Philip McCann

Professor Philip McCann is Chair of Urban and Regional Economics at Alliance Manchester Business School.

Philip McCann specialises in spatial economics and economic geography. He has also been a Special Adviser to two European Commissioners, an advisor to the European Commission, the OECD, the European Investment Bank, as well as government ministries and research institutes in several countries. He joined The University of Manchester in July 2022 from the University of Sheffield. In May 2024, he was appointed the Sir Terry Leahy Chair in Urban and Regional Economics. For more details, read his full CV.

Philip was a member of Labour’s Commission on the UK’s Future, led by former Prime Minister Gordon Brown. He gave evidence to the Report of the Commission on the UK’s Future about the UK’s geographical inequality.

Philip McCann is one of the world’s most highly cited and widely published spatial economists and economic geographers of his generation, and currently one of the UK’s most highly cited social scientists.

He has won seven awards for his research in different parts of the world: the 2002 Hewings Award from NARSC (North America); the 2007 Moss Madden Memorial Medal (UK and Ireland); the 2010 ERSA 50^th Anniversary Award (Europe); the 2016 Best Paper in Regional Studies Award (International); the 2018Best Paper in Regional Studies Award (International), the 2019 Martin Beckmann Award (International) and the 2019 ERSA European Prize in Regional Science (Europe).

Philip has been a Special Adviser to two European Commissioners (Commissioner Johannes Hahn 2010-2013 and Commissioner Corina Creţu 2015-2016), Chief Independent Economic Advisor on the EU Sixth Report on Economic, Social and Territorial Cohesion, an advisor or consultant to the Directorate General for Regional and Urban Policy at the European Commission, four different directorates at the OECD Paris, the European Investment Bank, as well as government ministries and research institutes in several countries.

In the UK Philip is the Co-Director and Principal Investigator of the £2.28 million Productivity Insights Network+ research programme funded by the UK Economic and Social Research Council 2018-2020. He is also a researcher with both UK in a Changing Europe and the Rebuilding Macroeconomics Network and the ‘Geography and Place’ Theme Leader in the ESRC-funded National Productivity Institute research programme.