Shirin Malekpour is Associate Professor in sustainability governance. As a social scientist, her work is dedicated to improving long-term policy making and governance for sustainable development. In recent years, her research has centred on governance through goals, exploring the potential of goal-based frameworks (such as the UN Sustainable Development Goals) to drive policy and institutional change in different contexts. Throughout her academic career, Shirin has led complex transdisciplinary programs (total $2M) on localising the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), collaborative governance, futures thinking and scenario planning. She has published in renowned journals, including Nature, Nature Sustainability and Nature Communications.

Shirin is a scientific advisor to the UN on sustainable development. She was appointed by the UN Secretary-General as one of the 15 members of the Independent Group of Scientists, tasked with writing the 2023 Global Sustainable Development Report. 

Shirin has an interdisciplinary background with a PhD in Sociology (Monash University – Australia), a Master’s Degree in Civil Engineering (Delft University of Technology – the Netherlands) and a Bachelor’s Degree in Chemical Engineering (the University of Tehran – Iran). Prior to her academic career, she has worked for 5 years in large water and wastewater infrastructure projects across Africa and the Middle East.

In 2018, Shirin was recognised as one of the top 25 young scientists in the world in the field of sustainable development and received the international Green Talents award.