Maÿlis Durand-Lasserve’s background is in Economics (University of Paris I). Until her recent retirement, she was Professor at the Department of sociology at University Victor Segalen of Bordeaux, France, where she taught social history. She is now a consultant with Geoffrey Payne and Associates where she specialized on land and tenure policies, especially on the relationships between urban and rural land tenure and tenure formalization in sub-Saharan African countries.