Our interdisciplinary research explores how pathways to sustainability, green transformations and equitable access to resources such as land, water and food can be achieved and help us meet the environmental as well as human development-related goals of the UN Agenda 2030 for Sustainable Development.
Our work builds on a long tradition of critical social science engagement with environmental issues and resource politics in collaboration with partners globally. It explores how pathways to sustainability are shaped by political-economic and social processes, and understands how they are driven by technology, markets, states and citizens. Our research sheds new light on how we can achieve green transformations that move us from fossil fuel to renewable energy, from throw-away to circular economies. It addresses the politics of sustainability, and understands how transformations occur at local levels as well as global, in both rural and urban settings, and be led by citizens as well as national governments. In doing so, it shines a light on how sustainable resource use, consumption and production is shaped by issues such as gender, livelihoods and politics.
The ESRC STEPS Centre (Social, Technological and Environmental Pathways to Sustainability) is an interdisciplinary global research and policy engagement centre.
Research published by UCL in 2021 highlighted synergies between sanitation and all 17 Sustainable Development Goals. Despite this many water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) actors operate in isolation, with few opportunities for learning from across sectors.
Over the years, here at the...
This moment in the Covid-19 pandemic is marked by its contrasts: whilst some countries emerge from restrictive public health measures and consider how to ‘live with Covid’, others continue to struggle with the health impacts of new variants. There is widespread agreement that Covid-19 has...
The ESRC STEPS Centre has made its free online course on Pathways to Sustainability available with new video lectures and reading lists.
The course introduces a set of ideas, approaches, cases and methods for critical research and action on sustainability, building on the STEPS Centre’s work....
Many of us would give an almost instinctual answer to the question posed in the title to this Sussex Development Lecture. We would say that clearly both are important. However, the relationship between scientific advice in response to immediate policy questions on one hand, and research and...
We investigate the cross scalar linkages between every day violence and global war on terror in the context of urban Pakistan. We draw upon intensive research undertaken in the twin cities of Rawalpindi/Islamabad and Karachi to highlight how marginalized Pashtun and Bengali Rohingya...
“Against the Odds” is a new report released today by the IDS-led Action for Empowerment and Accountability (A4EA) programme. It offers new insights into how people experience governance relationships, mobilise to make claims of authorities, and strategise to demand greater accountability...
As part of the Rejuvenate project, we are hosting a series of grounded dialogues. We’ve just confirmed the date for our third dialogue in February, which will reflect on the use of creative praxis to further rights and participation for children and young people.
In the first year of the...
The series of Rejuvenate dialogues are intended to foster discussion and debate across a community of practitioners working on child and youth rights. Dialogue three explored the transformative capacity of creative praxis and how it can strengthen rights and participation for children and young...
The digital revolution and access to online spaces is transforming the ways we communicate, work and organise. With online spaces and digital equality now also key to mobilising social justice movements and challenging inequities, understanding how to defend online spaces is now a critical...
How and under what conditions does citizen-led social and political action contribute to empowerment and accountability? What are the strategies used, and with what outcomes, especially in settings which are democratically weak, politically fragile and affected by legacies of violence and...
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).