INSTITUTE OF DEVELOPMENT STUDIES

Their core work

The Institute of Development Studies (IDS) is a UK-based research institute focused on international development, applying social science methods to understand poverty, inequality, and global challenges. They specialize in bringing social anthropology, political ecology, and gender perspectives into development policy — areas often missing from technically-driven EU projects. Their work bridges academic research with practical policy influence, particularly in pastoralist livelihoods, community resilience, and the social dimensions of health threats like antimicrobial resistance.

What they specialise in

How they've shifted over time

IDS began its H2020 participation focused on resilience, uncertainty, and pastoralism — largely grounded in traditional development studies and livelihoods research (PASTRES, FOL in 2017). By 2018-2019, their scope broadened significantly into gender, political ecology, One Health, and antimicrobial resistance, signaling a shift toward interdisciplinary health-development intersections. The recent keyword explosion — from 4 early terms to 14 recent ones — suggests deliberate diversification into global health governance and social dimensions of infectious disease.

IDS is moving from traditional development resilience research toward the social science dimensions of global health challenges, making them increasingly relevant for health-focused consortia needing social and behavioural expertise.

How they like to work

IDS operates as both a project leader and a specialist partner, splitting evenly between coordinator and participant roles across their 4 projects. With 34 unique consortium partners across 22 countries, they maintain a remarkably wide network for their project count, suggesting they are a well-connected hub rather than a repeat-partner organization. Their participation in both small fellowships (MSCA) and large coordination actions (CSA) shows flexibility in consortium scale.

Despite only 4 H2020 projects, IDS has collaborated with 34 distinct partners across 22 countries — an unusually broad network reflecting their global development mandate. This reach spans well beyond Europe, consistent with their focus on development contexts in Africa, Latin America, and Asia.

What sets them apart

IDS brings something most technical consortia lack: rigorous social science expertise applied to real-world development and health challenges. Where engineering or biomedical partners can build the solution, IDS understands the community dynamics, gender dimensions, and policy context that determine whether solutions actually get adopted. Their ERC Advanced Grant (PASTRES) signals top-tier academic credibility, while their global network across 22 countries gives them on-the-ground access that few European HES institutions can match.

Highlights from their portfolio

• PASTRES
  ERC Advanced Grant worth EUR 2.1M — the most prestigious individual research grant in Europe, studying uncertainty and resilience through pastoralist communities globally.
• SoNAR-Global
  Built a global social sciences network for infectious disease and AMR — positions IDS at the intersection of social science and pandemic preparedness.
• FOL
  MSCA fellowship on land conflict in Colombia — demonstrates IDS capacity to coordinate focused, field-based research in challenging contexts.