MA (Environment, Society and Development)

The MA in Environment, Society and Development is designed
to empower students to become critically informed by, and
ethically engaged with, the various geopolitical, economic and
environmental processes that shape the world in which we live.
The programme involves engagement with a number of core
areas in critical human geography, including issues of geopolitics,
development, governance and political ecology, and exposes
students to vital global challenges that encompass a complex and
dynamic mesh of environmental, social and economic processes.

Running through the MA is an overarching aim to impart understanding of how different philosophical and ideological approaches to environment-society relations influence policy formulation and implementation. In this context, our hope is to empower students to become critically informed by, and ethically engaged with, the various (geo)political, social, economic and environmental processes that shape the world in which we live. The practical emphasis of the MA is reflected in a field-based learning module in Bosnia and Herzegovina, where students will intersect with the development work of the European Commission, UN agencies and various NGOs. In connecting with the work of UN agencies like the United Nations Development Programme, a key challenge for students will involve thinking through the scalar nature of all forms of development, in which initiatives on the ground are framed by broader geopolitical, economic and institutional structures that both enable and hinder development in complex ways.