Professor Simin Davoudi is Director of the Global Urban Research Unit and Co-Director of Newcastle University Centre for Researching Cities. She is past President of the Association of the European Schools of Planning and elected Fellow of the Royal Town Planning Institute, the Academy of Social Sciences, and the Royal Society of Arts. Simin has served as expert advisor for the UK government, European Commission, and research councils in the UK and several European countries. She held visiting professorships in universities of: Amsterdam, Nijmegen, BTH (Sweden), Virginia Tech, RMIT and Tampere (Finland). Her research and publications focus on the socio-spatial and political aspects of urban planning, environmental governance, climate change, resilience and imaginaries.