Graham Teskey

Graham Teskey leads Abt Global’s Global Governance practice out of Canberra, Australia. He has 40 years of experience in governance and international development. He has worked with (and for) for the U.K.’s Department for International Development, (the forerunner to the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office), the World Bank, and Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. Graham has lived and worked in multiple countries, including Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Malawi, Fiji, Vanuatu, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Philippines, and Timor-Leste.

Graham serves as a resource on the governance aspects of international development, leads or supports engagement with major clients, and is building Abt’s thought leadership and reputational capital in governance.

Before joining Abt, Graham was the Principal Governance Specialist for the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT), where he advised DFAT on its governance and public sector projects in its international aid program.

Before moving to Canberra, Graham was Senior Adviser for Governance and Head of the Governance and Anti-Corruption Secretariat at The World Bank. He was responsible for the preparation and drafting of the World Bank’s 2012 Governance and Anti-Corruption Strategy.

Graham spent 16 years with DFID and was posted in Fiji, Kenya, and Uganda. In 1996 he helped establish DFID’s Governance and Institutions Department. His last two senior civil service posts were in London as head of the Africa Policy Department and head of Governance and Social Development. Graham was one of the key contributors to the U.K.’s 2006 Development White Paper, “Making Governance Work for the Poor.”

He began his career as an economist in the Central Planning Office in Fiji. Then he worked for the National Planning and Statistics Office in Vanuatu, followed by a post with the Rukwa region of southwest Tanzania for the Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation. Graham also held a lectureship teaching development studies at the University of Bradford in the U.K.

Expertise

• Public service reform and management
• Decentralisation and sub-national governance
• Political economy analysis / Thinking and Working Politically
• Capacity development
• Program and project design, review and evaluation

Key Current Projects

• Solomon Islands – Australia Partnership for Governance
• Sri Lanka Support Unit, DFAT
• Fiji Platform Support Program, DFAT

Publications

• Graham Teskey. ‘Thinking and Working Apolitically’ 2024. In The Elgar Companion to the World Bank. Edited by Antje Vetterlein and Tobias Schmidtke
• Maliki Achmad, Graham Teskey, Anna Winoto, and Michael Woolcock. 2023. ‘Responding Adaptively to the COVID-19 Crisis in Indonesia: Insights and Implications from an Indonesian Governance Program’. Harvard Kennedy School of Government CID Faculty Working Paper No. 425
• Graham Teskey. Afterword. In Jaime Faustino and John Sidel. 2020. Thinking and Working Politically in Development: Coalitions for Change in the Philippines. The Asia Foundation
• Graham Teskey. ‘Capacity Development and State Building: Reflections and Lessons. Abt Working Paper Series No 5, January 2019
• Alan Whaites, Eduardo Gonzalez, Sara Fyson, and Graham Teskey. 2015. ‘A Governance Practitioner’s Notebook: Alternative Ideas and Approaches’. DAC Network on Governance (GovNet) OECD