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 865–876 of 14837 results

Opinion

Why livestock keeping can be good for the environment

At the end of last year, together with colleagues at IDS, I spent quite a bit of time making the case for a more balanced view on livestock and the environment. We tried to raise the debate during the two big COPs – first in November at COP27 on climate change and then in December at COP15 on...

9 January 2023

News

Opportunities to join IDS as a Research Fellow

IDS is recruiting up to three Fellows to join our research clusters. This includes two vacancies to join the Rural Futures cluster as Social Protection Fellow and a vacancy to join the Digital and Technology cluster as Cluster Leader. Social Protection Fellows The Rural Futures Cluster...

4 January 2023

News

Join us for Recasting Development in 2023

Will 2023 be a year in which we make progress on development, or continue to falter? Join the Institute of Development Studies on Tuesday 31 January at 4.00pm (UK time) for Recasting Development in 2023 to discover new thinking on where development is heading in the coming...

4 January 2023

Opinion

News from PASTRES: December 2022

PASTRES has had a busy year, with long-term research coming to fruition in a series of PhD theses, the Seeing Pastoralism exhibition continuing its world tour and two linked campaigns on climate and biodiversity, challenging some of the myths that undermine effective action.

3 January 2023

Journal Article

Global Queer and Feminist Activism: An Introduction

Queer and feminist visual activism has various origins across the globe and has emerged in a fluid cultural field of visual arts, popular culture, and protest aesthetics. Given the current context of gender backlash, these forms of activism have become urgent, and so too has scholarship that...

Olu Jenzen

30 December 2022

Working Paper

Citizen Voice and the Arts: Opportunities and Challenges for Citizen–Policy Engagement on Environmental Issues in Sahelian West Africa

IDS Working Paper 584

Citizen and policy groups address environmental challenges in the Sahel, but rarely together. In Sahelian West Africa, including in Mauritania, Senegal, and Mali, artists and citizens have used protest art to make their voices heard, in contexts where this can carry risks of conflict with...

21 December 2022

News

Integrating social science into health and humanitarian responses in 2022

As we entered the third year of the global Covid-19 pandemic, 2022 was set to be another year of discourse about the social and political dimensions of health and humanitarian crises. The research and engagement conducted through the IDS-partnership Social Science in Humanitarian Action Platform...

19 December 2022

Working Paper

Connecting Food Inequities Through Relational Territories

IDS Working Paper 583

This paper explores how food inequities manifest at a territorial level, and how food territories are experienced, understood, and navigated by stakeholders to address those inequities. We interpret ‘food territory’ as a relational and transcalar concept, connected through geography,...

Julian May
Julian May & 6 others

19 December 2022

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).