October 8, 2020
Max Lawson and Matthew Martin launch the new index, published by Oxfam and Development Finance International. Are more equal countries better able to cope with crises like Covid-19? When we look at humanitarian crises like famines or droughts, there is a fair amount of evidence that more equal countries are more resilient, that the impacts are more evenly spread, and
Read more >>
‘Cutting Edge Issues in Development’ Heads up for an amazing series of online lectures, starting next week
October 2, 2020
Organizing (along with James Putzel) the LSE’s guest lecture series on ‘Cutting Edge Issues in Development Thinking and Practice’ has turned out to be one of the few genuine silver linings in the Covid cloud. Because we’ve had to move to fully online, we’ve been able to get some of the world’s most interesting thinkers to speak to us from
Read more >>
Taking Doughnut Economics from idea to action – welcome to the Action Lab
September 30, 2020
Kate Raworth launches a brilliant, potentially world-shaping, new initiative This week is the online launch of Doughnut Economics Action Lab (DEAL). At the heart of it is a community platform, open to everyone who wants to turn Doughnut Economics from a radical idea into transformative action. We’ll be co-creating tools and sharing stories of how to build regenerative and distributive
Read more >>
What have 5 years of tax campaigns achieved?
September 1, 2020
Guest post by Oliver Pearce In early 2016, I joined Oxfam GB to lead its tax work. As I now prepare to leave Oxfam, a lot has changed in the world of tax (and the wider world too!). Early 2016 was before the Brexit referendum, the Trump presidency, England’s men joining the women’s team by winning the cricket world cup,
Read more >>
Cracks in the knowledge system: whose knowledge is valued in a pandemic and beyond?
August 28, 2020
Guest post by Jon Harle Many of the inequities which COVID-19 has exposed – and exacerbated – have been with us for a long time. Setting aside very stark disparities in access to health services, and the ability to maintain decent livelihoods, COVID has shown us once again the processes of exclusion that are baked into the ways in which
Read more >>
The Covid Inequality Ratchet: how the pandemic has hit the lives of young, women, minority and poor workers the hardest.
July 8, 2020
On the occasion of the “ILO Global Summit on COVID-19 and the World of Work” Oxfam’s Filippo Artuso, Iñigo Macías-Aymar, and Franziska Mager looked into what we know about the unequal impact of COVID-19 on workers, and how to rebuild fairer societies. The coronavirus pandemic and global lockdown measures have shone a light on pre-existing inequalities in labour markets. What
Read more >>
#PowerShifts Resources: Anti-Racism in Development and Aid
June 23, 2020
‘White saviour complex’, ‘poverty porn’, ‘locals’ vs. ‘expats’. These terms are all part of an old conversation that has revived as a result of the mass protests calling for racial justice and anti-racism across the US and globally. Racism in development and aid is not a new issue, so why does it continue to be overlooked? Sadly, I’ve noticed a notable silence from
Read more >>
What are the weak signals of Covid-driven transformation, and will we hear them?
May 28, 2020
The Covid pandemic is bound to be a game-changing critical juncture for some issues in some places – maybe in all places, who knows. But what kind of transformations and how soon will we know? The problem with detecting these kinds of ‘weak signals’ is that our heads and organizations are already full of noise – especially the noise of
Read more >>
Reflections on an involuntary immersion, by Robert Chambers
May 25, 2020
Just read this extraordinary piece by one of my heroes, Robert Chambers, and wanted to share it. Fans and admirers all over the world will be wishing you a speedy recovery, Robert. I have just returned home after a health-related immersion of over 10 weeks as a patient and participant-observer in an NHS hospital and then in a private sector
Read more >>
Social movements in and beyond the COVID-19 crisis
April 28, 2020
Interface Journal are putting together brilliant compilations of readings by/on social movements and how they are dealing with the current Coronavirus pandemic. We will be republishing these compilations as they are rolled out, to join efforts in amplifying the voices of activists and those organizing communities through the crisis. They have a call for submissions below, please write in! And
Read more >>
Covid as Critical Juncture – please comment on this draft paper/join us on Zoom
April 3, 2020
My LSE students are a challenging lot (not as in ‘problem’; as in ‘challenging’) and their questions got me thinking about Covid-19 as a critical juncture. The result is this short-ish (12 page) paper (much improved by the students’ comments on earlier drafts). Please send comments. We will also be discussing it on Zoom next Wednesday (8th April) 2.30-3.30pm UK
Read more >>
What values should guide Britain’s role in the world, post-Brexit?
March 3, 2020
Oxfam today publishes (with UK think tank, the Foreign Policy Centre) a collection of essays from parliamentarians and policy experts called ‘Finding Britain’s role in a changing world: building a values based foreign policy’. Here are a few highlights from the conclusion, snappily written by Adam Hug, Abigael Baldoumas, Katy Chakrabortty and Danny Sriskandarajah: ‘The extent to which the United
Read more >>