Dr Nicholas Farrelly's research stretches across the Southeast Asian region and focuses on relationships between government control, spatial organisation and political conflict. He was a Rhodes Scholar at Balliol College, Oxford, before returning to take up teaching and research positions at the Australian National University where he had been an undergraduate. Much of Dr Farrelly’s previous research has focussed on the borderlands of northern Burma, northeast India and southwest China. While studying those areas he has continued to research, write and lecture about Thailand. In 2006 he co-founded New Mandala, a blog which has grown to become the preeminent website for academic discussions of Thailand and Burma, and the other countries of the region. He also provides commentary for the Australian and international media, particularly at times of acute public interest in Southeast Asia and its conflicts. Dr Farrelly’s current research focuses on policing and paramilitary organisations in Southeast Asia, and the role of governments in protracted political and social upheavals.