In Pursuit of Development

Achim Steiner is UNDP Administrator. He has served across the United Nations system. He was the Director-General of the United Nations Office at Nairobi and between 2006-2016 he led the United Nations Environment Programme, where he prioritized investments in clean technologies and renewable energy. Achim has also held other notable positions including Director General of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, and Secretary General of the World Commission on Dams.Achim Steiner- TED Talk : Humanity's planet-shaping powers -- and what they mean for the futureFuture of Development public conversation between Amartya Sen, Nobel Laureate and Professor of Economics and Philosophy, and Achim Steiner, UNDP Administrator.  UNDP Future Of Development - YouTubeClimate Promise | United Nations Development Programme (undp.org)UNDP Development Futures Series | United Nations Development ProgrammeHuman Development Reports (undp.org)Hello Future | UNDPTwitter: @AchimSteiner @UNDP Host:Professor Dan Banik, University of Oslo, Twitter: @danbanik  @GlobalDevPodhttps://in-pursuit-of-development.simplecast.com/  HostDan Banik (@danbanik @GlobalDevPod)Apple Spotify YouTube Subscribe:https://in-pursuit-of-development.simplecast.comhttps://globaldevpod.substack.com/

Guests:Raya Ahmed is a climate justice defender from Lamu. She holds Bachelor of Science in Development Studies and is the founder of Lamu Women Alliance which is a consortium organizations under Save Lamu, championing climate justice and women’s rights. In 2019, she was awarded the Lamu County Mashujaa by Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyata,and the Shujaa Female Activist of the Year Award by MUHURI/ Coast Women’s Magazine.Omar Elmawi is a lawyer who helps communities assert their rights and have their voices heard on various development projects. He coordinates the deCOALonize campaign – a movement that, with the help of community engagement, public activism and legal advocacy, pushes for green and sustainable energy solutions and is opposed to coal-related industrialization in Kenya and the region. He is also the coordinator of the Stop EACOP campaign that is against the construction of the East Africa Crude Oil Pipeline. Twitter: @OmarElmawiGino Cocchiaro is the Director of Programmes and Development at Natural Justice, where he previously served as the Director of the Kenya Hub as well as the Director of the Extractives and Infrastructure Programme. He is legally trained and has supported communities to participate in environmental decision-making processes in Southern Africa and Kenya. He was the lead lawyer from Natural Justice against the Lamu coal plant and has worked closely with the communities of Lamu since 2010. Twitter: @GinoCocchiaro Host:Professor Dan Banik, University of Oslo, Twitter: @danbanik  @GlobalDevPodhttps://in-pursuit-of-development.simplecast.com/   HostDan Banik (@danbanik @GlobalDevPod)Apple Spotify YouTube Subscribe:https://in-pursuit-of-development.simplecast.comhttps://globaldevpod.substack.com/

Tony Addison is a Professor of Economics, University of Copenhagen in the Development Economics Research Group. He was a Chief Economist and Deputy Director of UNU-WIDER in Helsinki, Finland. He was previously Professor of Development Studies, University of Manchester; Executive Director of the Brooks World Poverty Institute (BWPI), University of Manchester (from 2006-2009); and Associate Director of the Chronic Poverty Research Centre (CPRC).His books include: From Conflict to Recovery in Africa (Oxford University Press), Making Peace Work: The Challenges of Economic and Social Reconstruction (Palgrave Macmillan), and Poverty Dynamics: A Cross-Disciplinary Perspective (Oxford University Press). He was a lead author for The Chronic Poverty Report 2008-09: Escaping Poverty Traps.Extractive Industries: The Management of Resources as a Driver of Sustainable Development (Oxford University Press, 2018, open access book)Twitter: Tony AddisonTwitter: Dan Banik & In Pursuit of Developmenthttps://in-pursuit-of-development.simplecast.com/ HostDan Banik (@danbanik @GlobalDevPod)Apple Spotify YouTube Subscribe:https://in-pursuit-of-development.simplecast.comhttps://globaldevpod.substack.com/

