Background
Professor Craig has worked at the Universities of Bradford, York, Lincoln, Hull Durham, and Newcastle upon Tyne. Prior to this, he worked in local government and the voluntary sector, mainly in large-scale community development projects.
He was the first person in the world to hold a Chair in Social Justice, from 2000.
Secretary of the UK Social Policy Association 1993-7, Executive member 1993-8 and 1999 to 2003, Editor of the Community Development Journal from 1983-1997.
Sat on Editorial Boards of Community Development Journal, Community Development, Journal of Social Development in Africa, Social Policy and Society, Journal of Social Policy and Journal of Intercultural Studies.
Social policy adviser to many national NGOs including Family Service Units, the Council for Ethnic Minority Voluntary Organisations, the Children’s Society, Barnardos, and to National Lotteries Charities Board/Big Lottery Fund, and has been expert adviser to the UN ECOSOC, OECD, DfID and British Academy.
Former member of the Carnegie UK Trust Commission on Rural Community Development.
Frequently gives evidence to parliamentary bodies in the UK and elsewhere, and sits on Advisory Boards to many projects.
Joined the Board of the International Association of Community Development in 1995 and was elected President in 1999, negotiating special UN consultative status.
Member of the academic advisory group for the UK Index of Multiple Deprivation (2000,2006).
Has been external examiner to undergraduate/postgraduate courses at nine universities, examiner of three ESRC postgraduate research training schemes, and Chair of the Subject Area panel for social policy, social work and health studies. He has been external examiner for 29 PhDs and supervised 9 PhD and 2 MPhil students.
Former member of the social policy and social work sub-panel for the HEFCE 2008 RAE and has chaired DEFRA’s national Diversity and Equality Advisory Group. He also chaired the Hong Kong 2016 RAE subpanel on social policy and social work, advised 15 Universities on REF submissions and 13 others on Professorial /appointments.
Has been sole or joint grant holder for more than 100 research studies, total value of around £4M (see research page). He led major studies on community capacity building for the OECD and major evaluations of all or part of the national Health Action Zones programme, Sure Start, the Children’s Fund and the national CMEVO BME Voluntary Sector Capacity Building programme.
Co-founded (2007) the Wilberforce Institute for the study of Slavery and Emancipation (WISE), Patron Archbishop Desmond Tutu.