Kanchana N Ruwanpura awarded the Clarence E. Ayres Scholar

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Political economy of development conceptualisations shapes Kanchana N Ruwanpura’s research, where she has engaged with institutional economics, human geography, social anthropology, and feminist scholarship, from feminist economics to feminist geography.  Her work in the past has been recognised with the Rhonda Williams Prize (2005) from IAFFE (International Association for Feminist Economics) and more recently a best paper prize (2018) from Progress in Development Studies.  The Clarence E. Ayres Scholar for institutional thought is a welcome recognition from her initial disciplinary training in heterodox economics.

“It was an unexpected and pleasant surprise to win this award – and a rewarding experience too. Although I was initially trained in (heterodox) economics and came across fantastic mentors and leadings lights in the field (Jane Humphries, Tony Lawson, David Ruccio, William Waller, Anu Seth, Chris Gunn, Ha-Joon Chang), I have since then moved onto the discipline of human geography and development studies in terms of career and work.  However, I have continued my intellectual conversations and engagement with feminist economics and institutionalist thought, even as I also speak across disciplines to human geography, development studies, anthropology, and South Asian studies. 

So, it is so thrilling when my academic peers from my initial discipline of training still find value in my scholarship (follow the steps of Yanis Varoufakis a decade later: wow!), – and thought me worthy of the Clarence Ayres award for institutionalist thought.  I am thrilled.”   

Academic career

Ruwanpura is Professor in Human Geography at the University of Gothenburg. She also holds an Honorary Fellow position at the Centre for South Asian Studies, University of Edinburgh, Scotland, where she was a Reader until 2020.  She has held full-time positions in academia at the University of Edinburgh and University of Southampton in the U.K. and prior to that Hobart and William Smith Colleges, USA. At different stages of her academic career, she held fellowship positions at the National University of Singapore, Singapore, Humboldt Fellow at the Ludwig Maximilian’s University-Munich, Germany, Göttingen University, Germany, France-ILO Chair Fellow at the Institute of Advanced Studies-Nantes, France.  Her PhD is from Newnham College, University of Cambridge, England.

Research focus and funding

The research she has done has focused on issues around gender, conflict, post-disaster and post-war infrastructural politics and labour governance. More on Kanchana’s research can be found here: https://www.gu.se/en/news/new-professor-in-human-geography-with-focus-on-uneven-development-research-ethics-and-feminist-politics. Her research has been funded by the ESRC, ERC, British Academy, BA-GCRF, GCRF-NERC-AHRC, Adlerbertska Foundation and Jubileumsfonden.

Publications

Ruwanpura has written for popular science and open-editorials outlets to journal articles, edited volumes & books, and research monographs. Garments without Guilt? Global Labour Justice and Ethical Codes in Sri Lankan Apparels with Cambridge University Press (2021) is her most recent book. It takes a feminist and labour perspective to unpack historical and institutional conditions that have facilitated Sri Lankan apparels transition to be on the vanguard of ethical production – and record the centrality of labour agency (collective and individual) in the success of the country’s apparel industry.

- I draw on labour geography, feminist economics, and institutionalist thought to inform my theoretical and conceptual framings around political economy of development and draw on anthropological methods around ethnography to conduct my research, says Kanchana N Ruwanpura.

More details on her book can be found here: https://www.gu.se/en/news/garments-without-guilt-new-book-on-global-labour-justice-and-ethical-codes-in-sri-lankan-apparels With open access reviews on the book can be found here: https://antipodeonline.org/2023/02/16/garments-without-guilt/