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Dr Gerard Prinsen PhD, MA
Senior Lecturer
Doctoral Supervisor School of People, Environment and PlanningAreas for supervision and collaboration
I find diversity and interdisciplinarity a principal source of inspiration for my teaching and research. If students or colleagues also find inspiration for their research in any of the areas below, then I am keen to have a conversation about:
1. Public education, health services and small businesses in remote or fragile areas in East and Southern Africa.
Check out my blogs (2017-2018) on research with butchers and cooks in Tanzania, or this article (2019). You could also read this article (2017), exploring collaboration between aid organisations, rural communities, and African universities. I am passionate about connecting Aotearoa to Africa in this video: “A cent for Africa” (2018). Over the years, I have worked in: Benin, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Ghana, Mali, Tanzania, Uganda, and Mozambique – where I was also appointed as Honorary Consul for my country of origin, the Netherlands.
2. The design of development programmes, particularly logic models and composite indicators.
This article (2015) reflects on the application of logframes and theory-of-change in aid organisations. Similarly, I am serious about the design of indicators, the quantification of qualitative variables such as ‘sustainability’ or ‘resilience’. Since 2016, for example, I have been contributor to the global Quality of Nationality Index (Wikipedia, 2018), on which the New Zealand Herald reported in 2018: "New Zealand passports slip down!"
3. Policy-making in non-self-governing islands or small island states, especially in negotiations with metropolitan powers or aid donors.
I co-authored this book (2018) exploring how aid affects the sovereignty of Pacific islands. I am particularly interested in how islands that remain constitutionally connected to their colonial metropoles (so called “sub-national island jurisdictions”) seem to be quite successful in negotiating with their metropoles. With colleagues in the Francophone sphere, I have come to argue these islands are developing a new form of sovereignty: an Islandian sovereignty (2017).
4. Interdisciplinary research and bridges between researchers and local communities.
Check out this this video interview (2’45”) I gave in China about conceptual aspects (language, culture, identity) of interdisciplinary research, or this video interview (2’35”) in Tanzania about operational aspects. I am also involved in this research project (2018-2021) on leptospirosis, a crippling disease that affects mostly men, often Māori, working in dairy sheds and meatworks.
Professional associations and networks
- Since 2008, I have also been teaching part-time at Victoria University Wellington, in their courses Development Practice and Development Policy. In the latter I co-direct a complex simulation game on development policies.
- I am a founding member of New Zealand Aid and Development Dialogues (NZADDs), a data & discussion platform supporting debate about development aid since 2010.
- I am co-founder of Massey’s Security Politics & Development Network, supporting research and debate on conflict and peace-building in the Pacific since 2017.
- In 2018 I was appointed Research Associate at Canada’s University of Prince Edward Island and contribute to their Global Classroom.
- Similarly, I contribute to a course on Governance in Small Islands of the University of the Highlands and Islands (UHI) in Scotland.
I am “a pracademic”; a practitioner coming to academia after a career in professional practice and I continue to straddle both worlds. I worked for fifteen years with local governments in diverging African countries, before completing a PhD and becoming part-time lecturer in 2012.
Since then, I also worked part-time for Dutch NGOs supporting education and health services in six post-conflict states (2011-2015); for a British programme on food safety in Tanzania (2015-2019); and for Canada’s Institute of Island Studies investigating "sustainable island futures" (2018-2021). Since 2021, I work as adviser on "research and knowledges" in Caritas' He Oranga Taurikura.
Professional
Contact details
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Ph: extension 83636
Location: 3.19, Social Sciences Tower
Campus: Manawatu - Palmerston North
Qualifications
- Doctor of Philosophy - Massey University (2012)
- Master of Arts - Groningen State University (1986)
Certifications and Registrations
- Licence, Supervisor, Massey University
Prizes and Awards
- 2017 Massey University Research Fund (MURF) Award of $12,000. 1.Terms of Engagement (Massey-Lead). This project seeks to ascertain the appropriateness and utility of academic / military engagement. Drawing on debates in Anthropology about the ethics of working with military forces, military sociological literature on civil-military relations, NGO and think tank guidelines on civil-military-police-NGO cooperation, and policy discussions on military roles, interagency and external engagements, this foundational project seeks to identify boundaries in and around academic engagement with militaries and vice versa. Outputs: -Working paper on issues raised in academic discourse about engagement. -Working paper on issues from military perspective. -Set of TOE for future projects between Massey researchers and NZDF. Likely contributors: Nina Harding (Anthropological debates on ethical issues and cultural view on organisations). B Greener and A Powles (civil-military relations, military sociology). Gerard Prinsen (Development Studies perspectives on harm). 2.Southern Katipo 2017 (NZDF Lead) Planning for next major military exercise in 2017. Academics to bring expertise to comment on / engage with military planners to note areas of concern, overlap, limitations, opportunities. Outputs: -Planning and execution of exercise itself. -Post exercise analysis by NZDF and academic team. -Publications on procedural and conceptual - Massey University (2017)
Research Expertise
Research Interests
I am interested in using and building bridges between the work of practitioners and the work of researchers in three spheres:
Development programmes in practice
- Using participatory methods. (Click for an example of a slideshow of a class on pairwise ranking.)
