Who comes to an academic conference and why? At DSA2025, delegates joined from across the globe and included those from think tanks, NGOs, civil society, and universities and from all career stages. Meet some of them here. And remember: the connections don’t end at the conference. If someone’s work resonates with yours, reach out and connect with them.

Ignacio Feged is currently an undergraduate at Williams College in the United States, where he studies through a unique partnership with the Centre for Development Economics. He also works with the Economic Policy Research Institute (EPRI), a Cape Town-based institute focused on social protection in the Global South. His research concentrates on how social protection systems can respond to conflict and crises. More recently, his work has begun to explore how these systems can address the growing challenges of climate shocks and the climate crisis.

Ignacio attended DSA2025 with his colleague David Shi and virtually (online) by their mentor and collaborator, Professor Michael Samson. They presented a paper in a panel organised on nonstate actors in political crises and their contribution explored how local actors can be better centered in the delivery of social protection during crises. 

For Ignacio, the DSA conference offered much more than just a chance to present. As an early-career researcher, the opportunity to meet and engage with scholars he had previously only read about was deeply impactful. “It’s been incredibly valuable,” he said. “Everyone has been so receptive and welcoming. It’s not what we expected as younger delegates, but the community has been amazing.”

He also noted how different the academic environment around development studies can be in the U.S., where programs often lean heavily toward traditional economics. In contrast, the DSA conference offered a space for more interdisciplinary and critical conversations. “It’s been really, really fun,” Ignacio said. “We’re grateful to be here.”

Patrik Oskarsson, a researcher at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, works broadly on resource politics, mining, land, and focuses particularly on India. His participation in the conference was prompted by a colleague who proposed convening a panel which explored transitions away from coal and the concept of liminality – the space of being “stuck,” as he put it: “not being able to move forward and onward, but not necessarily moving back into agrarian livelihoods and forest livelihoods of the past, either.”

Reflecting on the experience of attending an academic development conference, Oskarsson described it as “quite like coming home.” He observed that while Sweden lacks a comparable academic network, the event reminded him of his PhD days in the UK, calling the conference terrain “familiar, even though I’ve not been here for a couple of years now.”

He emphasised the value of “making new contacts” and encountering fresh perspectives and examples: “especially new people you may not have heard of before.”

“My PhD is in Women’s and Gender Studies, and my research is on decision-making agency in Pakistani households,” she explained. “My presentation was: What gives women a say in decision-making in households? Agency and bargaining power in Pakistani households, taking a very quantitative perspective on it, and coming from a policy perspective.”

“I really wanted to come to DSA because I consider myself a development practitioner, but I’m at the Department of Sociology, so I really needed some development eyes on my work. And I was correct in thinking that – and I did get feedback, as if it was falling on listening ears.”

Her study proposes that women’s exclusion from critical household decisions is a form of women’s insecurity. Using social survey data from Pakistan, her research explores the factors influencing the bargaining power of Pakistani women in intrahousehold decision-making and determines their participation in these decisions.

Extending from Naila Kabeer’s resources, agency, and achievements framework, she uses decision-making agency as a proxy for a woman’s relative position and status within the family and household. “Exclusion from household decisions undermines women’s well-being and self-esteem, and therefore, I argue, is a form of women’s insecurity.”

“It is critical to engage with negotiations of agency and autonomy as experienced by contemporary Pakistani women.” This research, she emphasizes, contributes to the inquiry into gender inequalities in South Asia by studying how women in Pakistan navigate structural inequalities within homes despite gaining more education and entering the labour force in larger numbers than ever before. 

Michael presented research on the reintegration of returning terrorist fighters and refugees in Kenya, a country affected by regional conflicts in Somalia, Sudan, and South Sudan. His work explores how young Kenyans, especially unemployed men, have been recruited into militia groups like Al Shabaab, and what happens when they return under government amnesty.

“The government allowed them to come back home and reform but didn’t put in policies to reintegrate them. If you confine them in prison again, they become re-radicalised. My research asks: how can we create non-custodial reintegration strategies so they become useful members of society?”

His study examines how these programs support returnees’ welfare including family relationships, mental well-being, and financial independence and how communities can be made more resilient to receive and support them.

Oseo says attending DSA in person was invaluable: “This is one of the best conferences I’ve attended. The diversity of issues, the ability to hear perspectives from Asia, South America, and beyond. It really opened my eyes beyond the regional.”