Call for Proposals: STEG Ideas for Transformation with IGC

Sustainable growth refers to countries developing their potential in an inclusive way that improves social, environmental, and economic well-being for all, including for future generations.

Research Priorities

The IGC’s research focuses on sustainable growth policies in developing countries. Sustainable growth refers to countries developing their potential in an inclusive way that improves social, environmental, and economic well-being for all, including for future generations.

They are particularly interested in projects that address these issues through one of the four themes (outlined below), all of which play a crucial role in building resilience and promoting sustainable growth.

• Firms, trade, and productivity: They seek to understand the sources of the productive potential of all firms in an economy, from large formal firms to small-scale family farms.
• State effectiveness: The development of an effective state, able to raise revenues and implement policies, and ensuring welfare, stability and security against violence, remains central to the research.
• Cities: Recognising that the future of the developing world is urban, they emphasise the central role of cities in promoting productivity and growth as well as their potential downsides, such as congestion, emissions and crime that limit growth.
• Energy and environment: Affordable and reliable energy is essential for growth. The research will explore sustainable avenues to expand electricity access and consumption while addressing the associated externalities, both global and local.

Themes

• STEG has identified six research themes and three cross-cutting issues that help to guide the initiative. Research funded and promoted by STEG may focus on broad systemic patterns and processes of structural transformation and growth for low- and middle-income countries, in a comparative sense across time or space, or more narrowly defined topics related to one or more of the following six research themes:
  • Theme 0: Data, Measurement, and Conceptual Framing
  • Theme 1: Firms, Frictions and Spillovers, and Industrial Policy
  • Theme 2: Labour, Home Production, and Structural Transformation at the Level of Households
  • Theme 3: Agricultural Productivity and Sectoral Gaps
  • Theme 4: Trade and Spatial Frictions
  • Theme 5: Political Economy and Public Investment
• STEG is also focused around three cross-cutting issues that are simultaneously relevant to many areas of structural transformation, including the six research themes:
  • Issue 1: Gender
  • Issue 2: Climate Change and the Environment
  • Issue 3: Inequality and Inclusion

Award Information

• Amount: £2,000

Eligibility Criteria

• They accept applications from a wide and inclusive pool of researchers, including PhD students and early career-researchers in economics or related disciplines (e.g. public policy, political science), as well as policymakers, civil society organisations, practitioners, and think-tanks. Candidates from developing countries are especially encouraged to apply.

For more information, visit STEG.