About the blog

Bush banana flower, Central Australia © Dave Hodgkin

This is a blog about development happenings around the world, with a particular focus on local communities and the people affected by development actors and actions. The blog is currently authored by people associated with the Development Studies Program at the Australian National University. It focuses on opinion pieces and commentary on development issues and recent news.

People and Development can be contacted at:
development.blog (at) anu.edu.au.

People and Development is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.5 Australia License.

Contributors

Patrick Kilby

Dr Patrick Kilby is a political scientist with the School of Archaeology and Anthropology in the Faculty of Arts, the Australian National University. His research interests are NGOs in both developed and developing countries, empowerment and marginalisation, gender, and managing development activities. He has twenty years experience with development NGOs and his field research has been with NGOs working with poor women in India. Courses currently taught: ANTH8042 Migration, Refugees and Development, ANTH8009 Development in Practice.

Email: patrick.kilby (at) anu.edu.au.

Kim Williamson

Kim Williamson studied human ecology, development studies and Asian Studies at the Australian National University. She has researched and worked in the NGO and humanitarian sector in rural and metropolitan Thailand and Indonesia. She recently completed an honours thesis on sustainability and resilience in disaster response. Kim recently worked for the Global Poverty Project and runs the People and Development website.

Email: kim.suree (at) gmail.com.

Amy Glass

Amy Glass is a MAAPD student at Australian National University. She has ten years experience working with NGOs throughout the Sahel, Cambodia and now Madagascar, on programmes ranging from rural livelihoods and disaster risk reduction to humanitarian response. She currently works as an independent consultant, and her main interests are land, migration and chronic poverty.

Email: amykglass (at) hotmail.com

Cinzia Pedrotti

Cinzia Pedrotti holds a Bachelor-level degree in Anthropology from the University of Siena, Italy and completed the Master of Applied Anthropology and Participatory Development at the Australian National University in 2008, specialising in Gender and Development. She is currently starting her professional career in the development sector, and has been interning for several months at Oxfam Australia and Plan Australia in Melbourne. She is especially interested in issues relating to gender and development effectiveness.

Email: cinzia.pedrotti (at) gmail.com.

Joyce Wu

Joyce Wu is a PhD student at the Australian National University, carrying out research into sexual and gender-based violence during conflict situations and strengthening communities towards victims/survivors with a focus on increasing men and boys’ participation. Prior to her student life, Joyce has worked for various agencies including UNIFEM, AusAID, as well as women’s organisations in Australia, on the issue of eliminating violence against women and girls.

Email: joyce.wu (at) anu.edu.au.

Francesca Merlan

Francesca Merlan is Professor of Anthropology in the School of Archaeology and Anthropology at the ANU. Among her central research interests is social change in the relationships of people to land and livelihood. This focus is common to her long-standing and on-going research in several different field locations: Northern Australia, Papua New Guinea, and most recently (since 1999) in Germany. She has long-term involvement in applied anthropology, particularly in Australia with respect to indigenous issues. One of the developers of the Master of Applied Anthropology and Participatory Development, she teaches a number of undergraduate and post-graduate courses.

Email: francesca.merlan (at) anu.edu.au.

Development Studies at ANU

The Australian National University is Australia’s centre for research and training. Its Development Studies Program has a long history dating back to the establishment of the National Centre for Development Studies set up under the vision of Sir John Crawford, one of the leading development experts of the 1960s, and a strong advocate for high level teaching and research in development.

Development studies is now covered across campus with the College of Arts and Social Sciences having an undergraduate program in Development Studies, and a joint Graduate Coursework program with RSPAS in Participatory Development, Gender and Development, Indigenous Policy, and Conflict and Development. The Crawford School of Economics and Government, in the College of Asian & the Pacific, has a strong reputation in International Development Economics, Environment and Development, and Public Policy specialising in Development Policy.

MAAPD Program 2009

The Master of Applied Anthropology and Participatory Development (MAAPD) provides an understanding of the principal ways in which critical social inquiry and participatory processes can be applied to the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of development activities.

Graduates of the MAAPD program will have the knowledge and skills to:
• gain an understanding of trends and changes in development theory and practice as they apply to local development processes;
• apply critical social inquiry and participatory processes to the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of development activities;
• integrate social perspectives and participatory practices with other forms of technical expertise in development work;
• advise on the development policy processes of NGOs, the private sector, government, and multilateral agencies to ensure the inclusion of local and community perspectives.

Particular emphasis will be placed on combining social perspectives and participatory practices with other forms of technical expertise.

The MAAPD program is taught by social scientists in specialist areas from
• the Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies (RSPAS)
• the School of Archaeology and Anthropology in the Faculty of Arts
• the Centre for Aboriginal Economic Policy Research (CAEPR)program

The MAAPD program offers specialisations in:
• Conflict and development
• Gender and development
• Indigenous policy
• Society and environment

Images used in banners and homepage

Banners
Homepage and posts banner: photo: Ashley Wheaton..
Archives page banner: Baasii ceremony, northern Laos (photo: Kim Williamson).

Navigation gallery:
• About: Karen hilltribe women attending a local wedding in northern Thailand (photo: Kim Williamson).
• Environment: Villagers learning about community forest management in the Progo watershed, north of Jogyakarta, Indonesia (Farmers’ Field School for Bamboo: Yayasan Losari and Sahabat Bambu) (photo: Ben Brown, Yayasan Losari).
• Development: Schoolchildren in a hilltribe village (Mong Luang) in north-west Thailand (photo: Kim Williamson).
• Disasters: Floodwaters in Bangladesh after Cyclone Sidr (poto: Dave Hodgkin).