Speaker: Paul Prettitore, World Bank and Visiting Scholar, School of Law, QUB

Co-ordinator: Professor Louise Mallinder, QUB

This Seminar will explore the relationships among land markets, fragility, conflict and violence (FCV) and resilience.  These relationships are viewed through a new framework covering Policy & Institutions, Land Transactions, Equity & Inclusion, and Accountability.  Research is conducted as part of the World Bank’s ‘Global Policy Note on Developing FCV Land Markets to Promote Resilience’ that will support identification and assessment of risks and interventions that can promote resilience thorough the support of international development organizations.

The key themes covered include:

• Protection of land rights and safeguarding land transactions
• Elite capture and land grabbing
• Land tenure risk mapping
• Addressing gaps in access to land
• Accountability mechanisms for land-related abuses

This Seminar will cover global insights as well as country-level experience including Ukraine, Sierra Leone and Venezuela.

Paul Prettitore

Paul Prettitore is currently a Senior Land Administration Specialist at the World Bank.  Based in Zagreb, Croatia, Paul has worked on land conflict issues in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Palestine, Syria, Iraq, the Philippines, Colombia, Kosovo, Angola, Burundi and Uganda.  

During his career at the World Bank Paul has worked on issues of good governance, justice sector reform and land administration.

Prior to joining the World Bank Paul was Property Law Coordinator at the Office of the High Representative of Bosnia and Herzegovina (2000-2003), Legal Advisor at OSCE in Sarajevo (2003-2004) and Refugee Specialist at the U.S Embassy in Sarajevo (1998-2000).

Paul was a Visiting Scholar at the Faculty of Law at QUB from 2024-2025 and a pro bono lawyer at the Superior Court of Washington, D.C. (2013-2021).

Professor Louise Mallinder

Louise Mallinder is Interim Director of the Senator George J. Mitchell Institute for Global Peace, Security, and Justice and a Professor of Law and at Queen’s University Belfast.  At the University of Chicago she is a Faculty Affiliate of the Pearson Institute for the Study and Resolution of Global Conflicts, and was the 2024 Pozen Professor of Human Rights.  She holds a PhD in law, an LLM in human rights law, and BA in economic and social history and politics, all from Queen’s University Belfast. 

Louise’s book Amnesty, Human Rights and Political Transitions: Bridging the Peace and Justice Divide was awarded the British Society of Criminology Book Prize and the Hart Socio-Legal Studies Association Early Career Prize.  She is co-editing The Elgar Concise Encyclopedia on Law and Peace, and co-authored Lawyers in Conflict and Transition (2022).

Louise is a Member of the Royal Irish Academy and a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences and of the Higher Education Academy.  She is also a member of the Institute for Integrated Transitions Law and Peace Practice Group, and of the ESRC and AHRC Peer Review Colleges.  She was Chair of the Committee on the Administration of Justice, a human rights non-governmental organization based in Belfast, during 2015-2020, and was Vice-Chair during 2013-2015 and 2020-2024.