David Keen received his doctorate from Oxford. His study of the political economy of famine was published by Princeton University Press as The Benefits of Famine. He is also the author of The Economic Functions of Violence in Civil Wars (Oxford University Press) and The Best of Enemies: Conflict and Collusion in Sierra Leone (James Currey/Palgrave Macmillan, scheduled for 2004). He formerly worked as a researcher, consultant and journalist.