Global Development Institute podcast

In this episode we hear GDI undergraduate students Evelyn Taylor, Olivia Thornburrow and Cheryl Loh in conversation with Cecilia Milesi. 

Cecilia has over 25 years of experience advising multilateral organizations, United Nations agencies such as UNOSSC, and international NGOs including Amnesty International and Oxfam. She is the founder of the Global Change Center and the youth participation initiative Subir al Sur, in addition to serving as an Asia Global Fellow and a fellow of the Global South Unit for Mediation.

Together, they discuss how language shapes power in international development, why whose knowledge counts matters, and what a genuine shift towards Global South-led cooperation could look like.

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The Oxford Handbook of Social Policies in the Global South has just been published, bringing together the latest research on social policies and institutions in place outside the advanced capitalist countries. In this episode of the GDI Podcast, one of the handbook's co-editors, Professor Armando Barrientos, discusses the rationale behind publishing the book and the contributions it makes to the broad field of social policy studies. 

Read the book here: The Oxford Handbook of Social Policies in the Global South | Oxford Academic

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Three of our recently-graduated undergrad students - Amelia Campion, Alex Dannreuther and Niamh Keogan - speak with Chibwe Masabo Henry about the breakdown of aid structures and the ways we can shift our giving to a flexible, community-grounded model. 

Chibwe Masabo Henry is Shifting the Power Programme Lead at Comic Relief, and is also Chief Steward of One World Together. 

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In this episode, GDI's Pritish Behuria discusses his new book, The Political Economy of Rwanda's Rise (Open Access, Cambridge University Press). Pritish explains how the country's economic and political prospects have changed since the genocide in 1994, as well as the development challenges Rwanda currently faces. 

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In recent decades, conservation science has begun to pay greater attention to local people’s rights, livelihoods, and well-being. Yet the growing availability of data and advanced technologies raises new justice concerns for conservation science. This episode explores the justice dimensions of conservation in a data-driven world.

This episode features Professor Dan Brockington from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, interviewed by Leverhulme Early Career Fellow Thuy Duong Khuu.

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In this episode, we chat with some of the authors of a recent intervention published inTransactions of the Institute of British Geographers on 'Geographies of Responsibility, Care and Repair in Digital Worlds of AI'. We hear from Jessica McLean, Katarzyna Cieslik, Nikko Stevens, and Jack Gieseking about the threats posed by AI, the blurry definitions of AI, and the critical tools scholars are using to understand our ever-changing technological landscape.

You can read the essays in the intervention here: Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers - Wiley Online Library

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In her opening session for Research for Transformation Lab week in November 2025, GDI’s Diana Mitlin reflected on five academic personas and their possibilities for transformative research: the shining superstar, the convenor, the subversive persona, the collaborative co-producer, the shapeshifter. In this pod, we follow the recording of Diana’s reflections with a conversation between two of GDI’ researchers, Smith Ouma and Elisa Gambino. Ellie and Smith react to these personas through their own experiences and situate them in the current higher education and academic system of knowledge production. We hope you enjoy their reflections. The episode is hosted by Research for Transformation Lab manager Helen Underhill.

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In this episode, Taio Gardey, GDI alumnus and Executive Director of Farming Out of Poverty (FOOP), discusses the realities of working on the ground in Sierra Leone. We discuss tricky decisions he's had to make throughout his career, the kinds of skills he's developed in recent years, and how development organisations can adapt and thrive in the current environment.  

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In this episode, we chat with five recent graduates about their time with the SEED Changemakers programme. Participants include:

• Laura Acosta
• Ife Agboola
• Patrick Caskie
• Eddie Groves
• Thando Mathe

As well as chatting about their reasons for becoming Changemakers, participants describe their reasons for supporting social enterprise One World Together, the skills they learned as students, and their experiences of navigating a tough graduate jobs market. A must-listen for current and prospective students!

We covered a lot of initiatives and topics during the course of the interview, so we've provided some relevant links below:

• One World Together
• SEED Changemakers programme
• We Don't Do Charity
• Goonj
• Alumni Podcast: Navigating Development Careers in the Twenty-First Century

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In this episode, Dr Mohammed Ibrahim is joined by Dr Alex Moyem Kombat, Head of Research and Policy of the Ghana Revenue Authority and two GDI PGRs, Anifat Ibrahim and Mohammed Damba to discuss domestic revenue mobilisation in Ghana and in West Africa. 

Taxation is crucial to development as it provides states with the necessary funding to provide citizens with public services, such as healthcare and education. Currently, Ghana’s tax-to-GDP ratio is around 13%, just short of the African average of 15%, but far from the OECD average of over 30%. 

Listen to learn about what are some of Ghana’s biggest challenges in collecting taxes and how these resonate with broader development concerns in the West Africa region.

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