Victoria Beard

Victoria Beard’s research and teaching focus on comparative urbanization and international development planning. Beard’s research focuses on how planners address urban inequality and poverty. In cities in the Global South, communities often plan for themselves, outside of, in collaboration with, and in opposition to formal planning and regulatory frameworks. In response to the limitations of community-based planning, Beard has expanded her work to focus on the city perspective and access to basic services, particularly water and sanitation, and the broader processes that create and sustain city-wide transformation.

From 2015 to 2017, Beard served as director of research for the Ross Center for Cities at the World Resources Institute. In this role, she led work on the World Resources Report, Towards a More Equal City. Over the past 20 years, she has worked for the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, AusAID, Mercy Corps, the Research Triangle Institute, and RAND.

Beard holds a Ph.D. in community and regional planning from the University of British Columbia (1999); an M.A. in urban planning from University of California–Los Angeles (1995); and a B.A. in urban studies and planning from the University of California–San Diego (1992).