David Simon is a Professor of Development Geography at Royal Holloway University of London. His research encompasses the interface between development and the environment, in the context of sustainability and global environmental/climate change, with particular reference to urban, peri-urban and regional change. His interests include aspects of political geography, critical geopolitics and transport policy.
David has a keen interest in theoretical, applied and policy arenas, underpinned by the belief that real progress lies in a far closer integration across them than is generally the case. David's work attaches fundamental importance to 'grounding' it in real-world conditions, and to seeking to apply the insights thereby gained to improving policies and practices. Conversely, applied research benefits substantially from the rigour and orientation afforded by an appropriate, theoretically informed direction.
David has been at the leading edge of debates about the nature of 'development' and the exploration of the utility of so-called 'post-structuralist' perspectives such as postmodernism, postcolonialism and post-traditionalism, with application to various empirical contexts.
"Having worked across and between disciplines most of my career and more recently also in strongly transdisciplinary contexts, finding an appropriate home for these outputs has often been challenging. Many journals claim to welcome such intersections and cross-overs but rarely achieve this in practice. The opportunity to help launch and develop Global Social Challenges Journal as an explicitly inter-and transdisciplinary outlet therefore instantly attracted me, the more because of its open access and non-profit business model."
David Simon, Co-Editor of Global Social Challenges Journal
Hear David discuss inter-and trans-disciplinarity, accessible open access and the co-productive approach to editing Global Social Challenges Journal in this excerpt from our introductory webinar:
