Jayne Engle has a background in urban and regional planning, policy, development, and governance; philanthropy innovation; and social research and participatory practice. She’s worked in diverse societal change contexts around the world and is now a mission co-holder at Dark Matter Labs, where she’s co-leading 7GenCities, the Property & Beyond Lab and collaborative governance projects. Jayne’s passionate about futures of cities, infrastructure, and institutions, and is committed to decolonizing systems and opening possibilities for what that can mean.

Jayne previously led the Cities & Places Portfolio for the McConnell Foundation, and now is working with philanthropy on mission-aligned endowment strategy. Based in Montreal, and originally from the US, Jayne has also worked extensively in Eastern and Western Europe, including as a Peace Corps economic development volunteer in Slovakia. For her PhD, she carried out fieldwork in Haiti, where she studied community-led reconstruction and locally-designed governance efforts following the devastating earthquake of 2010.

Jayne holds a PhD in Urban Planning, Policy & Design from McGill University where she’s an Adjunct Professor. She’s a Futures Fellow with the Future of Canada Project and co-authored the book Sacred Civics: Building Seven Generation Cities (2022).