Global Development Institute Blog

Global Development Institute Blog

We’re the Global Development Institute at The University of Manchester: where critical thinking meets social justice.

Hrishipara daily financial diaries: Education and Occupations

Hrishipara daily financial diaries: Education and Occupations

To what extent are occupations shaped by the family’s educational record?

In early 2018 we published a blog called Bangladesh and Education: doing well, could do better. It was based on late 2017 data from the Hrishipara Daily Financial Diaries project, which has been tracking the lives of 70 low-income households in central Bangladesh since May 2015.

Today we return to the theme, partly to take advantage of a further two years of data, and partly to extend the discussion to look at the educational histories of households, and how that relates to the occupations of its current members. read more…

Open access book: The Politics of Social Protection in Eastern and Southern Africa

Open access book: The Politics of Social Protection in Eastern and Southern Africa

“The recent creation or expansion of programmes of social protection all across East and Southern Africa raises intriguing and important issues for scholars of the region’s politics. This book, with its admirable combination of empirical substance and analytic clarity, is a landmark contribution to this new field. It will be a key point of reference for our discussions and debates for many years to come.” – James Ferguson, Stanford University

A new, open access book on The Politics of Social Protection in Eastern and Southern Africa has been edited by GDI’s Sam Hickey, Tom Lavers, together with UNU-WIDER’S Miguel Niño-Zarazúa, and Jeremy Seekings of the University of Cape Town.

Closely linked to the Effective States and Inclusive Development research centre’s work on social protection, the book challenges existing accounts of how social protection has spread in Africa. read more…

Uma Kothari announces RGS with IBG 2020 conference theme

Uma Kothari announces RGS with IBG 2020 conference theme

Professor Uma Kothari is chairing the Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute of British Geographers) 2020 conference which will be held at the Society in London, from Tuesday 1 to Friday 4 September 2020.

The theme Uma has selected for the conference is borders, borderlands and bordering. The conference programme will include sessions and papers which engage directly with this theme, as well as others focusing on all areas of geography. read more…

Climate action: why developed countries should track imported emissions, and how to make certification and labelling work for developing countries

Climate action: why developed countries should track imported emissions, and how to make certification and labelling work for developing countries

Aarti Krishnan, Research Fellow, Global Development Institute, The University of Manchester, and Simon Maxwell, Senior Research Associate of ODI

Developed countries are making progress in reducing carbon emissions – and Government regulation of the private sector is playing its part. In the UK, for example, and alongside other measures, the requirement to report energy and carbon emissions has recently been extended to a wide range of quoted and unquoted companies and limited liability partnerships. This is intended to help improve energy efficiency, support companies in cutting costs, and at the same time reduce carbon emissions. Many hundreds of companies have signed up to measurement and certification, and sometimes offset, schemes, like the footprint label from the Carbon Trust, the carbon neutral label from Natural Capital Partners, or Carbon Smart certification from Carbon Smart. The scope and coverage of such schemes is expanding, as indirect emissions and life cycle issues are recognised. read more…

Obituary – Professor Dennis Austin

It is with great sadness that we report the death on October 21, 2019 of Emeritus Professor Dennis Austin at his home in Colchester. Born at the Grove Hospital, Tooting on 14th  March, 1922, he was the son of Henry Edmund Austin. After wartime service with the Royal Air Force, he obtained his B.A. degree from King’s College (University of London) in 1949, and that same year was appointed an extra mural tutor at the new University College in the British Gold Coast dependency in West Africa.  read more…

State [in]capacity and national development

State [in]capacity and national development

Mohammad Kamrul Hasan, PhD Researcher and Teaching Assistant, Global Development Institute

Capacity development has become an important issue in the management of public affairs. It deals with obtaining, strengthening and maintaining individual or organizational capabilities in order to fulfil its goal or objectives. Though capacity development has been the centre of attention in developed nations for long period of time, it has gradually become an issue for both developing and underdeveloped countries in the last decade or so.  And it has become an important tool for ensuring inclusive development. read more…

How mega infrastructure projects in Africa, Asia and Latin America are reshaping development

How mega infrastructure projects in Africa, Asia and Latin America are reshaping development

read more…

GDI Lecture: Can technology solve global poverty with Rachel Glennerster

GDI Lecture: Can technology solve global poverty with Rachel Glennerster

Listen or watch Rachel Glennerster, the Chief Economist of the Department for International Development, discuss whether technology can solve global poverty. Prior to her current role she was the Executive Director of the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab, a research centre in the Economics department of MIT.

Dr Glennerster discusses how technology has driven improvements in income and health in poor countries, why there is too little innovation designed to meet the needs of the poor, and the promise of the data revolution. read more…