The ratification of the Lisbon Treaty, and the arrival in Brussels of a new leadership team, together provided an opportunity to re-invigorate European collaboration and collective action in the realm of international development. Europe is at a cross-roads, emerging from an eight-year period of introspection with a treaty which provides a mandate, not for centralisation, but for greater cooperation.
The ODI European Development Cooperation Strengthening Programme
This site is facilitated by the European Development Cooperation Strengthening Programme, an Overseas Development Institute initiative funded by the UK Department for International Development (DFID). It has been established to support the debate on EU institutional and policy change by building an infrastructure of knowledge, contacts and information on EU development cooperation. It aims to:
- construct a community of ‘EU change-makers’;
- support the conversation on development cooperation, its structure and its relation to the wider arena of EU external action; and
- take the agenda forward through policy analysis and by promoting the sharing and practical use of knowledge and information.
The team
Simon Maxwell was Director of the Overseas Development Institute from 1997-2009. He is an economist who began his career working overseas, first in Kenya and India for the UN Development Program, and then in Bolivia for the UK Overseas Development Administration. He holds a BA in Philosophy, Politics and Economics from Oxford University and an MA in Development Economics from the University of Sussex.
Before joining ODI, Simon spent 16 years at the Institute of Development Studies at the University of Sussex, latterly as Programme Manager for Poverty, Food Security and the Environment. He has written extensively on poverty, food security, agricultural development and aid, and his current research interests also include development policy, linking relief and development, global governance and bridging research and policy. He is a forum fellow of the World Economic Forum and was awarded a CBE in January 2007.
Follow Simon on twitter here.
Mikaela Gavas specialises in European Union (EU) development cooperation. She has worked in the EU institutions – Commission and Parliament – as well as for an EU Member State, the UK’s Department for International Development, where she led on drafting the department’s EU Institutional Strategy Paper and on analysis on the implications of the Lisbon Treaty for EU development cooperation. She managed BOND’s (UK NGO network) EU programme from 2002 to 2006 and chaired CONCORD’s (European Confederation of NGOs) Policy Forum. She has also worked for a number of NGOs, including Saferworld on conflict prevention and arms controls and Oxfam GB advising senior management on EU influencing strategies and policy analysis. Mikaela holds an MSc in International Relations from the London School of Economics (LSE).
Siân Herbert is the Research/Project Officer for the EDCSP project. She also writes freelance, and has been published by the Guardian, Chatham House and Argentine think tank El Centro Argentino de Estudios Internacionales (CAEI). In 2011, she was longlisted for the Guardian International Development Journalism Competition. Siân joined ODI after working as a Researcher for the think tank Open Europe, specialising in EU external relations, aid and budgetary affairs. Prior to this, she carried out freelance research and communications work, including experience working for an Argentine NGO. Siân studied a Masters in International Economic Relations and International Relations and Negotiations at the Facultad Latinoamericana de Ciencias Sociales (FLACSO) in Argentina, and a BSc in Politics and International Relations at Southampton University.
Follow Siân on twitter here.
Adela Dumbrăvan is a Sub-Contractor with the EDCSP project. She has gained significant knowledge of the EU policies during a legal internship with the European Parliament and has previously worked with the Romanian Institute of Peace (PATRIR) as a conflict researcher. She holds a BA in Law from the Babes-Bolyai University in Cluj-Napoca, Romania, and is a graduate of the Erasmus Mundus MA in Human Rights Practice offered jointly by Roehampton University (UK), University of Goteborg (Sweden) and Tromsø University (Norway).
