About the Research Cluster

Lacking a minimum set of freedoms and capabilities, that is, being poor, condemns people to live unproductive and unfulfilling lives. Inequality refers to a disproportionate distribution of one or more valued items within a community, including income and other material resources, opportunities, civil and political rights, and recognition of difference. Development is the process of improving people's life chances.

It is well-established that widespread poverty stunts the capacity of societies to grow materially, culturally and to develop the institutional capacity to sustain democracy. This Research Cluster aims to research areas that are less well-known such as:

• How does inequality relate to poverty and affect efforts to alleviate it and promote development, including the resolution of political conflict?
• What role can redistribution play in the social, economic and political development of society?
• How does the distribution of wealth between nations affect poverty relief and development prospects within nations?

Researchers

• Prof Tony Binns
• Dr Jenny Bryant-Tokalau
• Prof David Fielding
• Dr Douglas Hill
• Assoc Prof Stephen Knowles
• Dr Andrew McGregor
• Assoc Prof Etienne Nel
• Prof Philip Nel
• Prof Dorian Owen
• Dr Alexander Thornton

Objectives

The primary goal is to secure a sustained output of research findings and publications that will have an impact on academic and public-policy debates on, and teaching and training in development, both locally and internationally. To achieve this goal, the research cluster aims at the following short and medium term objectives:

• Institutionalising research co-ordination and co-operation through regular planning meetings, research seminars, thematic workshops/colloquia, joint publications, and joint funding applications.
• Completing and/or initiating research projects that deal with the questions posed above, and publishing the results in peer-reviewed outlets. These projects are listed below.
• Appointing a post-doctoral fellow to assist in the completion of a focused research project on the nexus of poverty, inequality, and conflict (including post-conflict situations).
• Hosting visiting researchers.
• Sharing information on new theoretical developments, data sources, and methodological innovations in the field of Development Studies.
• Providing research mentoring for younger researchers and assisting them in getting their work published and presented at international conferences.
• Encouraging MA and PhD candidates to engage in research projects relevant to the focus of the cluster.

Over the longer term, the research cluster in addition aims at:

• Establishing a fully-fledged research programme on socio-economic and political development in middle- and low-income countries, involving a number of permanent staff, Masters and PhD students, post-doctoral and other research fellows. It is foreseen that the focus of this research programme will include, but may also be wider than the theme of the research cluster.
• Launching a multi-disciplinary and inter-disciplinary PhD programme in Development Studies.

The Cluster achieved one of its founding longer-term goals. In July 2008, we received formal approval for the launch of an MA programme in Development Studies from CUAP (Committee on University Academic Programmes of the Tertiary Education Commission).

The Cluster was accepted as Associate Members of the NZ Council for International Development (CID).

Members of the Cluster are involved in the Pacific Islands Research Cluster, and in the Otago International Health Research Network (OIHRN).

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Researcher Profiles

Prof Tony Binns

Tony Binns has been Ron Lister Professor of Geography in the University of Otago since October 2004. Prior to this, he was based at the University of Sussex (UK). Tony has worked in the field of Development Studies for over 30 years, with particular experience in Africa. His research has focused broadly on the people-environment interface in a development context, with specific interests in environmental management, food production systems, local institutions and community-based development.

Dr Jenny Bryant-Tokalau

Dr Jenny Bryant-Tokalau is a Senior Lecturer in Te Tumu, School of Mäori, Pacific & Indigenous Studies. As former Associate Professor of Geography at the University of the South Pacific (Fiji), and Sustainable Development Adviser, as well as Head of the Global Environment Facility unit for UNDP in Suva, she authored a number of publications and reports on poverty and development. Jenny's current research interests include poverty, inequality and environment linkages in the Pacific, and issues of environmental governance.

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Prof David Fielding

David Fielding, a Professor in the Department of Economics, researches on development macroeconomics and the economics of violent conflict. He is External Fellow of the Centre for Research in Economic Development and International Trade, University of Nottingham (UK) and Research Associate of the Centre for the Study of African Economies at Oxford University (UK). His most recent research project has been on macroeconomic policy in the CFA Franc Zone, conducted at the UN World Institute for Development Economics Research in Helsinki (Finland).

Dr Douglas Hill

Dr Hill is the Department of Geography's first lecturer in Development Studies. He has recently been working on transboundary disputes over the use of rivers between Bangladesh-India-Pakistan. In the past he has looked at poverty alleviation strategies in rural India; participatory environment management of forests. For the past two years he has been involved in a project looking at the effects on local communities when Ports and Docklands undergo rapid change in India, Bangladesh, Vietnam and Malaysia.

Assoc Prof Stephen Knowles

Stephen Knowles is an Associate Professor in the Department of Economics. Stephen's research is primarily in the area of economic growth and development, with special interests in income inequality, human capital, social capital and foreign aid. He is an External Fellow of the Centre for Research in Economic Development and International Trade (CREDIT) at the University of Nottingham (UK).

Dr Andrew McGregor

Dr Andrew McGregor is a Lecturer in the Department of Geography. His research interests include Southeast Asian development, foreign aid and human rights, tourism as development, political ecology, and environmental politics and philosophy. His methodological interests are in discourse analysis and discussion groups.

Assoc Prof Etienne Nel

Etienne joined the staff in the Department of Geography in 2008. He had taught previously at the University of Transkei and Rhodes University, both in South Africa. His PhD was in the field of Economic Geography and was entitled ‘Regional and Local Economic Development in South Africa: A Case Study of the Eastern Cape’. His primary research interests lie in the broad areas of Economic Geography and Local Economic Development. Currently he is an Editorial Board member of the Journals: Applied Geography, Local Economy and the Journal of Geography in Higher Education. He currently chairs the International Geographic Union’s Commission on Marginalization, Globalization and Local and Regional Response (C 04-27). He has authored or edited six books and has written nearly 100 articles or book chapters.

Prof Philip Nel

Philip Nel is Professor of Politics, where he teaches Global Political Economy, Ethics in International Relations, and Global Governance. His current research focuses on three themes, namely global welfare inequalities, the politics of cosmopolitanism, and global governance.

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Prof Dorian Owen

Dorian Owen is Professor of Economics. His research interests are mainly in the areas of empirical modelling of economic growth, applied econometrics and sports economics. Current interests include the effects of social capital and social divergence on economic performance, the fundamental determinants of economic growth and development, and competitive balance and sports attendance.

Dr Alexander (Alec) Thornton

Dr Alec Thornton is a Lecturer in Geography in the School of Physical, Environmental and Mathematical Sciences (PEMS) at UNSW in Canberra. Alec was previously a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Poverty, Inequality and Development (PID) Research Cluster in the Division of Humanities, University of Otago, NZ. He has a PhD in Development Studies awarded in 2006 (Sussex, UK), and a MA in Rural Development awarded in 2002 (Sussex, UK).

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