Max Spoor is Professor of Development Studies (in particular regarding economies in transition) at the International Institute of Social Studies, The Hague/Erasmus University Rotterdam (EUR). He is Visiting Professor at the Barcelona Institute of International Studies (IBEI), and Guest Professor at the Nanjing Agricultural University in China. He is the Chair of the Staff Group “Rural Development, Environment and Population Studies” and of the research cluster “Resources, Livelihoods and Environment” (RELIVE). His research interests are mainly focused on the countries in Central and Eastern Europe (in particular former Soviet Central Asia) and Asian transition economies such as Vietnam and China, with a special interest in rural and environmental issues, land, poverty, inequality and social exclusion. His most recent books are The Political Economy of Rural Livelihoods in Transition Economies, London and New York: Routledge (2009) and, co-edited with Murat Arsel, Water, Environmental Security and Sustainable Rural Development: Conflict and Cooperation in Central Eurasia, London and New York: Routledge (2010). His most recent journal article was with Oane Visser (2011), ‘Land grabbing in post-Soviet Eurasia: the world’s largest agricultural land reserves a stake’, in the The Journal of Peasant Studies.