Why are some communities able to provide secure environments, good education, adequate healthcare, and other factors that promote human development, while others fail to do so?
The Program on Governance and Local Development aims to explain variation in governance and local development in an effort to promote human welfare globally. It seeks to develop insights into the role of state and non-state actors, to consider the relationship between local level factors (e.g., poverty, gender relations, elite dynamics, ethnic diversity, etc.) and governance, and to provide policy-relevant findings based on scientifically rigorous research.
The program is committed to disseminating findings in the international and domestic communities, through academic publications, policy briefs, public presentations, and social media, as well as on-the-ground workshops in cooperation with local partners.
The Program comprises several key elements:
- The development of a survey-based measure of local governance and development, the Local Governance Performance Index (LGPI), and a database of consistent measurement tools to tap into variation at national and sub-national levels.
- Research based on the LGPI and other extant data, often in collaboration with other research groups.
- Workshops and conferences aimed at disseminating findings, considering policy implications and determining arenas in need of future research.
- Short-term grants to stimulate research from scholars and development specialists outside of the core GLD team.
- The GLD Working Paper Series; A peer-reviewed paper series that aims to disseminate findings in a timely manner.
GLD projects are collaborative, bringing together scholars from all across the world in an effort to foster our understanding of governance and development. GLD-Gothenburg also coordinates with the Program on Governance and Local Development at Yale University, which is focused on the Arab world.