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 numerous external interventions focused on resilience are often disconnected from local realities, as we discussed in the first blog in this series. Certain standard formulations of problem and solution are offered, informed frequently by a negative narrative about pastoralism and the...
From pet food to sunscreen, proposals to cut value-added
tax (VAT) on a range of products and services are ever increasing. One of the best-known and far-reaching
campaigns of this type has been the fight to abolish VAT
on feminine hygiene products. More popularly known as
the ‘tampon...
The terms that govern Malaysia’s public discourse have shifted tremendously in the last couple of decades. Thanks in part to the expansion of the third sector, NGOs, voluntary associations, and community-led groups have been challenging top-down and rigid institutional structures to stamp a...
Member states of the World Health Organization (WHO) are gathering next week at the World Health Assembly in Geneva to discuss a global pandemic treaty, aimed at strengthening future pandemic prevention, preparedness and response. This is an opportunity for high level commitment and a governance...
This Sussex Development Lecture will explore how, in 2020, South Africa and India brought a proposal to the World Trade Organisation to waive intellectual property rights for Covid-19 medical goods so that poor countries could manufacture Covid-19 vaccines and medicines instead of relying on the...
Food security, food systems, and food resilience are three related but contested concepts, with unique intellectual and policy histories. A new open access book brings together several contributions by global experts on these issues and highlights their interconnectedness. The book aims to...
In May 2022, concern was growing in Geneva about the appearance in Europe of a known zoonotic disease considered endemic to West Africa, within networks of gay, bisexual and other men who have sex with men (MSM). A year later, on 11 May 2023, the Public Health Emergency of International...
There have been huge investments in ‘early warning’ facilities across East Africa, prompted by previous emergencies where livestock have perished and people’s lives have been threatened. The most recent of these was the drought that struck the Somali region in 2011-12, but affected parts...
This paper draws on a feminist poststructural perspective to examine gendered dimensions of sending and managing international migrant remittances in a patriarchal community in Ghana.
It relies on primary data collected through in-depth interviews, focus group discussions, and observation in...
This paper aims to identify the most famous Yazidi heritage industries in the town of Bashiqa, in Nineveh governorate. It explores the economic, social and cultural reality of three non-material industries (the manufacture of al-rashi, olive oil and soap) in the town of Bashiqa by comparing how...
The challenge of childhood obesity is defined as a ‘wicked’ problem, up there with the likes of climate change and biodiversity loss. What makes these issues so wicked? To start with there are many (often contested) ways of defining the issue and how it should be ‘solved’, there is no...
This brief provides an overview of the Marburg Virus Disease outbreaks in Equatorial Guinea and Tanzania, as well as contextual factors to inform considerations for responses in both countries.
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).