People

Jo Beall

Emeritus Professor and Distinguished Policy Fellow
j.beall@lse.ac.uk
@JoBeall1

Katie Beck

Policy Fellow
k.a.beck@lse.ac.uk

Sudeep Bhargava

Researcher 
S.S.Bhargava@lse.ac.uk

Ricky Burdett

Director
Professor of Urban Studies, LSE
r.burdett@lse.ac.uk

Eugénie Cartron

Policy Fellow (Executive Education) for ECLI
E.Cartron@lse.ac.uk

Josefa Errázuriz Clark

Researcher/Project Coordinator (Santiago Urban Task Force)
J.Errazuriz@lse.ac.uk

Nuno F da Cruz

Senior Associate
n.m.ferreira-da-cruz@lse.ac.uk
@NFdaCruz

Catalina Duarte

Policy Officer
C.Duarte-Sanchez@lse.ac.uk

Saraja Gantner

Researcher
S.C.Gantner@lse.ac.uk

Adriana Gaganis

Researcher
A.M.Gaganis@lse.ac.uk

Alexandra Gomes

Research Fellow
a.peca-amaral-gomes@lse.ac.uk
@xpgomes3

Imogen Hamilton-Jones

Policy Officer
I.Hamilton-Jones@lse.ac.uk 
@ImogenHJ

Catarina Heeckt

Senior Policy Fellow
c.l.heeckt@lse.ac.uk
+44 (0)20 7107 5524
@CHeeckt 

Charlie Hicks

Research Officer
C.B.Hicks1@lse.ac.uk

Ben Plowden

Senior Associate
B.Plowden@lse.ac.uk

Philipp Rode

Executive Director
Associate Professor (Education), LSE
Co-Director, Executive MSc in Cities, LSE
p.rode@lse.ac.uk
@PhilippRode

Ben Rogers

Distinguished Policy Fellow
B.Rogers1@lse.ac.uk
@ben_rog

Savvas Verdis

Senior Lecturer in Practice
Co-Director of the Executive MSc in Cities
s.verdis@lse.ac.uk
+44 (0)20 7955 6313
@SavvasVerdis 

Nermin Abdulla

Executive MSc Programme Manager
N.Abdulla@lse.ac.uk
+44 (0)20 7955 6429

Sarah Davis

Finance and Resourcing Coordinator
s.j.davis@lse.ac.uk
+44 (0)20 7107 5155

Situ Diwan

Logistics Coordinator (Urban95 Academy) 
S.Diwan1@lse.ac.uk

Louise Ellaway

Programme Manager (ECLI) 
l.r.ellaway@lse.ac.uk

Nathaniel Gore

Executive Assistant and Centre Administrator
N.Gore1@lse.ac.uk

Jennifer Ho

Executive MSc Programme Administrator
and Centre Administrator
j.ho8@lse.ac.uk
+44 (0)20 7107 5232

Marie Kaune

Project Manager for Mayoral Leadership (ECLI) 
M.S.Kaune@lse.ac.uk

Alba Lamberti

Head of Programme (ECLI)
A.Lamberti@lse.ac.uk
+44 (0)20 7955 6207

Kate Ascher 

Visiting Senior Fellow, LSE Cities
Kate Ascher currently serves as the Milstein Professor of Urban Development at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, where she teaches real estate, infrastructure and urban planning courses. She continues to practice as a sub-consultant to Buro Happold, a global engineering firm based in the UK, where she served as partner through 2019 and founded the “Cities” team – which today works on a variety of resilience, public space and economic development projects on behalf of government and private clients across the US and internationally.

Prior to joining Buro Happold, she served as Director of Development at Vornado Realty Trust, Executive Vice-President at the NYC Economic Development Corporation (under Mike Bloomberg), and Assistant Director of the Port at the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. In these capacities, she oversaw and delivered a variety of complex projects ranging from waterfront and park activation to transportation, real estate development and urban regeneration.  

Kate holds a BA from Brown University, and an M.Sc. and Ph.D. from the London School of Economics, and is the author of several books on urban infrastructure (The Works, The Heights and The Way to Go), as well as co-author of New York Rising, an illustrated anthology of New York City’s physical evolution. She serves on the Boards of the Greenpoint Manufacturing and Design Center in NYC and the Holcim Foundation, based in Zurich

Matthias Brüning

Short-term Visiting Associate, LSE Cities
Matthias is currently a PhD student at the Institute for Mobility at the University of St. Gallen in Switzerland, having started his doctoral studies in 2023. Prior to this, he completed an MSc in Management & Strategy at the London School of Economics between 2019 and 2020. His research focuses on shared micromobility, utilizing econometric modelling methods such as discrete choice modelling and random forests.

