Inclusive Economies

Our work explores what characterises inclusive economies and how these can be achieved, particularly in a world where new technologies, rural to urban migration, and growing youth populations are disrupting and putting new pressures on people’s lives and livelihoods.

Our research looks at the impacts of business and markets on development and inequality and explores the potential for novel market-based solutions to work for the poorest and most marginalised based on gender, ethnicity and disability.  It explores alternatives that enable workers, consumers and communities to have a real voice.

It continues to revitalise debates on agriculture as a key pathway out of poverty and towards inclusion, particularly for young people. Our work is focused on identifying what opportunities exist in a period of agricultural commercialisation and rural transformation and how far different groups are able to access them.  It also understands how new technologies such as drones or blockchains pose risks, but can also be harnessed to improve the lives of the poorest and most marginalised people.  In a rapidly urbanising world where cities have become focal points for economic growth, jobs and innovation but also for poverty, inequality, vulnerability and conflict, our work explores what this means for both urban and rural people, and the opportunities and challenges they face in living safe and fulfilling lives.

People

Jodie Thorpe

Research Fellow

Philip Mader

Research Fellow

Richard Jolly

Research Associate

Ana Pueyo

Research Fellow

Carlos Fortin

Research Associate

Rachel Sabates-Wheeler

Research Fellow

Keetie Roelen

IDS Honorary Associate

Giel Ton

Research Fellow

Programmes and centres

Projects

Recent work

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Showing 217–228 of 14831 results

News

Understanding gender backlash through Southern perspectives

New research published today in the IDS Bulletin reveals the extent to which gender and sexual rights are being reversed in a global wave of gender backlash. The research, based on evidence from Bangladesh, Brazil, India, Kenya, Lebanon, Uganda, and the United Kingdom, explores the...

7 March 2024

Journal

Understanding Gender Backlash: Southern Perspectives

IDS Bulletin 55.1

Far from seeing continued steady progress on gender equality, we are currently witnessing significant backlash against gender and sexual rights. Limited and hard-fought gains for some are being reversed, co-opted, and dismantled – all amplified through new social media and digital...

7 March 2024

Past Event

Understanding gender backlash: Southern perspectives

This event will launch the new IDS Bulletin ‘Understanding Gender Backlash: Southern Perspectives’. It will address the urgent question of how we can better understand the recent swell of anti-gender backlash across different regions, exploring different types of actors, interests,...

7 March 2024

News

Essential feminist reads for International Women’s Day 2024

To mark International Women’s Day 2024, colleagues from the Sustaining Power: Women’s struggles against contemporary backlash in South Asia (SuPWR) project, of which IDS is a partner, share their essential feminist reads. Ranging from meditations and essay collections to academic...

6 March 2024

Opinion

Using a ‘capacity cube’ analysis to understand social protection delivery in crises

Across the social protection landscape, there is a lot of discussion about improving capacity to design and deliver social protection or emergency assistance in protracted crises. However, there is limited analysis unpacking what this actually means. By introducing the ‘capacity cube’, this...

6 March 2024

Brief

Researching Capacities to Sustain Social Protection in Protracted Crises. Part 2: Early Findings

BASIC Research Research Briefing 2

This briefing applies BASIC Research's new tool – the Capacity Cube – to better understand how to sustain capacity to deliver existing social programmes and systems in situations of climate and/or conflict crisis in Nigeria, Iraq, and Syria.

6 March 2024

Brief

Researching Capacities to Sustain Social Protection in Protracted Crises. Part 1: The Capacity Cube

BASIC Research Research Briefing 1

This research briefing introduces the Capacity Cube framework – a new tool for thinking about how capacity to deliver national social protection programmes and systems might be sustained in times of crisis.

6 March 2024

Opinion

International Women’s Day: Palestine and weaponising gender and sexuality

There is no turning away from the harrowing images and videos coming out of Palestine each day. In one such video, not explicitly ‘brutal’ like the rest of them, an Israeli soldier shows a pair of high heels belonging to a Palestinian woman. He records himself saying how pretty they are, and...

5 March 2024

Past Event

This Stained Dawn: feminist documentary and director Q&A

An International Women’s Day film screening of 'This Stained Dawn', a documentary film about the build up to the 2020 Aurat March (women’s march) in Pakistan. The screening will be followed by a question and answer session with the globally acclaimed film director and producer Anam...

5 March 2024

News

Podcast: African Perspectives on Agroecology

For the continent of Africa, seed's are integral to life. From deserts, river systems and forests, and for those growing a range of grains and vegetables, seed provides the mainstay for the continent’s 500 million small-scale farmers and is at the heart of  rich and varied...

4 March 2024

Why learn with us.

In an extraordinary time of challenge and change, we use more than 50 years of expertise to transform development approaches that create more equitable and sustainable futures. The work you do with us will help make progressive change towards universal development; to build and connect solidarities for collective action, locally and globally. The University of Sussex has been ranked 1st in the world for Development Studies for the past five years (QS World University Rankings by Subject).