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In response to Seth Kaplan: shifting from externally designed to local solutions, and from seeing poverty as isolated to the periphery to it being interconnected with the global economy and its inequalities.

The EADI conference has closed its doors. What the conference has shown us is that the debate on inequality and the rise of the middle class in developing countries opens many windows of opportunity to reframe development and development policy as...

Can global citizenship flourish in an era of increased competition between the middle classes in the North and the South?

The Broker had the pleasure of interviewing Nancy Birdsall, president of the Centre for Global Development, at the EADI conference. She has often asked herself  who you call middle class? And what does the rise of the middle class mean for de...

The bright picture of Africa’s economy is that it is growing and that inequality is declining. However, as Stefano Prato of the Society for International Development (SID) said at the beginning of a panel session at the EADI conference, not all Af...

A social contract may offer a sound basis for responsible development. Power relations are crucial.

It is questionable whether the middle classes in Southern Africa can be perceived as drivers of economic and societal change.

The rise of the middle classes in emerging and developing countries has implications on different levels. Their role in democratization processes is not unambiguous and, as the first plenary session of the conference made clear, depends partly on...

During the EADI conference, The Broker had an exclusive interview with Branko Milanovic, Professor at the City University New York and economist for the World Bank specialized in inequality.

Apart from being a media partner at the EADI conference The Broker also took part, presenting a panel on inequality and the post-2015 agenda. During a session of almost two hours the panel provided an update on global inequality trends, based on t...

Using Ostrom’s work on managing the commons, and more recent interest-based and discursive institutionalism, this paper seeks to reveal the interests behind and fallacy of the discourse used by the state, with support from segments of capital, to...

The EADI General Conference started its first full day on 24 June with a plenary panel on the middle classes. It emerged that perspectives on the middle classes are very different in Africa, Latin America, Asia and Europe.

In the opening lecture of the 14th General Conference of the European Association of Development Research and Training Institutes (EADI), Professor of International Development at the UK’s Open University Raphael Kaplinsky addressed the challenges...

Follow The Broker at the EADI general conference “Responsible Development in a Polycentric World: Inequality, Citizenship and the Middle Classes”.

The global development framework for the coming years cannot ignore global inequality if it should constitute a relevant and legitimate set of development goals in a globalised world.

For a national policy maker it is possible to think about raising the income levels of the bottom 10% or 20% toward the middle of the distribution. The poorest can be brought nearer the poverty line through measures like cash transfers.

Given the over-sensitivity of the Gini to the middle of the distribution, and the insensitivity of the Palma, policymakers could consider a choice between the two: which aspect of the distribution are you more concerned with?

On why the post-2015 agenda should include a goal to limit the negative characteristics of inequality and how indicators of income concentration are better suited for this. One proposal that could be used is the Palma index.

Inequalities within countries are largely ignored in the UN climate negotiations. This must change, but the global poor should be spared.

The specification of a new international income inequality goal will certainly be difficult. However, if rich-country fears of “the rise of the rest” can be replaced with a common commitment to a new economic and ecological convergence, global equ...

Editor Evert-jan Quak comments and reflects on new research, publications, blog posts, conferences and current affairs in the field of inclusive and sustainable economy.

What is it like to grow up male and middle class in a city where everyone sees a career in information technology (IT) as the road to success? Nicholas Nisbett, a social anthropologist, hung out at a cybercafé in Bangalore popular with young men a...