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Tax expenditures country report: Zambia

Mwale, Evaristo (2025)
Books

How to deprioritise? Selecting themes, countries and instruments for German development policy

Hughes, Sam / Heiner Janus / Ian Mitchell / Tim Röthel (2025)
External Publications

Germany is making steep reductions to its aid budget. Historically, it has struggled to deprioritise, with cuts spread evenly across programmes and countries. In this paper, we show how BMZ can deprioritise across the themes, partner countries and instruments. We find there is substantial room for improvement, leading to greater impact.

E-government tools, authoritarian propaganda, and regime support: experimental evidence from Turkey

Sinanoglu, Semuhi / Armin von Schiller (2025)
Discussion Paper 35/2025

E-government tools promise citizen empowerment but may serve autocratic agendas. Our experimental evidence from Turkey shows regime propaganda through e-government platforms increases institutional support, even among regime opponents. A warning against naive digitalisation optimism.

Offsetting Justice?

Bonn, 03. December 2025

Despite mounting evidence of their limited effectiveness in reducing emissions or halting biodiversity decline, techno-managerial and market-based approaches—such as carbon markets, biodiversity offsets, green bonds and protected areas—remain widely used. These approaches continue to dominate responses to environmental crises. The global…

IDOS at World Water Congress

Marrakech, Morocco, 01. December 2025

Event 1: Panel discussion, 1 December, 2:30-4:00pm Morocco at a critical juncture: expert debate on opportunities for improved water governance. Part 1: Gender mainstreaming in the water sector, part 2: Legal and institutional frameworks including for megaprojects Morocco faces a severe water crisis that affects different sectors,…

The EU digital strategy between sovereignty and green transformation: political milestones, policy fields and strategic narratives

Reiners, Wulf / Matthias Kachelmann (2025)
Discussion Paper 33/2025

Since 2015, the EU has focused on the challenges and opportunities of the digital transformation. This paper examines EU policies and strategies shaped by four key narratives: digital sovereignty, twin transitions, fundamental rights, and competitiveness.

Critical minerals in EU trade discourse: navigating a trilemma in times of geopolitical competition

Laurens, Noémie (2025)
Policy Brief 32/2025

Amid rising geopolitical tensions and the green transition, the EU increasingly portrays critical minerals (CMs) in its trade discourse through intertwined economic, environmental, and security frames. This policy brief traces this hybridisation and its implications for CM policy design.

Making Aid Work

Online, 20. November 2025

Development aid is increasingly under criticism for failing to achieve its objectives. The question, however, is how its effectiveness is measured. In many parts of the world, development aid pursues a whole range of goals that are incompatible with one another. This is particularly true in the Middle East and North Africa, where the…

COP30: The moment to make Just Transition work

Faus Onbargi, Alexia / Daniele Malerba (2025)
The Current Column, 10. November 2025

A genuine Just Transition cannot be confined to energy-sector decarbonisation or emissions cuts alone.

Vers un partenariat stratégique : le potentiel de la coopération germano-marocaine

Houdret, Annabelle / Mark Furness (2025)
Policy Brief 24/2025

Le partenariat entre l'Allemagne et le Maroc offre un potentiel de coopération stratégique. Quatre domaines façonnent l'avenir : intérêts géostratégiques ; infrastructures et investissements ; emploi, formations et migration ; et gouvernance pour le bien commun.

Industrial decarbonization and hydrogen

Potsdam, 28. October 2025

The industrial sector accounts for a quarter of global direct CO 2 emissions. Hard-to-abate heavy industries, such as steel, chemical, cement and aluminium, account for the bulk of these emissions. Decarbonizing them is essential to cope with global warming, but also challenging due to the need to coordinate upstream and downstream…

Aid cuts and the diaspora: strengthening partnerships to bridge the gap

Muhumad, Abdirahman A. (2025)
Policy Brief 23/2025

Aid cuts threaten vulnerable communities in Ethiopia’s Somali Region. The diaspora plays a crucial role in filling gaps through emergency relief and dev't support. This PB explores how understanding diaspora networks,strengthening collaborations and creating supportive frameworks can bridge the gap.

The impact of global governance networks on social innovation for sustainable development: linking setup, enablers and cooperation results of the Managing Global Governance (MGG) Network

Vogel, Johanna / Wulf Reiners (2025)
Discussion Paper 31/2025

How can networks translate collaboration into systemic change for sustainable development? This discussion paper shows that global governance networks can drive social innovation when we invest in the composition of members, cooperation infrastructure and culture.

Sino-Pakistan partnership under the China-Pakistan economic corridor and the burden of expectations

Ali, Murad (2025)
Books

This book has come up with the most up-to-date, comprehensive and objective analysis of China’s investments in Pakistan under the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, a flagship project of the Belt and Road Initiative. It covers the broad range of Sino-Pakistan relations in the backdrop of Pakistan’s complex political, governance, security, socio-environmental and technological challenges that hinder implementation of CPEC projects.

Promoting female employment in partner countries: priorities for development cooperation

Stöcker, Alexander / Tina Zintl (2025)
Policy Brief 18/2025

Boosting women’s employment in low- & middle-income countries takes more than just labour market policies. Our new policy brief highlights the role of social norms, gender-sensitive job creation in emerging sectors, and an enabling policy mix in the Middle East & Sub-Sahara Africa.

Climate mainstreaming in environmental treaties

Olivier, Annabelle / Jean-Frédéric Morin (2025)
Policy Brief 17/2025

Job Announcement: Research Assistant (f/m/diverse), Department “Transformation of Economic and Social Systems”

To support research staff with different tasks, the Department “Transformation of Economic and Social Systems” at IDOS is looking for a research assistant.

Beyond nature-based solutions: the case for integrated nature-climate action

Folkard-Tapp, Hollie / Idil Boran / Sander Chan / Ines Dombrowsky / Tarra L. Penney / Dawn Bazely / Fidele Ruzigandekwe / Angele Alook / Nathalie Pettorelli (2025)
External Publications

Internships

Internships Jump to: Current Advertisments Internships in the Research programmes Internships in Training Internships in the Communications Team Application Procedure Conditions The German Institute of Development and Sustainability (IDOS) has about 200 employees in Research, Policy Advice, Training and Service Facilities. Two-thirds of them work as researchers. IDOS pursues an interdisciplinary approach. On a regular basis, IDOS offers job positions within its…

Job Advertisement: Student / Research Assistant (f/m/diverse) ClimEQ

The German Institute of Development and Sustainability (IDOS) is now looking for a Student / Research Assistant (f/m/diverse) for the project “”Implementing Sustainable Development Goals in an incoherent world: Aligning climate action and reduced inequalities” (ClimEQ).