Harvard Center for International Development

Welcome to the Harvard Center for International Development’s Beyond COVID podcast. This podcast is a series of conversations with CID faculty experts on various key dimensions of COVID response and recovery. Our goal with these conversations, and with CID’s Beyond COVID research initiative, is to make use of lessons learned and capitalize on emergent innovations sparked by the pandemic in order to address losses and reimagine global development in the post-COVID era.

This week, we are joined by Ludwig Staub, Assistant Professor of economics at Harvard. CID Student Ambassador Kevin Chen (Harvard College) sat down with Ludwig on December 1, 2021, to discuss resilient macroeconomic policies and inclusive economic growth.

This podcast was originally recorded on Friday, December 3rd, 2021 for the CID Speaker Series featuring Sharmi Surianarain, Chief Impact Officer of the Harambee Youth Employment Accelerator. Surianarain continued the conversation with our CID Student Ambassador, Jamar Williams, after an appearance at the virtual CID Speaker Series event.

South Africa has the highest youth unemployment rate in the world. Annually, approximately 1 million young people exit schooling and enter the labor market. Within a year, nearly two-thirds are unemployed and discouraged, meaning only one-third find any kind of work or continue to further education. Harambee develops solutions to promote inclusive growth and reduce unemployment by identifying and creating jobs and work experiences for young people, breaking barriers for young people to access work, and linking young work-seekers to formal and informal work opportunities. In this session, Harambee and its key research partners share lessons from 10 years of impact and partnership with government, business, and civil society to achieve practical and scalable impact. In addressing South Africa’s challenge, Harambee believes an African blueprint can be prototyped to help solve a global challenge.

Welcome to the Harvard Center for International Development’s Beyond COVID podcast. This podcast is a series of conversations with CID faculty experts on various key dimensions of COVID response and recovery. Our goal with these conversations, and with CID’s Beyond COVID research initiative, is to make use of lessons learned and capitalize on emergent innovations sparked by the pandemic in order to address losses and reimagine global development in the post-COVID era. This week, we are joined by Margaret (Maggie) McConnell, Associate Professor of global health economics in the Department of Global Health and Population at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. CID Student Ambassador Harsh Sahni (Mason Fellow, HKS) sat down with Maggie on November 15th, 2021, to discuss how to build resilient health systems.

Welcome to the Harvard Center for International Development’s Beyond COVID podcast. This podcast is a series of conversations with CID faculty experts on various key dimensions of COVID response and recovery. Our goal with these conversations, and with CID’s Beyond COVID research initiative, is to make use of lessons learned and capitalize on emergent innovations sparked by the pandemic in order to address losses and reimagine global development in the post-COVID era. This week, we are joined by Zoe Marks, Lecturer in Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School. CID Student Ambassador Aqil Merchant (Harvard College) sat down with Zoe on November 10th, 2021, to discuss how to build resilient education systems.

This podcast was originally recorded on Friday, October 29th, 2021 for the CID Speaker Series featuring Latanya Mapp Frett, President of Global Fund for Women. Frett continued the conversation with our CID Student Ambassador, Kerianne DiBattista, after an appearance at the virtual CID Speaker Series event, Co-sponsored by the Women and Public Policy Program (WAPPP) at the Harvard Kennedy School.

From the Green Wave to #EndSARS, movements drive social transformation but lack resources and support. Feminist funds are changing that. They up-end the development model by providing flexible funding straight to local grassroots leaders and groups to use as they wish. Instead of dictating priorities, feminist funds follow grantees’ leadership, supporting them in addressing needs, opportunities, and challenges as they arise, on their own terms. Traditional philanthropy can resemble an old boys’ club. Only 0.42%—less than half of 1%—of all foundation grants are dedicated to women's rights. Feminist funders take a different approach. Think less top-down decision making, exploitation, and poverty porn; and more solidarity, trust, and building collective power.

Welcome to the Harvard Center for International Development’s Beyond COVID podcast. This podcast is a series of conversations with CID faculty experts on various key dimensions of COVID response and recovery. Our goal with these conversations, and with CID’s Beyond COVID research initiative, is to make use of lessons learned and capitalize on emergent innovations sparked by the pandemic in order to address losses and reimagine global development in the post-COVID era. This week, we are joined by Asim Khwaja, CID Director and the Sumitomo-Foundation for Advanced Studies on International Development Professor of International Finance and Development at the Harvard Kennedy School. CID Student Ambassador Devangana Rana(Harvard College) sat down with Asim on October 19, 2021, to discuss how to build resilient education systems.

