Aidan McQuade

Photograph: Jakub Sobik / Anti-Slavery International

Aidan McQuade is a writer and independent human rights consultant. He comes from South Armagh in the North of Ireland. 

He was director of Anti-Slavery International from 2006 to 2017. Before that he worked in development and humanitarian operations, including leading Oxfam GB’s emergency responses to the civil war in Angola. He is a recognised expert on forced labour and trafficking and regularly advises businesses, international organisations and NGOs. In 2017 he received an honorary OBE for his work on the elimination of modern slavery, which he returned in 2024 in protest at the UK government’s egregious human rights failures.

He has written another novel, Some Service to the State, which reunites readers with the characters from The Undiscovered Country in 1925, and a professional book, Ethical Leadership: moral decision making under pressure. He lives in London.