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Social Policy and Inclusion

Growth & Poverty Reduction in Open Economies

Sustainable Energy and Food

Qualitative/Quantitative Methods

Contact Quantitative Methods: Dr. Elkhan Sadik-Zada
Contact Qualitative Methods: Dr. Anne Siebert

Governance, Social Policy and Human Rights
Social Policy and Inclusion
 

Research activities by the members of Cluster 1 address the full spectrum of social policy. This spectrum is understood as ranging from aspects of social security and welfare to labour, education, health, food, and housing policies. It also concerns normative principles of social rights, justice, redistribution and inclusiveness. The broader aim of this research cluster is to understand the political economy of social policies, rights and respective instruments in the so called developing world by bringing together different empirical, disciplinary and methodological insights and perspectives.

In light of this research agenda, Cluster 1 members study the role of specific policies and instruments (e.g. cash transfers), normative and human rights considerations, national and international law, patterns of cooperation, and institutional arrangements in national, local or bi- and multilateral contexts.

 

Research Cluster 2 studies the effectiveness of policies supporting Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), trade and sectoral formalization, and of approaches for implementing social security schemes, labour regulations and minimum wages to support growth- and poverty-relevant outcomes.

Research projects in this cluster implicitly or explicitly acknowledge the existence of productivity and income differentials between and within sectors of the economy. This allows for the examination of the effects sectoral interactions bring about for economic growth and poverty, investigation of how policies affect these interactions, and explanation of why different sectors of the economy react differently vis-à-vis policy interventions.

Using macro as well as micro perspectives, cluster projects provide theoretical and empirical insights into sectoral transformation, into the interplay between FDI, Official Development Assistance (ODA), labour regulations and infrastructure investment, and job creation, growth and poverty at the level of the economy, the sector and the firm.

 

Growth & Poverty Reduction in Open Economies
Growth & Poverty Reduction in Open Economies
 
Natural Resource Use, Environmental Impact, Food & Agriculture
Sustainable Energy and Food
 

Research Cluster 3 focuses on topics that address the questions of natural resource use in developing countries through the lens of sustainable development.

Research projects within the cluster envisage cutting through the complexity of interactions between natural resource use, environmental quality and socio-economic development; and vice versa: addressing the impact of climate change on these three pillars.

Thematically, research on the productivity and environmental sustainability of rural and urban (subsistence) farming and the respective food value chains and works related to the rollout of renewable energy sources play a substantial role within the framework of Cluster 3's research activities. These projects address the research questions from micro and/or macro perspectives applying a broad toolbox of theories and methods.

 

Contact

Institute of Development Research and Development
Ruhr University Bochum
Room 2.04
Universitaetsstr. 105
D-44789 Bochum
E-Mail: ieeoffice@rub.de
Phone: +49 (0)234 / 32-22418