Helen Lackner has worked as a consultant in social aspects of rural development in over thirty countries in the Middle East, Africa, Asia and Europe. She has spent the past four decades researching Yemen, working in the country for fifteen years. She is currently the editor of the Journal of the British-Yemeni Society and is a regular contributor to Oxford Analytica's briefs and to openDemocracy. Her publications include Why Yemen Matters: A Society in Transition.