Understanding Global Development Research

A must read for all students, researchers and aid workers contemplating field work in emerging economies.


This is an up-to-date, thought-provoking and well-balanced publication that brings together the best insights of leading and young scholars at the nexus of development and participatory field research. Its relational, ethics- and power-sensitive perspective makes this book special.

Gordon Crawford is a Research Professor in Global Development at the Centre for Trust, Peace and Social Relations at Coventry University, United Kingdom. He has a B.A. in Sociology, an M.A. in Development Studies and a Ph.D. in Politics from the University of Leeds. He joined Coventry University in October 2015 after teaching and researching at the University of Leeds from 1993, where he was Professor of Development Politics. He was previously Director of the Centre for Global Development (CGD) at Leeds. His research examines issues of human rights, democracy and development, especially in countries of the Global South, and he has undertaken extensive fieldwork in Ghana. His current research includes work on natural resource politics and on social movement struggles for right-based development. Recent publications include Human Rights, Power and Civic Action (co-edited with Brd A. Andreassen) (2013). He is an Editorial Group member of the journal Africa Spectrum.

Lena J. Jaspersen is a University Academic Fellow in Innovation Management at the University of Leeds, where she co-developed and teaches the flagship interdisciplinary Innovation Thinking and Practice module with Tony Morgan and teaches qualitative research methods at the PhD level. Her main research interests include collaborative research and innovation, and the role of partnerships in addressing global development challenges.

Lenas background brings an international and interdisciplinary dimension to her writing, teaching and research. She holds Masters degrees in Sociology and International Relations and was awarded a PhD with Recommendation of Research Excellence from the University of Leeds. Lena is also currently part of the team at the Leeds Institute of Teaching Excellence carrying out pedagogical research into interdisciplinary team-based teaching and learning with a focus on digital and employability skills.

Lena has a strong interest in innovation and research methods. Shes a co-author of the 7th edition of the bestselling Management and Business Research (Sage, 2021), which provides readers with a clear and comprehensive overview of methods for conducting management and business research. Lenas other publications include a recent article in the British Journal of Management, containing a systematic overview of methods for qualitative network research, Understanding Global Development Research (Sage, 2017) and the UN-real World of Human Rights (Nomos, 2012).

Liberating Development Inquiry: Freedom, Openness and Participation in Fieldwork (Robert Chambers [IDS, University of Sussex] and Nicholas Loubere [Australian National University]) Democracy of the Ground?: Encountering Elite Domination During Fieldwork (Ashish Shah [University of Oxford and DFID]) Combining Participatory Tools with Ethnography in Rural Cambodia (Sarah Milne [Australian National University]) Gender is Not a Noun, It's an Adjective: Using Gender as a Lens Within Development Research (Ruth Pearson [University of Leeds] and Rosemary Morgan [Johns Hopkins University]) Putting Ideological Commitments into Practice? (Alice Evans [LSE]) Gendered Agency in Constrained Circumstances: Researching Women Selling Sex in Kenya (Egle Cesnulyte [University of Warwick]) Encounters with the Powerful: Researching Elites (Jean Grugel [Open University] and Rosemary Morgan [Johns Hopkins University]) Reflecting on Notions of Power in 'Researching Up' (Karen M. Siegal [University of Glasgow]) The Ups and Downs of 'Studying Up' (John Osburg [University of Rochester]) On the Margins of World Society: Working with Impoverished, Excluded and Marginalised People (Joanna Pfaff-Czarnecka [Bielefeld University]) and Lena J. Kruckenberg [University of Leeds]) Encounters at the Margins: Situating the Researcher Under Conditions of Aid (Swetha Rao Dhananka [University of Lausanne]) Marginalisation(s) at the Margins: Studying Identity, Ethnicity and Conflict in Rural Bolivia (Lorenza B. Fontana [Open University]) Under Threat: Working in Dangerous Environments (Jenny Pearce [University of Bradford] and Nicholas Loubere [Australian National University]) Perceiving Threats to Health in the Field (Scott Naysmith [LSE]) Children in the Streets: Bridging the Ethical Dilemmas of Dangerous Fieldwork through Activism (Nelly Ali [Birkbeck College]) Beyond the Ivory Tower: Fieldwork in Development Practice (David Mosse [SOAS] and Lena J. Kruckenberg [University of Leeds]) Multipositionality in the 'Field' (Kathy Dodworth [University of Edinburgh]) Encountering Failure (Working Title) (Lata Narayanaswamy [University of Leeds])