Daniel Maxwell is the Henry J. Leir Professor in Food Security at the Friedman School of Nutrition, Science, and Policy. He directs the Food Security and Livelihoods in Complex Emergencies Research Program at the Feinstein International Center, and in 2016-2017, he served as the Acting Director of the Center. His recent research focuses on the re-emergence of famines in the 21st century and the politics of analyzing and declaring famine. Dan also researches food security, resilience programming and measurement, and livelihood systems under stress. He teaches courses on food security, humanitarian action, humanitarian policy, and food insecurity in situations of crisis and chronic vulnerability.
Prior to joining the faculty at Tufts, Dan worked for two decades at humanitarian agencies and research institutes in Uganda, Ghana, and Kenya. His most recent position was Deputy Regional Director for Eastern and Central Africa for CARE International.
He is the author, with Nisar Majid, of Famine in Somalia: Competing Imperatives, Collective Failures (Oxford University Press, 2016). He is the co-author, with Chris Barrett of Cornell University, of Food Aid After Fifty Years: Recasting Its Role (Routledge, 2005), and co-author with Peter Walker, of Shaping the Humanitarian World (Routledge, 2009).
He holds a B.Sc. from Wilmington College, a master’s degree from Cornell University, and a Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin.