate engagement. He has undertaken significant field research across Thailand, Myanmar, India, Bangladesh, and China, and has worked closely with a wide range of government and commercial organisations to support the quality of their work in Asia. 

Nicholas holds a D.Phil from the University of Oxford, where he was a Rhodes Scholar.

Languages

Thai, Burmese, Indonesian

Influential work

Private sector

• Advice for major global companies on strategy for their Asian market engagements, with briefings to CEOs and other senior leaders

• Partnership development bringing together strong delivery teams to support commercial clients in Australia and across Asia

Public sector

• Significant analytical and advisory record on Asian politics drawing on regional language skills supported by long-established in-country networks

• Led a number of high-profile research initiatives, including as the founding Director of the Myanmar Research Centre at The Australian National University

• Senior executive responsible for leading large analytical and research teams focussed on interpreting social change and political risk

Thought leadership

• Author and/or editor of over 50 peer-reviewed works on Asian economies, politics, and societies, including books, articles and chapters, and more than 100 shorter articles and essays

• Founder of the leading Southeast Asian Studies website, New Mandala, which continues to provide cutting-edge analysis for academics, journalists, and government officials

Where my passion for Asia started

I started out learning Indonesian when I was in primary school. I ended up spending lots of time in Thailand, where I studied and then worked as a researcher and interpreter. Since then, I have been fortunate to conduct research across the Asian region, and have collaborated with a wide range of academic, government and commercial organisations. After all these years I still enjoy any chance to explore Asia’s rapidly changing societies from the ground-up, with attention to the human stories that keep life interesting.