- Quantifying the results of participatory methods. (Click for a slideshow of a class on quantifying the results of a series of pairwise rankings.)
- Designing indicators. (See this paper for an analysis of the background and the technical, political and epistemological challenges in the use of indicators for development programmes.)
- Testing innovations in development management instruments. (See this paper about field experiences with the Theory-of-Change approach in planning development programmes in post-conflict contexts – contrasting it with the more predominating logical framework approach.)
Development policies and politics
- Local polities and small island states negotiating development sovereignty. (Click here for a paper on policy sovereignty in the Pacific.)
- Local communities or ethnic minorities defining development policies and priorities. (See this article I wrote as a practitioner in 2000 and which - to my great surprise - I found again as an academic when it was reprinted in books in 2003, 2006, and 2011.)
Teaching and researching development work
- Using extensive simulation games to teach postgraduate students about the practice of policy-making, implementation, and evaluation in development work. (See this paper about my experiences at Victoria University.)
- Researching the effects and effectiveness of the 'supervision experiences' of African doctoral students and their supervisors at Massey and Victoria Universities, with Victoria University colleagues and funded by AKO - the National Centre for Tertiary Teaching Excellence. (Click here for the project document.)
- Using texts - found in old filing cabinets as well as in cyber space - for research purposes. (Click for a book chapter on methodological considerations, especially around maintaining a text's 'contextual integrity'.)
- Whenever possible, I collaborate or align with individual postgraduate students to turn work that's already been created for educational purposes into products or services that may be useful for the wide community of researchers and practitioners. See this prezi by Gisela Purcell on work we did together.
My activities around indicators are relevant for both researchers as well as practitioners. This comes together practically in an interactive database of over 300 very diverse documents about indicators. This article outlines the background and purpose of the database and this one-minute video clip highlights its content. Please contact me for obtaining free access to this database.
Thematics
Resource Development and Management
Area of Expertise
Field of research codes
Human Geography (160400):
International Relations (160607):
Other Studies in Human Society (169900):
Policy and Administration (160500):
Political Science (160600):
Studies In Human Society (160000)
Keywords
- Africa, local governance, health and education services. This is driven by my past and on-going professional engagement with international aid policies and aid work. If you are thinking of research in or about Africa; I will buy the first cup of coffee.
- Local polities and sovereignty. One of my personal discoveries in my research was the enduring resilience of local polities in Africa and I see a similar dynamic in the research on aid and sovereignty in the Pacific. 'Small is beautiful' needs an upgrade. If you want to research whether 'small is strong', please come and do some arm wrestling with me.
- Participatory research methods and development indicators. Here I am not just interested in the creative and interactive application of participatory research, but also in the challenges posed by upscaling participatory methods to feed into policy-making and research. If you want to quantify qualitative research, let's count some beans in my office.
Research Projects
Summary of Research Projects
| Position | Current | Completed |
|---|---|---|
| Project Leader | 0 | 2 |
| Team Member | 0 | 1 |
Completed Projects
Project Title: Use of development indicators
Date Range: 2012 - 2013
Funding Body: Massey University
Project Team:
- Dr Gerard Prinsen - Project Leader
Research Outputs
Journal
[Journal article]Authored by: Benschop, J., French, N., Prinsen, J.
[Journal article]Authored by: Prinsen, J., Walters, V.
[Journal article]Authored by: Prinsen, J.
[Journal article]Authored by: McNeill, J., Prinsen, J.
[Journal article]Authored by: Benschop, J., French, N., Knox, M., Midwinter, A., Prinsen, J.
Book
[Authored Book]Authored by: Prinsen, J.
[Discussion Paper]Authored by: Azizian, R., Belgrave, D., Choi, S., Greener, B., Harding, N., Hoverd, W., Powles, A., Prinsen, J.Edited by: Greener, B.
[Chapter]Authored by: Prinsen, J.
[Authored Book]Authored by: Prinsen, J.
[Chapter]Authored by: Prinsen, J.
Thesis
[Doctoral Thesis]Authored by: Prinsen, J.
Report
[Technical Report]Authored by: Prinsen, J.
[Technical Report]Authored by: Prinsen, J.
[Technical Report]Authored by: Prinsen, J.
Conference
[Conference Oral Presentation]Authored by: Prinsen, J.
