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HEDoctoral network2023–2027

PRESILIENT · Post-pandemic resilient communities: is the informal economy a reservoir for the next generation of digitalized and green businesses in the Global South?

Horizon Europe — Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions

Duration
2023-03-01 → 2027-11-30
EU contribution
€3,823,510
Participants
29
Scheme
HORIZON-TMA-MSCA-DN-ID

Lines connect the coordinator with its partners.

Results in brief

Post-pandemic resilient communities: is the informal economy a reservoir for the next generation of digitalized and green businesses in the Global South?

Around two billion people worldwide―more than sixty percent of the global workforce―earn their living in informal jobs. These workers face high vulnerability and lack basic protections, while governments lose crucial tax revenues and struggle to plan beyond urgent crises. The COVID-19 pandemic has only deepened these challenges. Without long-term planning and fiscal space, many countries have been forced into a cycle of short-term responses that fail to build resilient economies, robust welfare systems or sustainable infrastructure. Informal employment affects all regions, but its scale and consequences are mostly felt in Africa, Asia and Latin America. Climate change and other global shocks threaten to push more people into informality, compounding social and environmental pressures. PRESILIENT brings together fourteen core institutions (seven academic, seven non-academic) and fifteen regional partners across Africa, Asia-Pacific and Latin America. It will train fifteen doctoral candidates in cutting-edge methods to measure informality, map its drivers and design sustainable alternatives. Social sciences experts will work alongside economists, statisticians and policymakers to ensure that cultural, institutional and gender dimensions are fully integrated. The project pursues four main objectives: Training: Deliver a PhD-level, interdisciplinary curriculum combining coursework, fieldwork, and hands-on policy engagement to equip ESRs with analytical and transferable skills. Data and Theory: Generate novel, cross-regional data through mixed qualitative and quantitative methods; develop a sectoral taxonomy and advance theoretical understanding of informality’s social, economic and governance facets. Policy Impact: Co-create evidence-based recommendations with UN agencies, development banks, business forums and EU bodies to support humane, gender-sensitive and green recovery strategies. Knowledge Exchange: Foster multi-directional learning through secondments, joint supervision by academic/non-academic partners, and network events, ensuring continuous improvement and readiness for medium‐ and long-term planning. By combining rigorous social science inquiry with practical policy engagement, PRESILIENT will help governments, businesses and communities transform informal work from a systemic weakness into a source of inclusive, resilient development.

Data: CORDIS, © European Union

Project objective

In addition to the almost 2bln workers already active in the informal sector, World Bank and ILO estimate that the pandemic might have put at risk of precarious employment 500mln-1.5bln more. These losses, and related consequences, are not evenly distributed given that Africa, Asia and Latin America is where 93% of the world’s informal employment is located and where post-pandemic crisis is likely to hit harder (especially women, migrants and young people). Yet, the concern is global. Indeed, besides vulnerability and precariousness at individual and community levels, informality also eventually reduces state capacity and the ability of institutions to design and implement policies that properly address social, economic and environmental issues (i.e. SDGs) in a long term perspective. Accordingly, informality-related challenges have been devoted a great deal of attention and political statements. But seldom have these statements been followed by concrete instructions, guidelines or evidence-based policies to tackle informality across the world. Starting from this gap, PRESILIENT is a large network comprising 14 partners (of which 7 non-academic) and 15 associated partners located in Africa, Asia-Pacific and Latin America committed to delivering the a world class cross-regional training on informality in the Global South to: measure it, address it, find viable and sustainable alternatives. By doing this, we have committed to four main objectives: O.1 train the next generation of experts on informality in the global south. O.2 carry out a research spanning 15 different countries and to produce novel data and significant theoretical advancements in the field.O.3 produce strategic intelligence that can be used to provide practical policy recommendationsO.4 enable multi-directional knowledge transfer through network events, pairing of academic and non-academic partners (who will jointly supervise each fellow), secondment and task-based teamwork.

Original text from CORDIS.

Participants

  • DUBLIN CITY UNIVERSITY · DublinCoordinatorIreland
  • BRATISLAVSKY INSTITUT PRE POLITICKU ANALYZU · BRATISLAVASlovakia
  • Barnabas Research and Training Institute · LusakaZambia
  • CENTER FOR SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT STUDIES · HANOIVietnam
  • CENTRO PER LA COOPERAZIONE INTERNAZIONALE · TRENTOItaly
  • CHULALONGKORN UNIVERSITY · BangkokThailand
  • DEVELOPMENT PERSPECTIVES · DROGHEDA LOUTHIreland
  • DIPLOMACY SCHOLARS ASSOCIATION OF KENYA · NairobiKenya
  • Economic Policy and Research Center · TbilisiGeorgia
  • Facultad Latinoamericana de Ciencias Sociales · QuitoEcuador
  • INSTITUT DE RECHERCHE POUR LE DEVELOPPEMENT · MarseilleFrance
  • INSTITUT ZA JAVNE FINANCIJE · ZagrebCroatia
  • LATVIJAS UNIVERSITATE · RIGALatvia
  • Laboratoire d'Analyse des Politiques de Developpement of Cheikh Anta Diop University · DakarSenegal
  • PARTNERE NE ZGJIDHJE DHE ZHVILLIM · TiranaAlbania
  • Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaiso · ValparaisoChile
  • RIJKSUNIVERSITEIT GRONINGEN · GroningenNetherlands
  • SIAR RESEARCH AND CONSULTING LLC · BishkekKyrgyzstan
  • SVEUCILISTE U SPLITU EKONOMSKI FAKULTET · SplitCroatia
  • TRANSITIONS SDRUZENI · PRAHACzechia
  • UN Women Papua New Guinea Country Office · Port MoresbyPapua New Guinea
  • UNIVERSIDAD DE ANTIOQUIA · MEDELLINColombia
  • UNIVERSIDAD NACIONAL AUTONOMA DE MEXICO (UNAM) · CIUDAD DE MEXICOMexico
  • UNIVERSIDAD PRIVADA BOLIVIANA · ColcapirhuaBolivia
  • UNIVERSIDADE FEDERAL DO RIO DE JANEIRO · RIO DE JANEIROBrazil
  • UNIVERSITAS BRAWIJAYA · MalangIndonesia
  • UNIVERSITAT AUTONOMA DE BARCELONA · Cerdanyola Del VallesSpain
  • UNIVERSITATEA DIN BUCURESTI · BucurestiRomania
  • UNIVERSITE CHOUAIB DOUKKALI · EL JADIDAMorocco

Links

Data: CORDIS, © European Union