Accounting, Finance and Economics Research Group

Professor Anne-Marie Ward

Professor of Accounting

Education

• PhD in Accounting and Finance, Queen's University Belfast (2005)
• Postgraduate Certificate in University Teaching, University of Ulster (2000)
• Irish Chartered Accountant Professional Examinations, First in Northern Ireland (Fifth in Ireland) (1995)
• MAcc in Accounting, Queens University at Belfast (1993)
• BA (Hons) in Accounting, University of Ulster, First class honours (1992)

Research Interests

Professor Ward’s main research interest is the social economy and financial inclusion, in particular the governance and performance of non-profit, member-owned, cooperative credit unions.

She has contributed substantially to the literature in this area and is regarded as one of the leading academics on the subject.

Professor Ward has been involved in six successful grant projects worth a total of over £200,000 and is the author of over 100 publications including academic articles in peer-reviewed journals such as Journal of Business Ethics, Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly, Journal of Business, Finance and Accounting, Social Economic Review, Studies in Higher Education, Accounting Forum, Financial Accountability and Management and British Accounting Review.

She has also authored policy research reports and chapters in peer-reviewed research texts or encyclopaedias.

In recent years, Professor Ward has widened her research interests and is currently working on research projects in the areas of Northern Ireland’s 10X economy, doctoral education, sustainability and gender.

Teaching

Professor Ward teaches at undergraduate and postgraduate level on the subject area of financial management, as well as providing supervision for several doctoral students.

She taught professional courses for Chartered Accountants Ireland for 15 years. Professor Ward is regarded as one of the leading (co)authors of academic accounting textbooks, including Finance Theory and Practice (4 editions), Introduction to Financial Accounting (10 editions), Financial Accounting and Reporting: An International Approach and An Introduction to Personal Finance (4 editions).

Her textbooks are adopted in over 40 institutions in the UK and Ireland and also have international adoptions in China, Malaysia and mainland Europe.

Professor George Tridimas

Professor of Political Economy

George Tridimas is Professor of Political Economy at Ulster University.

He obtained a Bachelor’s of Arts in Economics from the University of Athens and a Master’s and a Doctorate in Economics from the University of Oxford. Before joining Ulster University, he held positions at the University of the Witwatersrand in South Africa, and the University of Reading in England.

George's research interests are in political economy, public economics and law and economics. He has published widely in topics such as mechanisms of collective decision-making, including elections, referendums and power-sharing arrangements in divided societies, the emergence and fall of direct democracy in ancient Athens, the size of government, the allocation of public expenditure, publicly provided goods and the economic behaviour of the private sector, and the economic analysis of the judiciary. His work combines theory, analysis of policy and applied econometrics and has a strong interdisciplinary element borrowing from history, political science and law. At various times his research was funded by the British Academy and the ESRC.

George has held various visiting fellowships in Canada, the Czech Republic, Romania and the USA. He is a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. He is currently serving as a member of the editorial boards of the European Journal of Political Economy and Constitutional Political Economy, and is Co–editor–in–Chief of the German – Greek Yearbook of Political Economy.

Professor Joan Ballantine

Professor of Accounting

Dr Sabrina Bunyan

Lecturer in Economics

Dr Sabrina Bunyan is a lecturer in Economics at Ulster University.  She is Course Director of Business Economics.

Sabrina holds a masters in economics from University College Cork and a PhD from the University of Portsmouth.  Sabrina is a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy.

Prior to joining Ulster University, Sabrina worked at the University of Portsmouth.  She has also taught in China and in the United Arab Emirates.

Sabrina’s research interests are in the area of the applied microeconomic issues of social exclusion and social participation.   In particular, her research interests include exclusion from financial markets, exclusion from the digital economy, as well as social participation, for example, through participation in voluntary activities.  Her work has been published in the Journal of Consumer Policy, Environmental Management and Tijdschrift voor economiche en sociale geographie (Journal of Economic and Social Geography).

Dr Mark Mulgrew

Lecturer in Accounting

Michael Pogue

Senior Lecturer

Paul Stewart

Lecturer in Financial Services

Dr Judith Wylie

Senior Lecturer in Accounting

Dr Judith Wylie joined the Ulster University Business School in 2010. Her research interests are in the areas of corporate social responsibility, corporate governance and business ethics. Judith’s PhD investigated Corporate Social Responsibility (“CSR”) communication strategies in Irish Listed Companies.

Judith is a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, and teaches at both undergraduate and postgraduate level. In 2014 she led a team which won an Ulster University Distinguished Teaching Fellowship for excellence in embedding employability within teaching and learning activities.

Judith studied accounting and law, under an entrance scholarship, and also obtained a further undergraduate scholarship to spend a semester studying at the University of Newcastle, Australia. Judith combined the two skill sets obtained during her degree and embarked in a career in forensic accounting with PwC where she qualified as a Chartered Accountant, she is now a Fellow of Chartered Accountants Ireland. In her role as a Consultant within Forensic Services she worked with clients globally, investigating economic crime and advising on commercial disputes.

Judith delivers a number of modules drawing on her professional experience and research activity including forensic accounting, cybercrime and forensic technology, effective board decision making and risk management and corporate governance within the Department of Accounting, Finance and Economics. She is also the Course Director of the BSc Hons Business Technology degree which is a successful Higher Level Apprenticeship Programme.