Karen possesses extensive experience in management, economics, research and teaching with a focus in the higher education and not-for-profit sectors within Australia. She has extensive experience spanning 30 years as a leader, project manager, administrator, consultant, researcher and teacher. Her strengths lie in research, change management, strategic planning, and bringing people together. She has a passion as an economist in the areas of welfare, social choice, public policy, labour economics, the history of economic thought, philosophy, education and knowledge to innovation translation.
Karen currently holds a number of industry roles. She is Research Director at ICANR and is an associate at Baxter Lawley. She teaches at the University of Western Australia and Edith Cowan University. Her current research focus is in welfare economics, public policy and social choice theory, issues impacting the Not-for-Profit sector, and the philosophy and history of economic thought. She is a member of the Economic Society of Western Australia and the History of Economic Society Australia (HETSA). Karen is a registered teacher in Western Australia.
Karen holds a Bachelor of Business, a Masters of Economics, a Doctorate in Economics and a Post-Graduate Diploma in Education. Her PhD thesis considers the evolution of economic thought and how it has been informed by movements in philosophy, psychology and the sciences. She has presented widely as an academic internationally, and has published work in book chapters and scholarly refereed journals. Her first book A.C. Pigou and the Marshallian Thought Style is currently under contract with Palgrave Macmillan, London.