Kris Clarke

I am an associate professor of social work in the Faculty of Social Sciences at the University of Helsinki. Originally from Fresno, California, I am an Irish citizen who has lived in Finland for over 25 years. My research interests center on decolonization, structural social work, and the significance of place and social memory. I teach courses on international and structural social work, and supervise master's theses and doctoral dissertations. 

I received my bachelor of arts in English literature from Reed College in Portland, Oregon, USA. I completed a master's of social science in International Relations at the University of Tampere. I received a licentiate and doctor of social science in social work at the University of Tampere.

I recently completed a book in collaboration with Michael Yellow Bird, Decolonizing Pathways towards Integrative Healing in Social Work (Routledge, 2020). I am further developing my interests in decolonizing social work practice through research on the significance of nature in healing. I am also working on a project that employs critical race analyses of the carceral state to explore how civic space and conceptions of community have been reconfigured through a case study in Fresno, California. Finally, I am developing a collaborative urban social work project that examines diverse communities and civic space in Helsinki.