As an anthropologist and business family member with an interest in the ethnography of family business, Dr O'Neal has served as a member of the research team which conducted in-depth interviews with some forty ultra-high-net-worth international multigenerational business families for a project led by Prof. Dennis Jaffe and conducted under the auspices of Family Office Exchange, Family Business Network and SilverBridge. A white paper by Dr. Jaffe chronicling the project may be accessed by clicking the title here:  “Good Fortune: Building a Hundred Year Family Enterprise".

In addition to his involvement in the family business arena, Dr O'Neal remains active as a scholar of Caribbean social history. His recently published volume on BVI social history, Slavery, Smallholding and Tourism: Social Transformations in the British Virgin Islands (Quid Pro Books, 2012), has garnered critical acclaim as a pioneering work and has relevance for an understanding of the transformation of the BVI into a major international financial services jurisdiction:

“Read in the historical context of tourism and Caribbean research, O’Neal’s work stands out as an early and significant contribution. But even apart from its pioneering status, this is an important book. . . . The work is fresh, innovative, and ethnographically rich … an in-depth account of the transformations activated by tourism, as they are happening.”
— Colleen Ballerino Cohen, Professor of Anthropology & Women’s Studies, Vassar College

The book also provides insights into the ascendancy of the financial services sector in the BVI:

“O’Neal’s book is a story of tourism, not finance. But it was written right at the beginning of the emergence of this ‘second pillar’ of the British Virgin Islands’ economy - financial services - and the tantalizing references to that industry in this book, as well as the rich discussion of the enduring influence of the plantation complex, provide … commentary on value, its circulation, and its deep histories, histories that O’Neal’s volume helps us better to discern.”
— Bill Maurer, Professor of Anthropology & Law, University of California, Irvine