Andy Thompson is Professor of Global & Imperial History at Nuffield College and Co-Director of the Oxford Global History Centre.

He was previously the Chief Executive of the Arts and Humanities Research Council and the International Champion for UK Research and InnovatIon. He was awarded a CBE for his “services to research” in 2021.

Andy is writing a book for Oxford University Press: “Humanitarianism on Trial: How a Global System of Aid and Development Emerged from the End of Empire”. Alongside this, he is the PI on an AHRC-funded project, “International NGOs and the Long Humanitarian Century: Legacy, Legitimacy and Leading into the Future”. He has spoken about his research on the past, present and future of humanitarianism and human rights to the senior executive groups of the United Nations Development Programme, the UK Disasters Emergency Committee, and the US-based NGO consortia InterAction.

He is currently advising former Prime Minister Theresa May on setting up a Global Commission on Modern Slavery having secured in 2016 a £10m investment from the UK government for the world’s first designated research centre into human trafficking. He has a long-standing interest in postcolonial migrations and was also involved in advising the Windrush Lessons Learned Review and commenting on its final report in draft.