Professor of Economic Geography, Department of Geography, University of Cambridge

Mia Gray is a Professor of economic geography at Cambridge University and a Fellow of Girton College, specialising in labour, economic and urban geography. Her work explores the intersection of political economy and geographies of inequality, labour, debt, and state restructuring. Her research on austerity examines the economic, social and political effects of austerity – how it is used to reshape the relationship between the local and central state, how it structures the local welfare state, and the ways in which it exacerbates and reproduces inequality in place. She is Vice Chair of the Regional Studies Association and is co-editor of the Cambridge Journal of Regions, Economy and Society.

Mia also researches:

• Labour markets and the social and organisational dynamics of work. This research covers workers in high-tech industries as well as in low-paid service sector industries, looking at issues of social capital in the workplace; unionisation; social inclusion in high tech industries; knowledge flows; gender, ethnicity and the links to innovation; and globalisation and the organisation of cross-site project teams.
• Regional economies. This research challenges some of the literature on industrial districts formation, characterises different types of regional growth, and explores the links between globalisation and vibrant regional economies. More recently, Mia has been exploring globalisation of R&D firms and their institutional efforts to promote knowledge diffusion within the firm.

Mia holds a Masters in City and Regional Planning from the University of California at Berkeley and a PhD from Rutgers University.