Social Mobility in Developing Countries

Vegard Iversen is Professor of Development Economics and Head of the Livelihoods and Institutions Department, Natural Resources Institute (NRI), University of Greenwich. After completing his PhD in development economics from University of Cambridge in 2000, he was tenured faculty at School of Development Studies, University of East Anglia until he moved to India in 2006. While living and working in India he was a Research Fellow in IFPRI's New Delhi office, a visiting faculty member at Indian Statistical Institute (Delhi), a Professor and Vice Dean at Jindal School of Government and Public Policy, an Adjunct Professor at Sanford School of Public Policy's Duke Semester in India programme and a Professor in the Economics Area, Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad. He received the Annual Dudley Seers Memorial Prize for the best article in Journal of Development Studies in 2008 and has served on the journal's editorial board since 2016. Anirudh Krishna is the Edgar T. Thompson Professor of Public Policy and Political Science at Duke University. He received his PhD in government from Cornell University in 2000, and a Master's in economics from Delhi University in 1980. Professor Krishna's research investigates how poor communities and individuals in developing countries cope with the structural and personal constraints that result in poverty and powerlessness. Before returning to academia in 2000, he spent 14 years with the Indian Administrative Service, managing diverse rural and urban development initiatives. He received an honorary doctorate from Uppsala University in 2011; the Olaf Palme Visiting Professorship from the Swedish Research Council in 2007; the Dudley Seers Memorial Prize in 2005 and 2013; and a best article award of the American Political Science Association in 2002. Kunal Sen has over three decades of experience in academic and applied development economics research. He is the author of eight books and the editor of five volumes on the economics and political economy of development. He is Director of UNU-WIDER in Helsinki, and is a Professor of development economics at the Global Development Institute, University of Manchester. Professor Sen is a leading international expert on the political economy of growth and development. He has performed extensive research on international finance, the political economy determinants of inclusive growth, the dynamics of poverty, social exclusion, female labour force participation, and the informal sector in developing economies. His research has focused on India, East Asia, and sub-Saharan Africa. He was awarded the Sanjaya Lall Prize in 2006 and the Dudley Seers Prize in 2003 for his publications.