Dr. Elizabeth Chatterjee is an assistant professor of environmental history at the University of Chicago. Her research explores how non-Western energy histories disrupt conventional understandings of capitalist development, the social dynamics of climate change, and green political thought."India and the 1.5°C warning: The power of political targets" (The Asia Dialogue)"The Asian Anthropocene: Electricity and Fossil Developmentalism"(Journal of Asian Studies , 2020)“New Developmentalism and Its Discontents: State Activism in Modi’s Gujarat and India” (Development and Change, 2020)"The politics of electricity reform: Evidence from West Bengal, India" (World Development, 2018)"Dissipated energy: Indian electric power and the politics of blame" (Contemporary South Asia, 2012)Liz Chatterjee on TwitterDan Banik and In Pursuit of Development on Twitterhttps://in-pursuit-of-development.simplecast.com/ HostDan Banik (@danbanik @GlobalDevPod)Apple Spotify YouTube Subscribe:https://in-pursuit-of-development.simplecast.comhttps://globaldevpod.substack.com/

Xu Qinduo is a political analyst, news columnist and an adjunct professor at Renmin University’s School of Journalism and Communication. He is also a senior fellow at the Pangoal Foundation and host of the talk show “Dialogue Weekend” at China Global Television Network, CGTN. He was previously posted as China Radio International’s chief correspondent in Washington, DC.Why the US and the West are always obsessed with changing China (Global Times)China and the U.S.: Equality and Beyond (China Today)Xu Qinduo on TwitterDan Banik and In Pursuit of Development on Twitterhttps://in-pursuit-of-development.simplecast.com/  HostDan Banik (@danbanik @GlobalDevPod)Apple Spotify YouTube Subscribe:https://in-pursuit-of-development.simplecast.comhttps://globaldevpod.substack.com/

Katerini Storeng is an associate professor at the Centre for Development and the Environment at the University of Oslo.  She directs the interdisciplinary Global Health Politics research group and is the Deputy Director of the Independent Panel on Global Governance for Health, an initiative to follow up the Lancet-University of Oslo Commission's agenda on the political determinants of health inequity. Dr. Storeng's research advances a critical, ethnographic perspective on the social and political dynamics shaping global health research and policy. She is particularly interested in how global public-private partnerships, scientific communities and civil society coalitions shape and challenge prevailing understandings and approaches to global public health.Resources:"The uncomfortable truth about Norway’s pandemic leadership" (Sept. 2021)"The Smartphone Pandemic: How Big Tech and public health authorities partner in the digital response to Covid-19", Global Public Health (2021)"Africa CDC, IFRC, and USAU call for Equitable Vaccine Coverage in Africa" (Sept. 2021)"Biden to Push Global Plan toBattle Covid as National Gaps Widen" (New York Times, 22 Sept. 2021)"Risky business: COVAX and the financialization of global vaccine equity", Globalization and Health (Felix Stein, 2021)Twitter:Katerini StorengDan Banik In Pursuit of Development https://in-pursuit-of-development.simplecast.com/   HostDan Banik (@danbanik @GlobalDevPod)Apple Spotify YouTube Subscribe:https://in-pursuit-of-development.simplecast.comhttps://globaldevpod.substack.com/

