Politics and Political Economy
In the 1950s and 1960s, Development Studies was dominated by the work of early development economists – many of whom employed an interdisciplinary approach to the study of economic development. Central to their work – e.g. Hirschman – was an emphasis on the political analysis of economic transformation. In the decades that followed, attempts to refine disciplinary boundaries has contributed to a multi-disciplinary emphasis, with an ‘economics imperialism’ (Fine and Milonakis, 2009) being paralleled by other disciplines clearly defining boundaries within development studies. Economics (and increasingly neoclassical economics) dominates the field of development studies. Many who eschew these Economics-led approaches retreat into a parallel sphere of ‘development geography’, while politics itself has long been confined to the margins. Though scholarship has consistently called for ‘the return of politics’ in Development Studies (Hickey, 2008), more recent attempts (World Bank, 2017) to analyse the politics of development have tended to be captured by the dominant neoclassical paradigm.
The DSA Politics and Political Economy group is also closely linked to EADI’s Politics and Political Economy of Economic Transformation Group (led by Pritish Behuria and Andy Sumner).
No existing DSA group explicitly focuses on development politics or heterodox political economy. This study group aims to fill a gap at the Development Studies Association. The group’s goal is to develop a space for scholars working on heterodox and classical political economy, as well as broader interdisciplinary perspectives on development politics. The group will have three central goals each year:
- Form a stream of panels at annual DSAs (with at least two panels but possibly more) to create a consistent forum of dialogue and collaboration across universities among scholars at different stages
- Organise a workshop on a topical subject on the politics of development, with the goal of publishing blogs in development studies websites (LSE ID, GDI, SPERI, SIID) and online outlets (Conversation, Developing Economics). In some years, special issues or edited collections may be a product of workshops.
- Support PhD students and postdoctoral researchers by providing comments on their papers-in-progress and encouraging a support network of like-minded researchers working on the politics of development.
Co-Convenors
Pritish Behuria, University of Manchester, pritish.behuria(AT)manchester.ac.uk
Matthew Tyce, Kings College London (matthew.tyce(at)kcl.ac.uk)
About the convenors
Dr. Pritish Behuria is Reader/Associate Professor at the University of Manchester’s Global Development Institute. He is also a British Academy Mid-Career Fellow for 2024-2025. He is also a Visiting Associate Professor at the South African Research Chair in Industrial Development at the University of Johannesburg. He is an Editor of the European Journal of Development Research and Reviews Editor for the Journal of Development Studies. His research examines the political economy of late development under contemporary globalisation. His monograph, The Political Economy of Rwanda’s Rise, will be published with Cambridge University Press in 2026.
Matthew Tyce is a lecturer in International Political Economy at King’s College London in the Department of European & International Studies. His/My research explores the political economy of economic transformation and the state in late-developing countries, with a particular focus on sub-Saharan Africa and how states across the region are navigating contemporary global trends related to the energy transition, ‘green’ industrialisation and the resurgence of industrial policy
Join our mailing list
Sign up to the study group mailing list for this study group if you are interested in politics and political economy issues. If you’re not already, please do consider becoming a member of the DSA before joining a study group.
Past and Forthcoming Activities
The DSA Politics and Political Economy Group has now organised several events, which have been co-funded by the DSA, Journal of Development Studies, University of Manchester, Kings College London and EADI. These events have included:
- The Politics of Development Studies Conference (organised in January 2023)
- Unity in Diversity? Future of Development Studies Workshop (June 2024)
- Structural Transformation and Late Development conference (December 2024)
- 3-day workshop, as part of the PhD Political Economy of Development Group, led by Caroline Cornier and Guido Masschhaupt. ‘Is Development still possible?’ and ‘(Re-)establishing Political Economy in Development Studies’
We have also held several panels at recent DSAs including on:
- The Political Economy of Structural Transformation
- The Future of Development Studies
- The Politics of Development Studies
- Development Politics
The New DSA Political Economy of Development PhD Group
We are a group of doctoral researchers working on Political Economy questions in Development Studies. We meet once a month online to discuss articles, books or our own work, which we agree on collectively and share in advance of the meetings. We are particularly interested in Political Economy as a research perspective, its evolution over time, as well as more general debates about its limits and strengths in ontological, epistemological and practical terms. Our overriding concern is improving our understanding of the strong hierarchies of power and uneven patterns of development that we observe on the global, regional, and national level. To join the group, please email Caroline Cornier and Guido Maschhaupt at [email protected] and [email protected].
About the Convenors of the DSA Political Economy of Development PhD Group
Caroline Cornier is a doctoral researcher at the Global Development Institute at the University of Manchester working on the Political Economy of commodity dependence based on the case of cocoa in Côte d’Ivoire. She is particularly interested in the multiscalar intersection of domestic power relations and external financial constraints and its role in inhibiting structural economic transformation. She explores her West African case study based on Political Settlement Analysis and Financial Subordination Literature. E-mail: [email protected]
Guido Maschhaupt is a PhD researcher at the International Institute of Social Studies in the Hague, Netherlands. He’s working on the politics of social policy, specifically investigating the ‘interacting politics’ of social cash transfers and agricultural input subsidies, comparing Malawi and Zambia. Major themes are the domestic feedback mechanisms that co-opt or reject both policy types, ideological conflicts, and the political dynamics between international donors and domestic government. E-mail: [email protected]