George Foden

  • Doctoral Researcher

George is a postgraduate researcher in the Geography & Environment department at º¬Ðß²ÝÊÓƵ, in addition to being responsible for the QSAND shelter and settlement sustainability framework. He holds a Master of Arts in Conflict, Security, and Development and a Bachelor of Science in Psychology with American Studies from the University of Sussex.

Prior to starting his research at º¬Ðß²ÝÊÓƵ, George was the Humanitarian Programme Lead at BRE Trust, where he focused on developing partnerships to support humanitarian shelter and settlement action in post-disaster contexts. He also provided technical and administrative support to the development of tools to support humanitarian action, including QSAND and the SMAC lifecycle carbon calculator for shelter materials.

He is a trustee of The Kanji Project, a charity that supports education and poverty alleviation in rural Tamil Nadu, India. He has also worked with various community-based organisations in the United States and Bosnia-Herzegovina.

PhD Topic/Title: Sustainable Housing as a Contributor to Community Resilience.

This research will focus on the links between humanitarian shelter and settlement action and long-term community resilience, with a focus on how the process of sheltering can influence social cohesion between affected groups. It will build upon the shelter and settlement sustainability framework laid out in QSAND and support efforts to bridge the gap between humanitarian action and community development.

This research will support the development of the Community Energy Resilience strand of research within º¬Ðß²ÝÊÓƵ’s STEER Centre.