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.”
High downside risk to income and livelihoods is part of life in developing countries. Climatic risks, economic fluctuations, and a large number of individual-specific shocks leave these households vulnerable to severe hardship. The paper explores the links between risk, vulnerability and poverty, taking a micro-level perspective. Risk does not just result in variability in living standards. There is increasing evidence that the lack of means to cope with risk and vulnerability is in itself a cause of persistent poverty and poverty traps. Risk results in strategies that avoid taking advantage of profitable but risky opportunities. Shocks destroy human, physical and social capital limiting opportunities further. The result is that risk is an important constraint on broad-based growth in living standards in many developing countries. It is a relatively ignored part when designing anti-poverty policies and efforts to attain the Millennium Development Goals. The paper discusses conceptual issues, the evidence and the policy implications.