Dr. Catherine de Fontenay received her PhD in Economics from Stanford University in 1998. Since July 2003 onwards she has been a member of faculty at both the Department of Economics and the Melbourne Business School, at the University of Melbourne. Her two main interests are Development Economics and Industrial Organisation.
One of her current areas of research is the cost of crime in developing countries: crime drives away investment and employment, and countries can become trapped in high crime and low employment. Another area of research is on the effect of market power on interlinked markets in developing countries.
In Industrial Organisation, her research focuses on negotiations between firms and their suppliers, and how mergers in an industry affect those negotiations. She also studies negotiations in other contexts: she is part of an ARC project to examine how scientists collaborate within laboratories, and how it impacts on their career prospects.