Academic freedom of speech; and equality, diversity and inclusion are highly valued by the DSA. We recently wrote to the Chief Executive of UK Research and Innovation and the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology about the suspension of the UKRI’s EDI group and attacks on academic freedom of speech.

On 20 November the FCDO published a new White Paper on international development. We round up some of the commentary and responses to the paper.

11 December 2023: DSA’s Land, Politics and Sustainability study group hosts an open webinar on “Redistribution, ownership, investment, and land administrative reform in Africa” with Kojo Amanor (Ghana).

14 December 2023: DSA’s NGO study group will host an open webinar on “Reimagining Civil Society Collaborations in Development” with Justice Nyigmah Bawole (Ghana); Tiina Kontinen (Jyväskylä) and Margit van Wessel (Wageningen).

The Centre for the Study of Global Development at The Open University is one of the newest members of the DSA. It’s also a new organisation in itself, focusing on human wellbeing in global development since 2020.

Jason W Moore’s talk at DSA 2023 questioned the notion of the anthropocene and the culpability of humanity in the climate crisis, laying responsibility on capitalism – coining the term the capitalocene.

Thanks to support from our sponsors, we are delighted to make the key note talks from DSA2023 available on Youtube. Jason Moore’s lecture on “Civilizing Projects in the Capitalocene” was sponsored by the Journal of Development Studies.

The African Cities Research Consortium (ACRC) at the Global Development Institute is commencing pilot action research projects in four African cities: Nairobi, Kenya; Harare, Zimbabwe; Maiduguri, Nigeria and Mogadishu, Somalia.

* The political economy of consulting firms in reform processes in the WHO
* Domestic humanitarianism: the Mission France
* Brazil’s Amazon Fund: a “green fix” between offset pressures and deforestation crisis
* Joseph Kony and the Lord’s Resistance Army
* Ebola to COVID-19 in Sierra Leone and the eastern
* DRC Democratic Republic of the Congo.
* Finance for an equitable recovery in the context of the international debt crisis.
* Bridging the global stocktake gap of climate mitigation
* Spatial mismatches and imperfect information in Southern labor markets

* Youth inclusive digital urban governance
* Resilient urban economies
* Settlement security in Cebu
* Urban exclusion in Israel.

* Federalism in Ethiopia
* Local power in humanitarian Syria
* Political polarisation
* Branding authoritarian nations
* Why citizens vote for corrupt politicians

* Bina Agawal wins economics prize
* Ethiopia’s Developmental State
* Drivers of successful IoT adoption for business transformation in German manufacturers
* US-China competition for centrality in infrastructure, digital, production, and finance networks
* Decoloniality and justice
* Critical global development

The Open University are inviting applications for full- and part-time ESRC-funded PhD study through the Development Policy and Practice training pathway of the Grand Union Doctoral Training Partnership.