About the Author

Dr Robert Cooper has a PhD in Economic Anthropology and was elected Fellow of the Royal Anthropological Institute in 1979. He has served with the UN in Laos, Malawi, the Philippines and Thailand, among others, and spent a year advising the Vietnamese government on poverty reduction before settling in Vientiane, Laos, where he currently manages Book-Café Vientiane, the largest bookshop in the country. He is the author of The Hmong and Thais Mean Business, in addition to various cultural guides and novels.