Featured image for “Why are care workers missing from the conversation about the gig economy in the UK?”

Why are care workers missing from the conversation about the gig economy in the UK?

November 13, 2024
Debates about workers on digital platforms too often focus on male-dominated sectors such as deliveries and ride-hailing. Veronica Deutsch explains how care workers, overwhelmingly women, are now central to the precarious UK gig economy – and sets out what campaigners, researchers, employers and policy makers can do to support them.
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Featured image for “How billionaire ‘pollutocrats’ are driving our climate crisis – and what we can do about it”

How billionaire ‘pollutocrats’ are driving our climate crisis – and what we can do about it

October 31, 2024
If everyone used private jets and superyachts like 50 of the world’s richest billionaires, the remaining carbon budget to stay within 1.5C would be burned up in just two days. Nafkote Dabi introduces Oxfam’s new climate report, which spells out how the emissions of the super-rich are driving inequality, hunger and heat-related deaths.
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Featured image for “Governments across the globe are giving up on the fight against inequality: here’s what they should do instead…”

Governments across the globe are giving up on the fight against inequality: here’s what they should do instead…

October 23, 2024
New Oxfam analysis shows global Commitment to Reducing Inequality (CRI) has just hit a new low. Anthony Kamande shares insights from Oxfam’s biannual CRI report that ranks 164 countries’ policies – and offers three big policy changes that should be firmly on the agenda at this week’s World Bank/IMF annual meetings.
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Featured image for “How my new book unpacks the problem with projects”

How my new book unpacks the problem with projects

October 9, 2024
The “project” is intrinsic to modern international development – yet this basic form of organising our work is not something neutral or benign, says Caitlin Scott, but has real, often distorting, effects on the way development organisations think and act.
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We don’t want your money: why do NGOs refuse donations?

October 3, 2024
Logan Cochrane and Alexandra Wilson on a fascinating new analysis that identifies four principles that drive NGOs to reject large donations – and if your organisation has turned away money recently, they want to hear from you…
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Vetoing humanity: How a few powerful nations hijacked global peace

September 20, 2024
Marc J. Cohen, Amy Croome and Elise Nalbandian introduce a new Oxfam report that sets out how the veto power of a few countries at the UN Security Council has been catastrophic for humanity. Ahead of next week’s landmark Summit of the Future, they demand four changes to reform a UN system that is simply no longer up to the challenge of maintaining international peace and security.
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Featured image for “When inclusion is an illusion: sign language interpreters and the pitfalls for ‘inclusive’ development”

When inclusion is an illusion: sign language interpreters and the pitfalls for ‘inclusive’ development

September 6, 2024
How did a meeting for disabled people in Uganda end up using sign language that local deaf people couldn’t understand? Julia Modern reflects on how that failure is rooted in racialised ideas about who is an expert – and shares six tips for effective deaf inclusion. (And you can also watch a Ugandan Sign Language translation of the blog)
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Should I birth a book? Top tips from a ‘book doula’

August 6, 2024
Always wanted to write that book about progressive change but don’t know where to start? Oxfam’s Irene Guijt shares tips from an expert…
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Featured image for “Artificial intelligence will turbocharge the spread of disinformation – and development organisations need to respond”

Artificial intelligence will turbocharge the spread of disinformation – and development organisations need to respond

June 10, 2024
The development sector has been too slow to invest in the healthy news media and “information ecosystems” on which healthy societies depend, say Nick Benequista, Laure-Hélène Piron and Cristina Ordóñez.
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Featured image for “Why is inequality so sticky? The political obstacles to a fairer economy”

Why is inequality so sticky? The political obstacles to a fairer economy

June 6, 2024
Theory tells us that democracies should become more equal. So why are they still so unequal? Gideon Coolin, Emanuele Sapienza, and Andy Sumner on their new UNDP paper that unpicks the politics of inequality.
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Featured image for “UN Women makes Norm Change central to its mission”

UN Women makes Norm Change central to its mission

November 28, 2023
Bafflingly, I was recently invited to an online ‘Expert Group Meeting’ to help UN Women flesh out a really important new strategy – making norm change central to its role. This from the Concept Note for the session: ‘In recognition of the emerging emphasis on an articulated approach to social norms in international development and acknowledging that discriminatory social norms
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Featured image for “What can we learn from looking at the overlaps between innovations in ways of doing research and neglected development issues?”

What can we learn from looking at the overlaps between innovations in ways of doing research and neglected development issues?

November 23, 2023
The same subjects have been coming up again and again in random conversations recently, especially the ones where someone comes down to South London for a general chat in a local coffee shop (one of my favourite ways of avoiding work). In a recent discussion with Oxfam Mexico’s Estefanie Hechenberger, a small penny dropped – the value of looking at
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