The submission standard for this year’s wide and fascinating range of entries was very high – well done to all entrants for their work.
Winner: Maryam Jimale, London School of Economics.
Dissertation title: “Somali Pastoralists, NGOs and the Politics of Ecological Authority”.‘
‘Somali Pastoralists, NGOs and the Politics of Ecological Authority’ is an impressive and compelling dissertation that investigates how Somali pastoralists’ traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) is absorbed, reflected and represented by NGOs working in community-based adaptation programmes, and at the international level (COP29). The student generated methodologically rigorous and innovative data by engaging directly with TEK holders, as well as NGO practitioners in United Nations spaces and online. The dissertation develops a highly astute analysis that links findings to existing scholarship on TEK, development politics, feminism, and science and technology studies. It contains a particularly good discussion of epistemic resistance. Overall, this is a highly original dissertation in an under-researched area.