Sinclair is a Senior Fellow and Associate Professor at the Australian National University with over 30 years’ research and policy experience in the Southwest Pacific. He was formerly a law lecturer at the University of Papua New Guinea and senior researcher at PNG’s National Research Institute. His PhD fieldwork undertaken in PNG investigated raskol gangs in Port Moresby, conflict around resource development projects in the Highlands and election-related violence.
Sinclair has a longstanding interest in access to justice and the intersections between formal and informal justice provision in the contemporary Pacific. He has also conducted research and published widely in the areas of legal pluralism, crime and policing, private security, conflict and peacebuilding, state fragility and hybrid social orders. Currently he is a chief investigator on two major Australian Research Council Discovery projects, investigating community lawmaking in the Pacific Islands and improving responses to sexual violence against children in PNG.
Sinclair has completed policy and research assignments for a wide range of regional governments and civil society groups, international donors and organisations, including the Australian and New Zealand governments, World Bank, Overseas Development Institute, CARITAS, The Asia Foundation, UNDP and UNICEF.