Person

Ian Scoones

Ian Scoones

Professorial Fellow

Email

i.scoones@ids.ac.uk

Telephone

+44 (0)1273 915679

Website

http://ianscoones.net/

Ian Scoones is a professor in the Resource Politics and Environmental Change cluster. He was co-director of the ESRC STEPS Centre at Sussex (2006-21) and the principal investigator of the ERC Advanced Grant project, PASTRES (Pastoralism, Uncertainty and Resilience: Lessons From the Margins, (2018-2023).

An ecologist by original training, he works on the interface between science and policy, focusing on the politics of knowledge in the context of agrarian and environmental change, especially in southern Africa. His long-term research on land, agricultural and livelihoods in Zimbabwe is covered in his regular blog, Zimbabweland. His most recent book is Navigating Uncertainty: Radical Rethinking for a Turbulent World published by Polity Books in 2024.

Academic links

Google Scholar
http://goo.gl/1ltnaj
ORCID ID
https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8547-4464
Research Gate
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Ian_Scoones

Downloads

Ian Scoones's CV PDF, 191 KB

Research

Programme

Future Agricultures Consortium

Future Agricultures is a network of researchers on agriculture and food policy in Africa, formed of more than 100 people working in 12 countries across Africa and in Europe.

Project

PASTRES: Pastoralism, Uncertainty and Resilience

PASTRES (Pastoralism, Uncertainty and Resilience: Global Lessons from the Margins) is a research project which aims to learn from the ways that pastoralists respond to uncertainty, applying such 'lessons from the margins' to global challenges.

See all

Opinions

Opinion

Rural development challenges in land reform areas of Zimbabwe

We have recently produced three new booklets summarising our work on themes relating to rural development challenges based on our work across our sites. The booklets contain lots of photos and draw from blogs published earlier on this site. They are being distributed in our field sites both to...

Ian Scoones
Ian Scoones

20 January 2025

Opinion

Zimbabweland’s festive top 20 for 2024

As has become the tradition at this time of year, this week I am sharing a list of top posts for the year. This time it’s not just ones published this year, but any post viewed by the 27.7k visitors to the blog. There are a lot of blogs on the site to choose from – nearly 600 since 2011 –...

Ian Scoones
Ian Scoones

16 December 2024

Opinion

A new land administration system for Zimbabwe

This blog was originally published in July 2017 and was followed by another one in The Conversation as part of a series on priorities for the Mnangagwa administration. As the previous blogs on ‘new entrants’ have highlighted the need for a low-cost, effective land administration system...

Ian Scoones
Ian Scoones

9 December 2024

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Publications

Book

Navigating Uncertainty: Radical Rethinking for a Turbulent World

Uncertainties are everywhere. Whether it’s climate change, financial volatility, pandemic outbreaks or new technologies, we don’t know what the future will hold. For many contemporary challenges, navigating uncertainty – where we cannot predict what may happen – is essential and, as the...

Ian Scoones
Ian Scoones

1 August 2024

Journal Article

Economics for an Uncertain World

Uncertainty, where we do not know the likelihood of future events, dominates our world. This article examines how economics as a profession and discipline can address uncertainty. From Frank Knight to John Maynard Keynes to Friedrich von Hayek to George Shackle, economics has highlighted the...

Ian Scoones
Ian Scoones

23 October 2023

Book

Pastoralism, Uncertainty and Development

In the drylands and mountains where pastoralists live, uncertainty is everywhere. In these settings, negotiating access to resources, navigating volatile markets, making use of varying social relations in times of stress, and responding to conflict and complex political dynamics is essential if...

31 May 2023

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Ian Scoones’s recent work

Featured Project

PASTRES: Pastoralism, Uncertainty and Resilience

PASTRES (Pastoralism, Uncertainty and Resilience: Global Lessons from the Margins) is a research project which aims to learn from the ways that pastoralists respond to uncertainty, applying such 'lessons from the margins' to global challenges.

See all