Alexander Söderholm

Is an independent consultant in the drugs field. He conducted projects for Johns Hopkins University, the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA), M&C Saatchi World Services, the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime (GIATOC), Open Society Justice Initiative (IDPC), and the International Drug Policy Consortium (IDPC), among others. He formerly served as the Policy Coordinator of the International Drug Policy Unit (IDPU) at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), Head of the IDPU Middle East Initiative, and Managing Editor of the Journal of Illicit Economies and Development (LSE Press). A graduate of LSE with a Master’s of Science (MSc) in International Development and Humanitarian Emergencies, Mr. Söderholm is a PhD candidate at the LSE in Social Policy. His PhD project is “Drugs, Livelihoods, and Development: The Role of Illicit Markets in Determining Development Outcomes.” Before joining IDPU, He worked with the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) in Tehran, and he has studied the intersection between illicit drug markets and development outcomes in Myanmar, Thailand, South Africa, Brazil, and Colombia.