VoxDev

VoxDev is the home of development economics

Across our articles, podcasts, videos, VoxDevLits, and blogs, experts outline the key takeaways for policy from cutting-edge research that has been reviewed by our Editorial Board.

New VoxDevLit

Air Pollution

Teevrat Garg and Anant Sudarshan summarise economic research on air pollution.

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Check out our new podcast: Ideas in Development

Ethiopia’s economy: Mamo Mihretu on economic reform and the macroeconomic foundations of growth

Mamo Mihretu on export-led manufacturing, economic reform and the macroeconomic foundations of a growing economy.

Macroeconomics & Growth

Mamo Mihretu Kartik Akileswaran Oliver Hanney

Published 09.06.26
Vietnam’s economy: The remarkable story of the last 50 years

Vietnam’s economic transformation is one of the most dramatic in recent history. Economist and Advisor Pham Chi Lan saw it all and tells us how it happened.

Macroeconomics & Growth

Phạm Chi Lan Kartik Akileswaran Oliver Hanney

Published 27.01.26
How Costa Rica became an FDI powerhouse

Costa Rica has become a world leader in attracting FDI. We talked with the former Minister of Foreign Trade to find out how.

Trade

Andrés Valenciano Yamuni Kartik Akileswaran Oliver Hanney

Published 13.01.26

Latest

Why are so many women in Africa converting to Christianity?

The persistence of patriarchal clan-based orders around the world is a serious hindrance to development not least because they constrain women’s emancipation. Drawing on varied empirical evidence from sub-Saharan Africa, we argue that women’s convers...

Institutions & Political Economy

Pablo Álvarez-Aragón Catherine Guirkinger Jean-Philippe Platteau

Published

12.06.26

How targeting cash transfers at women strengthens bargaining power within the household

In Mexico, income transfers targeted at women are effective at improving their decision-making position within the household, translating into significant changes in household consumption and time allocation patterns.

Social Protection

Andrea María Flores

Published

11.06.26

When microfinance credit contracted in India, children’s education suffered

In Andhra Pradesh, credit contraction in the rural economy, triggered by microfinance regulation, lowered educational investments and caused lasting learning losses, with larger effects for girls and younger children.

Education

Muneer Kalliyil Soham Sahoo

Published

11.06.26

The end of aid dependency

With international aid in structural decline, W. Gyude Moore argues that developing countries must recentre their strategies around growth diagnostics, tradable-sector expansion, and legally mandated development plans – using remaining aid flows stra...

Institutions & Political Economy

W. Gyude Moore

Published

10.06.26