Welcome to the Harvard Center for International Development’s Beyond COVID podcast. This podcast is a series of conversations with CID faculty experts on various key dimensions of COVID response and recovery. Our goal with these conversations, and with CID’s Beyond COVID research initiative, is to make use of lessons learned and capitalize on emergent innovations sparked by the pandemic in order to address losses and reimagine global development in the post-covid era. This week, we are joined by Emmerich Davies, Assistant Professor of Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. CID Student Ambassador Aqil Merchant (Harvard College) sat down with Emmerich on October 13, 2021, to discuss how to build resilient education systems.

This podcast was originally recorded on Friday, October 15, 2021 for the CID Speaker Series featuring Andrew Stern, Founder and CEO of The Global Development Incubator(GDI). Stern continued the conversation with our CID Student Ambassador, Mandla Isaacs, after an appearance at the virtual CID Speaker Series event.

Creating impact at the scale of the problems we are trying to solve in the world is hard -- be it climate change, global migration or agricultural finance. GDI aims to take good ideas and turn them into great solutions -- and ones that can attempt to make a dent in the big problems of our time. In addition to designing and launching new product or service solutions, GDI also creates multi-stakeholder initiatives that bring together governments, companies and nonprofit organizations to solve big problems, such as: How do we build a sustainable agricultural finance market in East Africa? Or, can we create more durable and ethical solutions for refugees and migrants? Or, how do we protect large swaths of forests around the world, with a minimum size being equivalent to the State of Vermont? GDI designs, builds and launches efforts like these and can share some of the lessons learned and pitfalls of attempting to do so.

Originally recorded on Friday, October 1, 2021 for the CID Speaker Series, featuring Dianne Calvi, President and CEO of Village Enterprise. Calvi continued the conversation with our CID Student Ambassador, Maryam Guerrab, after an appearance at the virtual CID Speaker Series event where they shared insights on addressing extreme poverty and the Village Enterprise model.

Great progress has been made in alleviating extreme poverty. According to the World Bank, the number of people living in extreme poverty dropped significantly from 1.9 billion people in 1990 to 689 million in 2017. But due to the COVID-19 pandemic, that progress has stalled for the first time in 25 years. What does the evidence point to as possible solutions to this problem? The evidence suggests that entrepreneurship and innovation play important roles in driving poverty alleviation. Identifying and scaling up the most cost-effective, evidence-based solutions has never been more urgent as the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change, and conflict could push hundreds of millions of people into extreme poverty. Microloans, cash transfers, and poverty graduation are three different approaches to providing the extreme poor with a path out of extreme poverty.

Originally recorded on Friday, September 17, 2021 for the CID Speaker Series, featuring ​Philippe Aghion, Professor at the College de France, at INSEAD, and at the London School of Economics. Aghion continued the conversation with our CID Student Ambassador Ana Alvarez after an appearance at the virtual CID Speaker Series event where they shared insights from his research and book, The Power of Creative Destruction.

Creative destruction is the process whereby new innovations displace old technologies. This talk will use the lens of creative destruction and of the so-called Schumpeterian growth paradigm to: (i) address some main enigma in the history of economic growth; (ii) question common wisdoms on growth policy design; (iii) rethink the future of capitalism, and how to direct the power of creative destruction to achieve sustained, greener, and more inclusive prosperity.

Philippe Aghion is a Professor at the College de France, at INSEAD, and at the London School of Economics, and a fellow of the Econometric Society and of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. His research focuses on the economics of growth. With Peter Howitt, he pioneered the so-called Schumpeterian Growth paradigm which was subsequently used to analyze the design of growth policies and the role of the state in the growth process. Much of this work is summarized in their joint book Endogenous Growth Theory (MIT Press, 1998) and The Economics of Growth (MIT Press, 2009), in his book with Rachel Griffith on Competition and Growth (MIT Press, 2006), and in his survey “What Do We Learn from Schumpeterian Growth Theory” (joint with U. Akcigit and P. Howitt.) In 2001, Philippe Aghion received the Yrjo Jahnsson Award of the best European economist under age 45, in 2009 he received the John Von Neumann Award, and in March 2020 he shared the BBVA “Frontier of Knowledge Award” with Peter Howitt for “developing an economic growth theory based on the innovation that emerges from the process of creative destruction.”