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.
The Covid-19 virus – and the public health response – has wrought significant disruption on sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) and maternal, neonatal and child health (MNCH) in Bangladesh.
In recent weeks, millions of Nigerians have been barred from making calls after the government instructed telecommunications providers to disconnect their SIM cards because they failed to comply with the government directive to register and link them to their digital ID, known as the National...
This article describes how the mass media in Ghana use quantitative information to communicate the prevalence of child labour. During the period 2000–2020, stories about child labour frequently appeared in Ghana’s mass media. Within nearly 30 per cent of the stories, at least one numerical...
The Cerrado is a natural biome occupying 25 per cent of Brazil’s surface. Compared to the Amazon, it is relatively unknown to international audiences, yet it is currently the world’s largest agricultural frontier.
This Working Paper, commissioned by the Covid-19 Learning, Evidence and Research Programme in Bangladesh (CLEAR), provides an overview of the mechanisms of accountability and responsiveness in operation during the Covid-19 pandemic in Bangladesh.
The Women, Peace and Security or Gender Peace and Security (WPS/GPS) agenda has expanded significantly over the 20+ years of concerted efforts at many levels to expand the role of women in conflict resolution and peacebuilding.
Yet many authors note that the expansion of international...
This webinar launched the new IDS Bulletin: Humanitarianism and Covid-19: Structural Dilemmas, Fault Lines, and New Perspectives.
Watch now
https://youtu.be/pkz-_5_OK7I?t=150
The unprecedented threat posed by the Covid-19 pandemic has presented a crisis for the international humanitarian...
The Social Science in Humanitarian Action Platform (SSHAP) - a partnership between the Institute of Development Studies, Anthrologica, and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine - has announced the third cohort of its SSHAP Fellowship.
The Fellowship, which will run between May 2022...
In order to understand the drivers of child labour in the slum areas of Dhaka, a research team formed of the Grambangla Unnayan Committee (GUC) with ChildHope UK designed and conducted a mapping and listing exercise, in consultation with CLARISSA consortium colleagues. The overall objective of...
This year, the findings of a study of financial inclusion undertaken by IDS and the University of East Anglia (UEA) contributed to a major investigation by the US Government Accountability Office (GAO) into the US Government’s multi-million-dollar microenterprise and microfinance development...
It has become a truism: we live in times of intense climate, geopolitical and social change, defined by uncertainty and complex, fast-changing relationships between government, civil society, business, and communities.
Truism or not, challenges like these demand appropriate responses from...
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).