As international program director for Natural Resources and Climate Change, Anthony “Tony” Bebbington leads the team that works to ensure natural resource governance serves the public interest and reflects the aspirations of rural, low-income, and indigenous communities who claim customary rights to their land or have secured land rights.

He also serves as the foundation’s representative on the Board of the Climate and Land Use Alliance. With over 35 years of experience, Tony’s work has addressed the impacts of extractive industries on community rights and territories, the role of social movements and NGOs in social and political change, and the factors driving inclusive rural development in Latin America and Indonesia.

Before joining the foundation in 2021, Tony was Higgins Professor of Environment and Society and Director of the Graduate School of Geography at Clark University, and an Australia Laureate Professor at the University of Melbourne. In addition to holding academic positions, he has worked for non-profit think tanks in the United Kingdom, as a social scientist at the World Bank, and as a research associate with NGOs in Peru and Chile. He is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, was a Fellow of the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation and sits on the board of Oxfam America.

Tony holds a PhD in geography from Clark University in the USA, and a bachelor’s degree in geography and land economy from Cambridge University in the UK.