Global Development Institute opens with call for new solutions
18 Feb 2016
University launches Europe’s largest research and teaching institute for international development
The University has launched Europe’s largest research and teaching institute for international development, the Global Development Institute (GDI).
University alumna and Oxfam's Executive Director Winnie Byanyima returned to the University to open the GDI, telling academics: “We have the talent, the technology and the imagination to build a much better world.”
She challenged academics working on poverty and inequality to come up with ‘disruptive’ new solutions and calling for more imaginative ways to fix the world’s broken economy.
You can also watch Nobel Prize winner, Professor Joseph Stiglitz, Economist at Columbia University, also speaking on the challenge of inequality and the role of the Global Development Institute in tackling it:
Addressing Global Inequalities is one of the University’s five flagship research beacons. The Global Development Institute will focus on finding solutions that will bring sustainable development and social justice for all of humanity, uniting the strengths of the Institute for Development Policy and Management and the Brooks World Poverty Institute and building on 60 years of University of Manchester work on international development. The University’s research in the field was ranked 1st for impact and 2nd for quality in the UK Research Excellence Framework 2014 and third in the QS World University Rankings.
A key part of the GDI will be the Rory and Elizabeth Brooks Doctoral College – the world’s first doctoral college for international development and the first in the UK to be funded by philanthropy. It recognises the long-standing generosity of the Rory and Elizabeth Brooks Foundation.
GDI Executive Director Professor David Hulme said: “We believe The University of Manchester must shape ‘what comes next’. The world needs a different way of thinking and new solutions to tackle inequality but governments aren’t going to implement system reform without proof that another way is possible. The Global Development Institute will provide that proof by bringing together indisputable evidence of what works. We will also make sure our knowledge reaches beyond academia because people are demanding an alternative to chronic poverty, deepening inequality and environmental degradation.”
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