Hugo de Camps Mora

Short-term Visiting Associate, LSE Cities
Hugo studied Economics at Universitat Pompeu Fabra (UPF) and a Master’s in Political Sociology at the London School of Economics (LSE). He is currently a fully funded ESRC UBEL DTP PhD candidate at Birkbeck, University of London.

His research, The City and the Sea: Tourism, Urbanisation, and Resistance in the Mediterranean Context, examines how tourism reshapes urban socio-spatial dynamics, the resistance movements that emerge in response, and the limits of municipalism in regulating these processes. Using case studies such as the expansion of Barcelona’s port and the implementation of the Superblock project, he specifically explores the city’s transition to a tourism-based economy throughout the late 20th century, and the various political interventions that have emerged in response.

Takayuki Kubo

Short-term Visiting Associate, LSE Cities
Takayuki is currently a Professor at the College of Sustainability and Tourism at Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific University (APU) in Kyushu, Japan. His specialties are Urban Development, Urban Planning, Urban Economics, and Urban Policy.

He worked on the Shanghai World Financial Centre project at Mori Building Co., Ltd. and then worked on urban policy research at the Mori Memorial Foundation's Institute for Urban Strategies, where he was a member of the ‘Global Power City Index’ inventive team, benchmarking Tokyo against rival cities such as London and New York. He then left Tokyo to work as a Senior Researcher at a policy think tank in Fukuoka, Japan's fastest growing regional city at the moment, and published the ‘Cities on the Third Axis’ comparing the global competitiveness of regional cities. After moving to APU, he has been working on research aimed at improving the global competitiveness of smaller regional cities such as Beppu, where the university is located, by clustering regional resources.

He holds a Master of Architecture from Cornell University, a PhD in Economics from Chuo University, and is a licensed First-Class Architect in Japan. His major publication, ‘Global Competitive Strategies for Cities and Regions’ (Jiji Press) won the Japan Society for Urbanology Award 2020.

Kieron Boyle

CEO and Director, 100x Impact Accelerator, Marshall Institute, LSE

kieron@100ximpact.org

Stephan Chambers

Director and Professor in Practice, Marshall Institute for Philanthropy and Social Entrepreneurship, LSE

s.chambers1@lse.ac.uk

Alexandra Cirone

Assistant Professor, School of Public Policy, LSE

a.e.cirone@lse.ac.uk

Elisabeth Costa

Senior Visiting Fellow, Department of Psychological and Behvioural Science, LSE

Duncan Green

Professor in Practice and Senior Strategic Adviser at Oxfam GB, Department of International Development, LSE

D.J.Green@lse.ac.uk

Suzanne Hall

Professor in Sociology and Deputy Head of Department, Department of Sociology, LSE

s.m.hall@lse.ac.uk

Gareth Jones

Professor of Urban Geography, Department of Geography and Environment, LSE

g.a.jones@lse.ac.uk

Kate Laffen

Assistant Professor in Behavioural Science, Department of Psychological and Behavioural Science, LSE

k.m.laffan@lse.ac.uk 

Connson Locke

Professor (Education) of Management, Deputy Head of Department (Teaching and Learning), Department of Management, LSE

c.c.locke@lse.ac.uk

David Madden

Assistant Professor in Sociology, Department of Sociology, LSE

d.j.madden@lse.ac.uk

Elizabeth Robinson

Professor of Environmental Economics and Acting Dean of the Global School of Sustainability, Department of Geography and Environment, LSE

e.j.z.robinson@lse.ac.uk

Andres Rodriguez-Pose

Princesa de Asturias Chair and Professor of Economic Geography, Department of Geography and Environment, LSE

a.rodriguez-pose@lse.ac.uk

Vanessa Rubio-Márquez

Professor in Practice and the Associate Dean for Extended Education, School of Public Policy, LSE

v.rubio-marquez@lse.ac.uk

Mike Savage

Emeriti, Department of Sociology, LSE

m.a.savage@lse.ac.uk

Kathleen Scanlon

Distinguished Policy Fellow and Deputy Director, LSE London, LSE

k.j.scanlon@lse.ac.uk

Fran Tonkiss

Professor in Sociology, Department of Sociology, LSE

f.tonkiss@lse.ac.uk

Tony Travers

Professor in Practice and Associate Dean of the LSE School of Public Policy, Department of Government, LSE

a.travers@lse.ac.uk

Will Venters

Associate Professor of Information Systems, Department of Management, LSE

w.venters@lse.ac.uk

Christine Whitehead

Emeritus Professor of Housing Economics, Department of Economics, LSE

c.m.e.whitehead@lse.ac.uk 

Austin Zeiderman

Associate Professor of Geography, Department of Geography and Environment, LSE

a.zeiderman@lse.ac.uk