Experts

Our researchers work globally to produce research and evidence-based policy recommendations to create positive change.

Below is a selection of our staff and their respective expertise. Please contact our media team to arrange an interview with any of our experts.

Melissa LeachProfessor Melissa Leach – IDS Director

  • UK aid and UK foreign policy
  • Sustainability and planetary boundaries
  • Lessons from Ebola
  • Pandemic preparedness and social science dimensions of Covid-19
  • Vaccine hesitancy

Professor Mariz Tadros – Research Fellow, Director of Coalition for Religious Equality and Inclusive Develoment

  • Freedom of religion and belief
  • Middle East, Egypt including democratisation, Islamist politics, gender, human security and religion and development.
  • Gender-based violence and sexual harassment
  • Impact on religion in relation to Covid-19

Dr Amrita Saha – Research Fellow

  • The political economy of international trade, agricultural policy, innovation and gender
  • UK-India trade
  • South-South trade
  • Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) free trade agreement in South East Asia

Dr Shilpi Strivastava – Research Fellow

  • Impacts of climate change on communities living on its front lines
  • Climate justice – what it is and why it needs to be central to climate change policy and COP27
  • The gendered impacts of climate change

Dr Tony Roberts – Research Fellow and co-lead of the African Digital Rights Network

  • Digital rights
  • Digital surveillance
  • Closing online civic space in Africa

Dr Jing Gu – IDS Research Fellow and Director of the Centre for Rising Power and Global Development

  • China’s role in global development
  • Belt and Road Initiative
  • China and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
  • The role of development diplomacy for the UK-China relationship

Dr Max Gallien – IDS and International Centre for Tax and Development Research Fellow

  • Smuggling and border politics
  • Modern politics in North Africa, particularly Tunisia and Morocco
  • Informal economies and informal taxation
  • Tobacco taxation and tobacco smuggling

Dr Keetie Roelen – Research Fellow

  • Social protection
  • Child poverty
  • Rwanda

Dr Dolf te Lintelo – Research Fellow

  • Informal urban settlements
  • Refugee settlements and community integration in Lebanon and Jordan

Dr Deepta Chopra – Research Fellow

  • Women’s economic empowerment
  • Paid and unpaid care work in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa

Dr Shandana Mohmand – Research Fellow and leader of the IDS Pakistan Hub and IDS Governance Research Cluster

  • Democratisation, inclusive politics, local governance and informal institutions
  • Pakistan
  • Political participation in fragile and conflict settings

Dr Becky Faith – Research Fellow

  • Digital technology for better development and aid outcomes
  • Gender and digital technology
  • Technology for social change

Professor Jerermy Allouche – Research Fellow

  • Resource politics (water, mining)
  • Conflict resolution and peacebuilding

Dr Sohela Nazneen – Research Fellow

  • Domestic violence against women in South Asia and Sub Saharan Africa
  • Women in politics in South Asia and Sub Saharan Africa
  • Women’s empowerment in South Asia and Sub Saharan Africa

Dr Hayley MacGregor – Research Fellow

  • COVID-19 impacts in low-income countries
  • Pandemic preparedness in sub-Saharan Africa
  • Health and wellbeing in informal settlements in low-income countries

Dr Amber Huff – Research Fellow

  • Mining conflicts and natural resource marketisation in southern Africa
  • Land grabbing
  • Critique of market environmentalism and impacts of environmental and conservation policies and large initiatives like Terra Carta on marginalized peoples

Dr Martin Hearson – Research Fellow and Research Director of the International Centre for Tax and Development

  • International taxation
  • Impact of tax treaties on African countries
  • Global digital companies, e.g. Google and  Facebook, tax and developing countries

Dr Stephen Devereux – Research Fellow

  • Food security and famine
  • Rural livelihoods
  • Social Protection and poverty reduction

Professor Danny Burns – Research Fellow

  • Child labour and modern slavery in South Asian countries
  • Participatory research
  • Peacebuilding

Dr Nick Nisbett – Research Fellow and Leader of the IDS Health and Nutrition Cluster

  • Nutrition in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa
  • Community nutrition policy

Dr Mary Wickenden – Research Fellow

  • Disability and development

Dr Phil Mader – Research Fellow

  • Microfinance
  • Financial inclusion
  • Youth unemployment
  • The ‘unbanked’ and
  • The implications of moving to ‘cash less’ society

Dr Peter Taylor – Director of Research

  • Lessons from Covid-19 for building back better
  • Vaccine passports