[Conference Oral Presentation]Authored by: Prinsen, J.
[Conference Oral Presentation]Authored by: Prinsen, J.
[Conference Oral Presentation]Authored by: Prinsen, J.
[Conference Oral Presentation]Authored by: Prinsen, J.
Other
[Working Paper]Authored by: Prinsen, J.
Consultancy and Languages
Consultancy
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Jan-Jul 2008
- Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Teamleader for the Policy and Operations Evaluation Department, evaluating Dutch 'good governance' programmes in Africa between 1998-2007. -
Jun 2011 - Dec 2015
- Dutch Consortium for Rehabilitation (DCR)
Adviser for the Knowledge Network of the DCR, supporting research designs and reviewing draft research reports. -
May 2011 - Dec 2015
- Research Trust of Victoria University
Consultant for a Marsden-funded research into policy sovereignty in the Pacific to design and apply indicators, and to research international aid policies. -
Jan 2015 - Dec 2017
- University of Glasgow
Associate Investigator in Project "Hazards Associated with Zoonotic pathogens in Emerging Livestock meat pathways" (HAZEL)
Languages
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Dutch
Last used: this morning
Spoken ability: Excellent
Written ability: Excellent -
Portuguese
Last used: last week
Spoken ability: Excellent
Written ability: Excellent -
French
Last used: last month
Spoken ability: Average
Written ability: Needs work -
Spanish
Last used: last year
Spoken ability: Average
Written ability: Needs work -
German
Last used: a long time ago
Spoken ability: Average
Written ability: Needs work
Teaching and Supervision
Teaching Statement
- 131.702 Development Management - Internal
- 131.702 Development Management - Distance
My classes are quite often a mix of 'training in technical skills' followed by 'critical reflection on the application'. As an example, you may want to sit back and check out this audio-visual recording of a postgraduate class on the design and application of logframes as an important management tool in development practice (47'37").
Here's a thought I found worth sharing: “If the student is not better than the teacher, then the teacher is a failure.” (Allen Ginsberg, quoting a Buddhist saying)
Courses Coordinated
- 131.702 Development Management
Summary of Doctoral Supervision
| Position | Current | Completed |
|---|---|---|
| Main Supervisor | 1 | 2 |
| Co-supervisor | 2 | 1 |
Current Doctoral Supervision
Main Supervisor of:
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Sueann Waite-Chung
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Doctor of Philosophy
An exploration into how cultural narratives of “creole islandness” manifest in the participatory policy-making and implementation process: A case study of Jamaica
Co-supervisor of:
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James Stiefvater
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Doctor of Philosophy
Otonomi bilong wanem? Autonomy for what?: the confluence of micronationalism and efforts for provincial autonomy in Papua New Guinea. -
Heidi Van Der Watt
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Doctor of Philosophy
"Better lives for all"? The development contribution of marine wildlife tourism in Gansbaai, South Africa
Completed Doctoral Supervision
Main Supervisor of:
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2017
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Amaliah Fitriah
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Doctor of Philosophy
Decentralization, Identity Construction, and Conflict: Education under Aceh's Special Autonomy -
2017
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Yuanheng Zheng
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Doctor of Philosophy
Political and Ethnic Representation in Chinese Local Governance - Analysis of the Roles of the Deputies of Leishan County People's Congress, Guizhou Province, China
Co-supervisor of:
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2020
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Ackim Mwape
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Doctor of Philosophy
From international conventions to local park management plans: an analysis of the vertical integrity of Zambia’s national park system
Media and Links
Media
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30 Nov 2010 - Video
Civil Society, Development Policies and Indicators
DevNet/NZAID Conference presentation -
16 Oct 2012 - Radio
Radio NZ Sunday Morning: A look at overseas aid
As “former aid worker”, I have discussed aid policies with Jane Silloway Smith from the Maxim Institute (a conservative NZ think tank) and Geoff Bertram, economist at Victoria University. -
11 Jul 2014 - Online
NZ Aid & Africa: 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2… 1
Development Policy Blog of the Australian National University (ANU)
Other Links
- Inter-Island Rivalry in the Pacific - Presentation at CNEP Conference in Nouméa (New Caledonia) in December 2015.
- Western volunteers fighting for IS. How is this time different? - Presentation at NZPSA Conference in Palmerston North (New Zealand) in December 2015.
- When cows go to town: Food safety and livestock in Tanzania - Presentation at NZPSA Conference in Palmerston North (New Zealand) in December 2015.
- Collaboration between international NGOs and national knowledge institutes (Uganda, South Sudan) - Presentation at Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs in The Hague (The Netherlands) in November 2015
- Purpose, relationship, and outputs in the collaboration between international NGOs and national universities - Presentation at DCR Conference in Amsterdam (The Netherlands) in November 2015
- view more...