Welcome to season 3!Our first guest this season is Sir Paul Collier, Professor of Economics and Public Policy at the Blavatnik School of Government and a Professorial Fellow of St Antony’s College, University of Oxford. In 2014, Professor Collier received a knighthood for services to promoting research and policy change in Africa.Sir Paul's research covers the causes and consequences of civil war; the effects of aid and the problems of democracy in low-income and natural resources rich societies; urbanisation in low-income countries; private investment in African infrastructure and changing organisational cultures. He has authored numerous books, including The Bottom Billion (Oxford University Press, 2007) which in 2008 won the Lionel Gelber, Arthur Ross and Corine prizes and in May 2009 was the joint winner of the Estoril Global Issues Distinguished Book prize; Wars, Guns and Votes: Democracy in Dangerous Places (Vintage Books, 2009); The Plundered Planet: How to reconcile prosperity with nature (Oxford University Press, 2010); Exodus: How migration is changing our world (Oxford University Press, 2013); and The Future of Capitalism: Facing The New Anxieties (Penguin Books, 2018). His latest book, co-authored with John Kay, is Greed is Dead: Politics After Individualism (Penguin Books, 2020). Paul Collier, Blavatnik School of Government, University of OxfordIn Pursuit of Development and Dan Banik on Twitterhttps://in-pursuit-of-development.simplecast.com/ HostDan Banik (@danbanik @GlobalDevPod)Apple Spotify YouTube Subscribe:https://in-pursuit-of-development.simplecast.comhttps://globaldevpod.substack.com/

Welcome to the final episode of season 2. We’ve had some great guests this season and the show has attracted thousands of new listeners in large parts of the world. Thank you all for listening and for all the positive and most encouraging feedback that we have received this year.Our guest this week is Emma Mawdsley, who is a reader in human geography at Newnham College and Director of the Margaret Anstee Centre for Global Studies at the University of Cambridge. She recently received the Royal Geographical Society’s Busk Medal for her exceptional engagements with fieldwork, research and knowledge production about the Global South."From recipients to donors: the emerging powers and the changing development landscape"‘From billions to trillions’: Financing the SDGs in a world ‘beyond aid’"Human Rights and South-South Development Cooperation: Reflections on the "Rising Powers" as International Development Actors"Please follow our Twitter account @GlobalDevPod and share our episodes with your colleagues and friends. We will be back in a couple of months in season 3 of the show with another bunch of great guests. Thank you and I wish you all an enjoyable summer.TwitterEmma MawdsleyDan Banikhttps://in-pursuit-of-development.simplecast.com/  HostDan Banik (@danbanik @GlobalDevPod)Apple Spotify YouTube Subscribe:https://in-pursuit-of-development.simplecast.comhttps://globaldevpod.substack.com/

Many of you may have heard about instances of local communities mobilising against the construction of dams in various parts of the world. But it turns out that not all communities are able to collectively resist dam-building. So, what explains the varying degrees of community resistance against large dams?Kyungmee Kim tackles this question in a doctoral thesis that she successfully defended recently at Uppsala University in Sweden. She studied popular mobilization against dams in Myanmar and the extent to which political violence influenced identity formation, particularly its pace, direction and implications."Civil Resistance in the Shadow of War: Explaining popular mobilization against dams in Myanmar" (PhD thesis, Uppsala University)TwitterKyungmee KimDan BanikIn Pursuit of Developmenthttps://in-pursuit-of-development.simplecast.com/  HostDan Banik (@danbanik @GlobalDevPod)Apple Spotify YouTube Subscribe:https://in-pursuit-of-development.simplecast.comhttps://globaldevpod.substack.com/

Even though the world is richer today than ever before, a large number of people do not share in those riches, even in democracies. So, what does living in a democracy mean for people who simultaneously confront persistent deprivations and increasing inequalities? Do people living in poverty absorb the universalistic ideas associated with democracy? Or do their precarious lives overwhelm them so much so that they cannot act beyond particularistic concerns? These are the questions that Indrajit Roy tackles in Politics of the Poor: Negotiating Democracy in Contemporary India. Indrajit Roy is Senior Lecturer in Global Development Politics at the University of York. "Why the subaltern chose, not Hindutva, but Trinamool in Bengal""India: a year after Narendra Modi’s re-election the country’s democracy is developing fascistic undertones""Contesting Consensus. Disputing Inequality: Agonistic Subjectivities in Rural Bihar"Twitter: Indrajit Roy Dan Banik In Pursuit of Developmenthttps://in-pursuit-of-development.simplecast.com/  HostDan Banik (@danbanik @GlobalDevPod)Apple Spotify YouTube Subscribe:https://in-pursuit-of-development.simplecast.comhttps://globaldevpod.substack.com/