Marcus Brand

Dr. Marcus Brand (Austria) is a senior democratic governance expert at UNDP’s Asia Pacific Regional Centre (APRC) in Bangkok, and also serves as part-time adviser on Democratic Governance, Rule of Law and Justice Sector Reform at UNDP Myanmar. Affiliated with the APRC since 2011, since 2012 he has been the UNDP APRC’s focal point for coordinating democratic governance-related advice to the UNDP Country Office in Myanmar on developing its new country programme, leading assessments on decentralization, rule of law/access to justice, administrative and parliamentary reform, and democratic space. From 2008 to 2011 he served as senior constitutional advisor and policy specialist in UNDP’s to Constitution Building Support Programme in Kathmandu, Nepal. In that capacity, he was in charge of coordinating international assistance to Nepal’s post-conflict constitution building process, and led the work on state restructuring (federalization) and transition planning. Previously, he has held assignments with the UN in Nepal as Humanitarian Affairs Analyst for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) and with the UN Resident Coordinator’s Unit. Before moving to Nepal, Dr. Brand worked with UNDP’s Governance Group in New York, with assignments in the Gulf Region and Central Asia, focusing on support to new and restored democracies, and the linkages between human development and democratic governance. Prior to his career with the UN, he worked for several years (1999-2006) with the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), including as Special Advisor to the Director of the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) in Warsaw, and as an Advisor to the Head of Mission of the OSCE in Kosovo, where he worked on the establishment of democratic institutions and elections in the post-war period. For the OSCE, he has served on a number of Election Observation and Assessment Missions, including to recently established democracies in South East Europe and the CIS, as well as Turkey, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Denmark and the U.S. He was the lead report writer for the ODIHR’s assessment report on the 2009 elections to the European Parliament, as well as the lead drafter for the ODIHR’s 2006 report “Common Responsibility”, which focused on the ODIHR’s elections-related mandate. He has also worked for the Austrian Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Vienna, the European Stability Initiative (a think tank), the Yale-Soros Civic Education Project in Bulgaria, and the Robert Schuman Centre in Florence. Dr. Brand holds a doctoral degree in international and constitutional law from the University of Vienna (2002), where he also obtained his Masters degree in law earlier (1994). His dissertation deals with the development of constitutionalism and human rights protection in UN-administered Kosovo. He also holds degrees from the European University Institute (EUI) in Florence (LL.M., 1997) and from the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) in Bologna (1995). He speaks several European languages. He is married and has two daughters.

Thematic Areas of Expertise