Report by Zack Zimbalist

Thanks to the generous financial support of the WU International Research Fellow grant, this summer I completed a one-month research stay at the Southern Centre for Inequality Studies (SCIS) at Wits University in Johannesburg, South Africa.

During my time at SCIS, I made progress on several research papers on South Africa while building valuable connections with professors and researchers. I was fortunate to interact with and exchange feedback with SCIS’s interdisciplinary group of scholars from South Africa, Mozambique, Uganda, and India, who work on development topics closely connected to my research interests. Additionally, participating in weekly seminars and workshops deepened my understanding of ongoing research in South Africa.

While in Johannesburg, I also conducted interviews and meetings with independent consultants and civil society members, which enhanced my research projects on local governance and public service delivery, attitudes toward immigration policy, and epistemology in African politics. These meetings and conversations also led to further contacts, data, and literature that will be useful to advancing my research.

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