Currently, Jochen is directing a major ESRC-funded three-year project entitled Whither Multilateralism? International Security Institutions and Informal Groups of States. The primary aim of the project is to open up and to develop a new research agenda that undertakes a cross-institutional and cross-regional comparison of the dynamic relationship between informal groups of states and international security institutions in the management of risk and the resolution of conflict. The project, which is associated with the Centre for International Studies at the University of Oxford, will develop and test the proposition that the effectiveness of multilateral institutions in addressing security threats and challenges can be enhanced by informal groupings.

In 2007, Jochen was awarded the Zvi Meitar/Vice-Chancellor Oxford University Research Prize in the Social Sciences. The Prize will facilitate the establishment of an international research team that examines the broader problems related to effective multilateralism and the design of international institutions. In Phase 1, the team will concentrate on East Asia as a test case. With the problem-solving capacities of East Asian regional forastill underdeveloped, the need to engage in a major discourse on how to enhance collective action is particularly strong in this part of the world. Especially China and Japan require special scholarly attention because both countries have key roles to play in providing regional stability. In this context, the impact of U.S. hegemony on East Asian regional dynamics has to come under scrutiny.

Jochen is co-editing (with Dr Amrita Narlikar, University of Cambridge) a recently launched book series with Martinus Nijhoff Publishers on Studies in International Institutional Dynamics.

Prior to his academic career, Jochen worked in financial services with Allianz SE.

India is a long-standing country of interest for Erin. Her MPhil examined state-big business relations in India after economic liberalisation, and Erin has worked for Microsoft India on community engagement, including a pilot project to develop mobile phone technology to deliver maternal health information in local dialects to pregnant women in rural India. Erin worked as a research assistant for several years at the Canadian Program on Genomics and Global Health, a think-tank which aims to harness the advances of innovative technologies for global health. Erin was a member on the Genomics and Nanotechnology Working Group for the United Nations Millennium Project Task Force on Science, Technology and Innovation in 2005. She holds a BA in Philosophy and Bioethics from the University of Toronto.

Kevin is a board member of the Center for Global Development, UNICEF’s Innocenti Center and the Journal of International Development. He holds a PhD from the University of Oxford, with a concentration in modern Indian history and economics.

Pooja Sharma was previously a Fellow at the Research and Information System for Developing Countries (RIS), New Delhi, Visiting Research Fellow, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), New Delhi and Senior Consultant, National Council of Applied Economic Research (NCAER), New Delhi. She has also been a consultant for the Water and Sanitation Program (WSP) of the World Bank in South Asia. She is a member of the Global Trade Analysis Project (GTAP), Purdue University.

Selected publications:

Political economy of conditional aid in a federal economy, Review of Development Economics, 12 (2), 327-338, 2008.

Agriculture in The World Trade and Development Report, Oxford University Press: New Delhi, 2007.

Dima was educated in Ethiopia, Senegal and the United States. He obtained a PhD in Sociology with a major concentration in political economy and a minor in environment from the University of Tennessee. His dissertation research focused on the structure of power and strategy of survival in states with contested legitimacy. In particular, it highlights the dual structure of power, the use of excessive violence, and external patronage. Dima has a B.A. in Political Science and Government from Addis Ababa University, and a Post-Graduate Diploma from the United Nations Institute for Economic Development and Planning (IDEP).

Dima has worked as a consultant on Development, peace and conflict issues for several international non-governmental organizations. He was also involved in struggles for social justice, in diplomacy, negotiations and mediation. In addition, he has worked in education, relief and rehabilitation among refugees, IDPs, and victims of state repression and civil wars in Ethiopia, Sudan, Somalia, and Kenya. Furthermore, he has served as a cabinet minister in the Government of Ethiopia.

Dima has lived in many countries in Africa and Europe and has travelled widely in Africa, Europe, Asia, the Pacific, and the Americas. He speaks and understands several languages, among them, English, Oromo, Amharic, German, French, and Arabic.

His research interests include international monetary and financial cooperation, the relationship between China and the IMF and the political economy of international financial regulation.  Currently he is working on imbalances between China and the US as well as on the political economy of  China’s foreign exchange rate.