The department is a lively community that is recognised internationally as one of the top centres for research and teaching in development studies.

Our courses offer excellent training for a career in international development or for advanced study, and attract students of the highest calibre from across the world.
“I had waited for 10 years before my dream to study in Oxford became a reality and the experience was truly beyond expectation”
Our students are taught to develop as critical and independent thinkers and when they leave us they are equipped with the knowledge and skills they need to bring about real change.
“My time at Oxford strengthened my critical analysis and provided me with a unique interdisciplinary grounding in history, politics and economics that has equipped me well in dealing with public policy issues and program development strategy.”
Our courses offer excellent training for a career in international development or for advanced study, and attract students of the highest calibre from across the world.
“I had waited for 10 years before my dream to study in Oxford became a reality and the experience was truly beyond expectation”
Our courses offer excellent training for a career in international development or for advanced study, and attract students of the highest calibre from across the world.
“I had waited for 10 years before my dream to study in Oxford became a reality and the experience was truly beyond expectation”
Our students are taught to develop as critical and independent thinkers and when they leave us they are equipped with the knowledge and skills they need to bring about real change.
“My time at Oxford strengthened my critical analysis and provided me with a unique interdisciplinary grounding in history, politics and economics that has equipped me well in dealing with public policy issues and program development strategy.”
Our students are taught to develop as critical and independent thinkers and when they leave us they are equipped with the knowledge and skills they need to bring about real change.
“My time at Oxford strengthened my critical analysis and provided me with a unique interdisciplinary grounding in history, politics and economics that has equipped me well in dealing with public policy issues and program development strategy.”
Francesca Lessa, Departmental Lecturer in Latin American Studies and Development, was invited by Uruguay's Peace and Justice Service (SERPAJ) NGO to write a chapter for its prestigious annual report on the human rights situation in the country.
SERPAJ was founded in 1981, when Uruguay was still a military dictatorship; it was the first NGO in the country to work on the defence of fundamental human rights. It has published a yearly report on the country's human rights situation since 1988.
Dr Lessa wrote the opening chapter of the 2020 report, in which she discusses the significance of the historic sentence handed down by Rome’s Appeals Court in the so-called Operation Condor trial in 2019, in which 13 former Uruguayan civilian and military defendants were sentenced to life imprisonment.
Read the full chapter here.
The launch of the report (in Spanish) can be watched here.