Professor Patricia Justino is a development economist who works at the interface between Development Economics and Political Science. She is a leading expert on political violence and development, and the co-founder and co-director of the Households in Conflict Network. She is currently Deputy Director at UNU-WIDER and Professorial Fellow at the Institute of Development Studies (IDS) in Brighton, UK (on leave).
Professor Justino’s research focuses on the relationship between political violence, institutional transformation, governance and development outcomes. She has led major research programmes funded by the European Commission, the UK Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) and the UK Department for International Development (DFID). She is currently the director of a ESRC large grant project on the relationship between inequality, social trust and governance outcomes.
Professor Justino’s research has been published in leading international journals such as the Journal of Development Economics, Journal of Conflict Resolution, the Journal of Peace Research, and the World Bank Economic Review, and is the lead author of A Micro-Level Perspective on the Dynamics of Conflict, Violence and Development (Oxford University Press). She has held several advisory positions in major international organizations, including Action Aid, DFID, FAO, UNDP, UNESCO, UNICEF, UN Women, USAID, and the World Bank. She was the director of the MICROCON research programme and deputy director of the TAMNEAC Initial Training Network.
Professor Justino holds a MPhil in Economics from the University of Cambridge and a PhD in Economics from the University of London. She has held visiting positions at Harvard University (2007-09) and the European University Institute (2017), among others.
This systematic review examines the effectiveness of social assistance programmes in protecting households in Africa—a region highly vulnerable to climate change, conflict, and other shocks—during periods of crisis. Despite the significant increase...
The years since 2020 have been one of the most violent periods since the end of the second world war. The war in Ukraine and the escalating violence...
This paper analyses the impact of armed groups and their taxation practices on the municipal fishing sector of the Zamboanga Peninsula in Mindanao, Philippines. Leveraging novel qualitative and quantitative data, we find clear evidence of armed group...
Tax revenues are fundamental to state-building and development, particularly in the aftermath of conflict. Through the lens of the recent post-conflict experience of Colombia, this paper explores the challenges of increasing tax revenues amid...
Critically examining the Global South’s proposals for international financial architecture reformsThis report offers a critical examination of the...
Many European countries introduced austerity policies to control rising debt in the wake of the Great Recession of the late 2000s. Recent research suggests that austerity fuelled political polarization, instability, and populism in Europe. However...
We show that the Russia–Ukraine-war-induced changes in the international price of wheat affected political violence in Asia. Using data from 13 countries and more than four million cell-level observations, we show that a higher wheat price increases...
We study how the stringency of policy measures to counter the COVID-19 pandemic affects individuals’ trust in formal institutions. Drawing on micro-level panel data from Germany spanning an 18-month period from the onset of the pandemic, we show that...
We examine the long-term impact of forced labour on individual risk behaviour and economic decisions. For that, we focus on a policy of coercive cotton cultivation enforced in colonial Mozambique between 1926 and 1961. We combine archival sources...
The political consequences of economic inequality have been debated in academic and policy circles for centuries. The nature of this relationship seems highly dependent on specific contexts, with empirical studies showing mixed evidence on how...
Following the abolition of slavery, various forms of compulsory labour were adopted by colonial powers to develop their economies. This paper analyses the contemporary consequences of compulsory cotton production—a forced labour system that operated...
Improving early child development outcomes in low-income settings requires affordable, sustainable, and easily scalable solutions. The “First Steps”...
Elaborated in their current form in Busan in 2011, and reiterated in Geneva in 2022, the four Principles of Effective Development Co-operation comprise country ownership, focus on results, inclusive partnerships, and transparency and mutual...
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