Election of your new Board of Directors and Office Holders

At our Annual General Meeting (AGM) on September 10, 2025, the available seats on the Board of Directors and Office Holders will be elected by our members.

Every member of ISCA is encouraged to review the nominees below so that you can make an informed vote at the AGM to elect the members who you believe will be best for the association. You can read their profiles and click to watch short videos, their CV, and other professional information.

How voting will work

ISCA members are eligible to attend the virtual online AGM and vote to have their say in who governs our association.

Each member will vote for one (1) candidate for each office holder position, this year it is just the President position.

Each member will vote for two (2) candidates for Ordinary Board positions. The two (2) candidates receiving the most votes will be elected as Directors.

Meet the nominees

Listed in alphabetical order.

Nominees for President

Tristan Claridge (he/him)

Australia

I am the current President of ISCA and Director for the Institute for Social Capital. I have a deep passion for social capital, and I believe the concept has great potential to be transformative... Read more

Tristan Claridge

I am the current President of ISCA, Director for the Institute for Social Capital, Visiting Associate Professor at Heriot-Watt University, and Fellow of the RSA. I have a deep passion for social capital, and I believe the concept has great potential to be transformative to a wide range of applications. I have been helping and supporting social capital researchers and practitioners for over 15 years, and ISCA has grown out of this passion. Since early 2020, I have held regular social capital events with free and open access for everyone in the world. From these events and my website audience, a community of several thousand people formed, and with Jacob Spanke’s significant and ongoing support, ISCA was formed in 2021.

I am passionate about ISCA’s vision, and I believe I have the experience and drive to continue to lead our association. I believe ISCA can be a global leader and can facilitate our members to be leaders in their fields, and help to improve the application of social capital.

I have over 20 years of experience researching and applying social capital to a wide range of contexts. I am a geographer and environmental scientist with a passion for sustainable development and poverty alleviation. I have a bachelors and masters degree from the University of Queensland in Australia. I take an interdisciplinary perspective by combining the lessons of economics, sociology, political science, psychology, urban planning and any other discipline that contributes to understanding the concept of social capital.

In my professional career, I have worked in consulting, training, university lecturing, project management, and event management. I have started and operated several businesses in a range of different industries, and I have a strong background in volunteer work for non-profit and community-based organisations. I am a facilitator, teacher, and consultant, and I am happiest when I am helping people and organisations.

Nominees for Ordinary Director

You will be asked to vote for the two (2) people whom you would like to form the Board of Directors.

Jennifer R Bishop (she/her)

United States

I am honored to be nominated for an ordinary directorship with the International Association of Social Capital (ISCA). My 25-year career spans financial services, academia, and nonprofit leadership, all centered on strengthening systems through equity, resilience, and social capital. Read more

Dr. Jennifer R. Bishop

I am honored to be nominated for an ordinary directorship with the International Association of Social Capital (ISCA). My 25-year career spans financial services, academia, and nonprofit leadership, all centered on strengthening systems through equity, resilience, and social capital.

Professionally, I have served as a senior executive in operational risk at major U.S. banks, where I designed enterprise-wide frameworks for 8,000+ employees and worked closely with regulators to deliver sustainable change. These experiences shaped my understanding of organizational networks, power dynamics, and the importance of trust and credibility in building collective success.

Academically, I earned a Ph.D. in Management and Organizational Design from Case Western Reserve University. My research focuses on the social capital of African American women in organizational leadership, examining the ways networks, sponsorship, and trust shape advancement opportunities and resilience in environments where representation remains scarce. I continue to publish and present on these topics globally, bridging scholarship with practice and contributing to the growing body of work on equity and social networks.

I also serve as faculty in doctoral and undergraduate programs, teaching organizational change, leadership, and human resource management. Beyond academia, I founded Triumphant Steps, a nonprofit dedicated to breaking cycles of poverty for women and children by building social capital and economic pathways to sustainability.

As an ISCA board member, I would bring deep academic grounding, lived experience, and strategic leadership to expand our global membership, amplify diverse perspectives, and enhance the practical application of social capital research. My vision is to strengthen ISCA’s role as the premier hub where scholarship and practice intersect to drive innovation and societal transformation.

Dr. Jennifer R. Bishop ISCA Board Nominee Video

Geeta Mehta
(she/her)

United States

It will be my honor to be of service on the board of ISCA because I firmly believe in its mission. Social Capital is the way forward for our world, as there much need to balance the excessive focus on financial capital, which is destroying the social and ecological capital. Read more

Geeta Mehta

It will be my honor to be of service on the board of ISCA because I firmly believe in its mission. Social Capital is the way forward for our world, as there much need to balance the excessive focus on financial capital, which is destroying the social and ecological capital. My vision for ISCA is for it to become a globally recognized organization bringing ideas and applications of social capital to members in the academia, civil society and governments in the service of humanity.

I am the founder of Social Capital Initiatives (SCI), a non-profit organization that serves over 100,000 people in underserved communities to help improve neighborhoods, the environment and people’s livelihoods. More information about our work is at socialcapitalinitiatives.org. Social Capital Credits (SoCCs), our community currency for social good that has won the “World Changing Idea” award from the Fast Company, and prizes from MIT SOLVE, General Motors, Vodafone, Jacobs Foundation and others. SoCCs is being used in our projects in India, Nepal, Taiwan, Kenya and the United States. I am also an adjunct professor of architecture and urban design at Columbia University in New York. I have had the opportunity to work in 13 countries in Asia, Africa, Europe, as well as South and North America.

I have served on the New York City Mayor’s Waterfront Management Advisory Board, and the Management Policy Council of the University of Tokyo. I was the president of the American Institute of Architects’ Japan Chapter while I lived in Tokyo. My book entitled “Building Social Capital by Design” is scheduled to be published in 2026.

I was listed by Forbes as one of the 50 over 50 Impact Makers, and by Women’s eNews as one of the 21 Leaders of the 21st Century.

Alex Petric
(he/him)

Canada

Having been an ISCA member since 2022, I have actively engaged with the association through webinars and in-person conferences, and I am grateful for ISCA’s role in advancing and convening social capital research. Read more

Alex Petric

Having been an ISCA member since 2022, I have actively engaged with the association through webinars and in-person conferences, and I am grateful for ISCA’s role in advancing and convening social capital research. I am eager to build on my involvement to date and to contribute further to the association’s growth and development. Most recently, I helped organize a lecture by ISCA President Tristan Claridge at the University of Waterloo, and this experience deepened my appreciation for ISCA’s mission and strengthened my commitment to its work.

I am currently a Ph.D. Candidate in Urban Planning, with research focused on the relationship between the built environment, urban policy, and the creation and maintenance of social capital. Beyond academia, I have organizational experience from student-run and community-based initiatives where I worked with teams to manage meetings, record minutes, plan events, and navigate challenges. As a published academic with direct experience in the peer-review process, I believe that I am well-positioned to contribute to ISCA’s Publications Committee and to support the association’s broader organizational goals.

If elected to the Board of Directors, I would be honoured to apply my skills in the service of ISCA’s mission, and to help strengthen the community of scholars and practitioners dedicated to the study and application of social capital. Thank you for considering me as a candidate.

Nomination Process

The Nomination Committee established a robust and transparent process for accepting and reviewing nominations for the Board of Directors. More details about the process can be found here.

Six submissions were received in 2025. Following the review process by the Nomination Committee, only four of the nominees are eligible for election.

Scroll to Top