Abstract Drawing upon panel data estimations, we have analysed the relationships among agricultural productivity, employment, technology, openness of the economy, inequality in land distribution and poverty. First, we have identified a number of important factors affecting agricultural...

Abstract Chinese households have experienced significant income growth, while their nutrition intake has not increased pari passu. This paper uses household data in both rural and urban China over the period 1989-2009 to explain the paradox of higher income but lower nutrition. In addition to...

Abstract This paper argues that microfinance in South Asia, like mainstream finance in North America and Europe, "has lost its moral compass". Our particular concern is with microloans to vulnerable clients. Microfinance institutions (MFIs) have increasingly focussed on financial performance and...

Abstract On the record of poverty and inequality in India over the last thirty or so years, the general scholarly view seems to be that there have been substantial declines in money-metric poverty, that there has been no significant over-time increase in inequality, and that the growth in per...

Abstract Young people constitute a large proportion of - and a particularly vulnerable segment of - Africa's population. 'Youth' constitutes a critical stage in the life course, marked by decreasing household and familial support. Yet as we explore here in the context of Uganda and Tanzania,...

Since 1960 many countries have experienced growth accelerations, but few have maintained growth. An adequate theory of growth must explain both how some countries kick-start growth, and how some maintain it over decades. For us, the key is to be found in the relationship between what we call the...

Over the past 15 years, Cambodia has made significant strides in expanding effective access to free healthcare for poor people, thanks largely to 'Health Equity Funds' (HEFs), a multi-stakeholder health-financing mechanism. HEF operators have helped expand access, incentivise health staff, and...

In this paper, I direct attention to the role of class politics in shaping the outcomes of social protection interventions. I highlight the ways in which class politics is constituted by the interaction of class relations and the balance of substantive class power in a polity. I demonstrate the...

The capacity and commitment of Uganda to govern its oil in developmental ways has generally been discussed through a ‘new institutionalist’ prism that focuses on the dangers of the ‘resource curse’. This paper argues that the developmental potential of oil in Uganda can be more...

The growing literature on social protection in Africa has tended to focus on conceptual debates, policy design issues and impact evaluations. To date, there has been relatively little systematic analysis of the ways in which politics and political economy shape policy. This paper outlines a...